RITUALISTIC SECRETS OF SORCERY, SHAMANISM, WITCHCRAFT,
MAGIC AND FORTUNE-TELLING.

Tim Swartz on Badlands Radio and UFONAUT Radio

http://www.thebadlandsradio.com/

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/ufonaut

- THIS JUST IN DEPARTMENT -

Mac Tonnies Passes Away

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- THE SILENCERS DEPARTMENT -

Timothy Beckley Goes On The Trail Of The Dreaded
Men-In-Black With The UFO Hunters

Researchers theorized how to design a table-top black hole earlier this year. Now two ambitious Chinese scientists have actually built one—using the same materials that made invisibility cloaks possible.

A theoretical design for a table-top black hole to trap light was proposed in a paper published earlier this year by Evgenii Narimanov and Alexander Kildishev of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Their idea was to mimic the properties of a cosmological black hole, whose intense gravity bends the surrounding space-time, causing any nearby matter or radiation to follow the warped space-time and spiral inwards.

Narimanov and Kildishev reasoned that it should be possible to build a device that makes light curve inwards towards its centre in a similar way. They calculated that this could be done by a cylindrical structure consisting of a central core surrounded by a shell of concentric rings.

The key to making light curve inwards is to make the shell's permittivity – which affects the electric component of an electromagnetic wave – increase smoothly from the outer to the inner surface. This is analogous to the curvature of space-time near a black hole. At the point where the shell meets the core, the permittivity of the ring must match that of the core, so that light is absorbed rather than reflected.

Now Tie Jun Cui and Qiang Cheng at the Southeast University in Nanjing, China, have turned Narimanov and Kildishev's theory into practice, and built a "black hole" for microwave frequencies. It is made of 60 annular strips of so-called "meta-materials", which have previously been used to make invisibility cloaks.

The working Chinese model consists of a cylinder, made up of strips of a special material that increasingly affects electric fields. As rays of light approach the device, they curve inward towards its center, where the permittivity (a characteristic that describes how the material affects an electric field) is such that the light cannot escape. The device then converts the light into heat energy.

Each strip takes the form of a circuit board etched with intricate structures whose characteristics change progressively from one strip to the next, so that the permittivity varies smoothly. The outer 40 strips make up the shell and the inner 20 strips make up the absorber.

"When the incident electromagnetic wave hits the device, the wave will be trapped and guided in the shell region towards the core of the black hole, and will then be absorbed by the core," says Cui. "The wave will not come out from the black hole." In their device, the core converts the absorbed light into heat.

Narimanov is impressed by Cui and Cheng's implementation of his design. "I am surprised that they have done it so quickly," he says.

Fabricating a device that captures optical wavelengths in the same way will not be easy, as visible light has a wavelength orders of magnitude smaller than that of microwave radiation. This will require the etched structures to be correspondingly smaller.

Cui is confident that they can do it. "I expect that our demonstration of the optical black hole will be available by the end of 2009," he says.

Such a device could be used to harvest solar energy in places where the light is too diffuse for mirrors to concentrate it onto a solar cell. An optical black hole would suck it all in and direct it at a solar cell sitting at the core. "If that works, you will no longer require these huge parabolic mirrors to collect light," says Narimanov.

Source: New Scientist
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17980-first-black-hole-for-light-created-on-earth.html

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Do “flying snakes” exist? Roy Mackal and other cryptozoologists have investigated flying snake reports in Africa. Did you know there are files on airborne serpentine reptiles in North America? Here are some reports for your consideration. You will rapidly discover that there are varying levels of credibility in these articles. ~ Loren Coleman

The earliest known recorded sighting can be found in the journal writings of Hieronymus Benzo, an Italian naturalist who traversed the New World from 1541 to 1556. In his text Istoria de Mondo Nuovo Libr. III, Benzo included the following entry on an expedition into what is now Florida:

"I saw a certain kind of Serpent which was furnished with wings, and which was killed near a wood by some of our men. Its wings were so shaped that by moving them it could raise itself from the ground and fly along, but only at a very short distance from the earth."
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Athens Messenger, Athens, Ohio, 9/16/1875
Leavenworth, Texas

In August of 1875, an unnamed woman dwelling in the southern side of Leavenworth, Texas made local headlines with her insistence that a smallish winged snake was undertaking excursions over her neighborhood. So astonishing was her testimony that a local, aged psychic was stirred to boldly foretell (to the local newspaper) “in a short time the air would be full of flying serpents”. Perhaps, if the next 35 years might be interpreted as “a short time”, she was partially right.

In September of that same year, two young men surnamed Remington and Jenkins, while hunting in the woods near Leavenworth, were astonished to see this oft-gossiped about creature soaring straight toward them at an altitude of about four feet. Jenkins quickly removed his cap and, with an accurate sweep, netted the little beastie. It turned out to be quite harmless; it was approximately one foot in length, spotted and bore wings approximately the size of their hands. After dispensing of it, the two intelligent lads brought the now lifeless body home and preserved it in a jar of alcohol. Tragically, this essential physical specimen appears to have been lost to time, most likely in much the same manner as myriads of copies of Action Comics #1 have been innocently tossed by mothers with other attic junk, without realization of what they possessed.
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Galveston Daily News
Galveston, Texas.

May 23, 1899

FLYING SNAKE.

Has a Skull Like an Adder and a Bat-Like Expression.

New York Journal.

A flying snake five feet long has built its nest in one of the tall trees at Waterford, N.J., and when it is not setting on its eggs to hatch out a lot more flying snakes it is roving about intimidating the natives.

No amount of hunting in mere natural history books will reward the searcher with a glimpse of a picture of a flying snake or any information about one. The creature does not exist in any scientific work. It is found only in Waterford, where a party of indignant citizens are making a desperate effort to locate it before it eats some of the farmers.

Robert McDougall, who saw the flying snake, is perhaps the most prominent citizen of Waterford - a fact that the intelligent reader has already guessed, for persons who see sea serpents, flying snakes, wild men, or horned gazoozas are invariably described by their neighbors as prominent in order that the story may not be doubted and the town thereby indirectly reflected upon.

This gentleman was taking a short trip through the woods, cogitating as he walked as to the turnip crop, when suddenly the flying snake darted from the low branch of a [illegible] pine tree and flapped its wings with hoarse cries until it vanished from view. Its bearing was plainly vindictive.

“It had the look of a bat in its face,” says McDougall, “but it was a flying snake sure enough; one of the venomous kind, I should say. Its skull resembled that of a puff adder, but it had no hair, and it had a tapering tail and eyes that flashed fire, but never before did I see eyes on a monster like that,” and Mr. McDougall shuddered at his narrow escape.

On the following morning the Waterford vigilantes armed themselves and repaired to the lair of the flying snake. They found its footprints, not in the air, where it might be expected that a snake on the fly would leave them, but on the ground. They were web-like prints, something like those of a swan. The local indignation increased when it was thereby proved that the monster is amphibian.

Hiram Beechwood, who lives at a place called Elm, says he saw the flying snake at daybreak crossing a road near a swamp. As soon as it noticed it was observed[,] it exchanged looks of deadly hate with him and then, uttering an angry bleat like an exasperated sheep, unwound a pair of bat-like wings and slowly flew into the swamp, where it is feared it has a nestful of eggs.

According to the ornithologists of the place, flying snakes are an established fact. They stick pretty closely to the thick undergrowth unless driven out by forest fires or lack of food. They build in tall trees, Mr. McDougall says, and when in a good temper utter a note something like that of a robin who has just found a worm. When annoyed or frightened, however, they emit an angry scream that is very terrifying.

Some of the residents hold that the snake is a vegetarian and won’t eat Jerseymen. Others wisely say that this may be so, but still it might bite them, and they are going after it to put it out of its misery.

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Logansport Pharos
Logansport, Indiana
March 25, 1885

A flying snake is on exhibition at Virginia City, Nevada. The reptile is four feet long and has two wings attached to its body, about four inches back of the head.

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Greenville Evening Record
Greenville, Pennsylvania.
June 16, 1900

Venango county papers note the appearance of a flying snake and also a leathered snake. The latter was captured by Arthur Savage, of Canal township, and is said to have a fine coat of feathers and a head like a chicken. It is about three feet in length. It eats nothing but grain and drinks an abundance of water. Mr. Savage intends to take it to some zoological garden.
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Alton Evening Telegraph
Alton, Illinois.
August 9, 1905

The moonshine whiskey business appears to be flourishing in Missouri. At least flying snakes are reported in several places in the Ozark Mountains region.
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Washington Post; Washington DC, 10/29/1911
St. Charles, Missouri

Another specimen was observed over St. Charles, Missouri, not far from the Mississippi River in 1911. Mrs. John Bishop and her children were startled from their work and play by an odd sound evocative of a monoplane. This buzzing though was not from an engine, but rather from the highly rapid fluttering of a sizeable pair of wings attached to a three-foot-long spotted snake passing over their residence. The awe that overtook the unsuspecting family quickly transformed into terror however, as the airborne snake turned and approached the terrified group of witnesses. The mother hastily herded the children into the home where they watched in safety as the creature performed various aeronautic feats for almost twenty minutes before it disappeared over the horizon in the direction of Alton, Illinois.

The Washington Post also noted on June 5, 1911 that the “passengers and crew of the White Star liner Celtic brought with them to New York today a revival of the sea serpent tales of other years. They reported having passed early yesterday morning a formidable looking creature that was going at a high speed in pursuit of a school of young whales. The monster, they say, had wings, and rose frequently 10 feet or more from the water. Whales and pursuer faded from sight within a few minutes.”

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Bonham, Texas, June, 1873

In June of 1873, a farmer in Bonham, Texas, looked up from his work and was astonished at what he saw. There appeared to be an enormous flying snake, banded with brilliant yellow stripes, writhing and twisting in the sky above him. Other people in the Bonham vicinity also witnessed this strange apparition, which was said to be at least as long as a telegraph pole. According to a report in the local newspaper, Enterprise, the bewildered eyewitnesses watched the creature coil itself up, and thrust forward its enormous head as if striking at something.
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Sky Dragons - Amphipteres

These winged serpents were spotted in the skies of Great Britain until the mid 1600s. Described most commonly as a large snake with small wings behind the head, they could grow to lengths around nine to ten feet. Their heads were dragon-like, with multiple tongues and sharp fangs. Villagers reported having been able to scare them away by throwing rocks.

Similar creatures were reported in India. These sky dragons, or winged serpents, were nocturnal, and equipped with a singular form of defense. Their urine was like acid, and could melt the skin of anyone walking below.

Winged serpents also plagued the ancient Middle East. Arabia and Egypt were overrun with these snakes, reportedly small in size yet devestating to crops and livestock. Luckily, ibises ate these sky snakes. Even Moses was reported to use ibis birds to help his attack on Ethiopia who had invaded Egypt.

An intriguing variation on the mythology and anecdotal history of North American winged snakes is the contemporary investigation of Northern Arizona University anthropology student Nick Sucik into Navajo and Hopi legends that tell of snakes that can take brief flight through convoluted spiral contortions and lunges. He published a well-researched paper in 2004 on these mystery animals that nicely bridged the fields of theoretical herpetological physiology and cryptic anthropological folklore.

Sucik’s flying snakes of Arizona were hypothesized to be wingless—by definition of bat or bird—but capable of limited aeronautics through extended flaps that stretched over a significant portion of their bodies. He discredited the few reports he found (which did not include any of these presented here) that testified to bat-like or scaled wings, writing them of as justifiable misidentifications made under startling circumstances.

Thanks to Jerome Clark and Scott Maruna for archival input.

Sources: Cryptomundo/Biofort
http://www.cryptomundo.com/cryptozoo-news/flying-snakes/
http://biofort.blogspot.com/2007/11/american-srph-unnatural-history-of.html

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Forget vampires. A raft of new werewolf films looks set to take horror to hairy new levels. It's time to stock up on the silver bullets, says Brad Steiger.

Is the vampire's reign as creature of the night coming to an end? For some time now, bloodsuckers have been hogging the moonlight in everything from the chaste, teen-friendly Twilight to HBO's kinky True Blood, while October alone has given us Park Chan-wook's mad sanguinary love story Thirst, and Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant.

But could the release earlier this year of Underworld: Rise of the Lycans, the return to cinemas of John Landis's influential comedy-horror An American Werewolf in London, and the delayed arrival next February of the remake of George Waggner's seminal The Wolfman, starring Benicio del Toro as the titular lycanthrope, be a sign that the scales are tipping in favour of another mythical creature? As will be evident when The Twilight Saga: New Moon is released, werewolves are on their way back – and they're coming in force. It had to happen, eventually.

"If vampires are popular, it follows that werewolves must soon arrive," says Brad Steiger, author of The Werewolf Book. "In cinema, the two are paired like horse and carriage. You can't have one without the other." Chris Weitz, director of New Moon, concurs. "I suppose they're the two most relatable human monsters we can think of," he said recently. "They nicely encapsulate restraint and passion. Vampires are cold-blooded, literally, and werewolves are hot-blooded."

Whether we will go as loopy over lycanthropes as we have vampires remains to be seen. But like them or loathe them, they will be hard to avoid. Indeed, New Moon will offer a whole (six) pack of buff Native American werewolves. The writer/producer/director Alan Ball has promised that the beasties will soon be padding around True Blood's Bon Temps. Jack and Diane, a notorious lesbian werewolf movie originally, but no longer, starring Juno's Ellen Page, looks likely to finally appear in 2011, while MTV is developing a pilot for a series based on the popular 1985 Michael J Fox movie Teen Wolf. Fox network's "dramedy" Bitches – yes, really – about a quartet of female New Yorkers who happen to be werewolves, has, apparently, been put on the back-burner for now.

Meanwhile, Leonardo DiCaprio's production company, Appian Way, is putting together a "Gothic re-imagining" of Little Red Riding Hood, with Twilight director, Catherine Hardwicke, at the helm. Some early oral versions involve a werewolf rather than a wolf; after all, the girl's fate at the end of the first published version, by Charles Perrault, was more grim than Grimm.

Add to this list a proposed, some might say pointless, remake of An American Werewolf in London, and the news that the film rights to Maggie Stiefvater's best-selling teen novel Shiver, about a young girl and her wolfy teenage boyfriend, have been snapped up by the producers of Lord of the Rings and Blade, and who can doubt that the fur is really going to fly? Why now? According to Steiger, the werewolf might just be the perfect creature for today.

"What could give one more of a sense of power in these troubled times," he muses, "than being able to shapeshift into a wolf and run off into the night, howling at the moon, and being able to demolish one's enemies and anxieties?" Steiger has a point. Who doesn't feel like going wild these days?

Werewolves in various forms have stalked the imagination for millennia, the reasons for their existence changing over the centuries. In some legends, people become werewolves by choice, says Steiger; they "seek the power of transmutation through incantations, potions or spells, glorying in their strength and in their ability to strike fear into the hearts of all who hear their piercing howling on the nights of the full moon. They also become great warriors in the legends of the Norse and other countries."

After the Church condemned them as Satanic in the Middle Ages, however, a lycanthrope was one of the last things anyone wanted to be identified as. Take the case of Peter Stubbe, in 1589, for instance. He was accused of a series of wolf attacks near Cologne – the wolf itself having vanished – and confessed under torture to making a pact with the Devil, who he claimed gave him a belt that transformed him into a wolf. He said he had killed and eaten children, including his own son, and livestock, and committed incest. The least grisly part of poor Stubbe's punishment was his beheading.

Today, our concept of the werewolf comes mainly courtesy of Hollywood. Though there had been earlier werewolf films, notably Universal's Werewolf of London, in 1935, it was the same studio's The Wolf Man, starring Lon Chaney Jr, six years later, which would fix the creature in popular culture, and for a long time serve as the blueprint, effectively, for future werewolf movies.

Intelligently scripted by Curt Siodmak, the film "rewrote centuries of werewolf lore and legend", says Steiger. Even the film's famous poem – "Even the man who is pure at heart/ And says his prayers at night/ May become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms/ And the moon is clear and bright" – was written by Siodmak.

"The Wolf Man created a number of faux werewolf traditions that became cinematic werewolf dogma in many horror films to follow," notes Steiger. These included the transmission of lycanthropy via a bite or scratch, the first full moon following an attack as the trigger for the victim's initial transformation into a werewolf, the look of the creature, the "clouding of human compassion by blood lust", and the lethal effect of silver. A silver bullet in the heart, he points out, was not added until Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man in 1943.

If werewolves have anything to be thankful for, it is surely that, unlike vampires, at least they aren't undead. The sun's rays are harmless to them, they can see their reflection in mirrors, and crucifixes pose no danger. On the other hand, pentagrams, especially silver ones, must be avoided.

The years since The Wolf Man have seen the creature's popularity wax and wane, as actors including a pre-Little House on the Prairie Michael Landon (I Was a Teenage Werewolf), Oliver Reed (The Curse of the Werewolf) and Jack Nicholson (Wolf) have followed in Chaney Jr's paw prints.

In 1981 the sub-genre gained a new lease of life with the release of An American Werewolf in London. The film was a perfect meld of comedy, horror and satire, and featured groundbreaking, ultimately Oscar-winning special effects by Rick Baker, which seamlessly transformed David Naughton's hapless backpacker, horrifyingly, into a ravening wolf before our eyes.

The momentum was maintained by two other films released the same year: Joe Dante's The Howling and the more serious-minded Wolfen. While the rest of the 80s produced further memorable outings for werewolves, such as A Company of Wolves and Teen Wolf, the 90s proved disappointing, offering the likes of Mike Nichols' so-so Wolf and the dire An American Werewolf in Paris.

The Canadian cult favourite Ginger Snaps gave the werewolf a much needed boost at the beginning of the Noughties, and the creature has barely been away since, re-appearing in Dog Soldiers, the Underworld and Harry Potter films, and Van Helsing, among others.

Next year, The Wolfman will take us back to the creature's cinematic roots. It is a risky business remaking a classic and time will tell whether it works like moonlight on the werewolf sub-genre, or a silver bullet. "I am not a fan of remakes, but I do have great hopes for the film," says Steiger.

With any luck, it will be – ahem – a howling success.

Source: The Independent
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/
new-moon-rising-return-of-the-werewolf-1805067.html

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A police officer contacted British UFO experts after seeing three aliens examining a freshly made crop circle near Avebury, Wiltshire.

The sergeant, who has not been named, was off-duty when he saw the figures standing in a field near Silbury Hill, and stopped his car to investigate.

However, as he approached the 'men' – all over 6ft tall with blond hair – he heard "the sound of static electricity" and the trio ran away ''faster than any man he had ever seen''.
 
The officer returned to his home in Marlborough, Wiltshire, and contacted paranormal experts and told them he had spotted a UFO.

Wiltshire Police has refused to comment on the incident, saying it is a ''personal matter'' for the officer involved.

Crop circle researcher Andrew Russell, who is investigating the bizarre sighting on behalf of the officer, described the moment his sighting was made.

He said: ''At first he thought they were forensic officers as they were dressed in white coveralls. He stopped his car and approached the field.

''The figures were all over 6ft and had blond hair. They seemed to be inspecting the crop. When he got to the edge of the field he heard what he believed to be a sound not dissimilar to static electricity.

''This crackling noise seemed to be running through the field and the crop was moving gently, close to where the noise was.

''He shouted to the figures who, at first, ignored him, not glancing at him. When he tried to enter the field they looked up and began running.

''He said; 'They ran faster than any man I have ever seen. I'm no slouch but they were moving so fast. I looked away for a second and when I looked back they were gone.

''I then got scared. The noise was still around but I got an uneasy feeling and headed for the car. For the rest of the day I had a pounding headache I couldn't shift.''

The bizarre incident occurred on the morning of July 6 this year as the police officer was driving.

The officer claims the three figures were examining a crop circle, which had appeared several days earlier, when he stopped his car and began walking towards them.

However, the mysterious beings disappeared when he ''looked away for a second'' and he contacted UFO experts after witnessing other paranormal activity.

A spokesman for Wiltshire Police said: ''The police officer was apparently off duty when this happened so we have no comment to make because it is a personal not a police matter.''

Crop circle expert Colin Andrews, who investigated the incident alongside Andrew Russell, said he is ''convinced'' by the police officer's story.

He said: ''I am quite convinced the officer had an experience that day and one that we have not fully explored.

''I think with the unusual movement of the being and the poltergeist experiences there is too much additional information to say that is something in nothing.''

Source: Telegraph (UK)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/ufo/6394256/
UFO-alert-police-officer-sees-aliens-at-crop-circle.html

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A demonic dog lurks across the lonely stretch of asphalt known as Bloods Point Road near the community of Cherry Valley, Illinois.

Ghosts from a fatal school bus crash haunt the bridge where the students met their demise.

"Did you read the one about the ghost truck? The black truck that chases you and all of a sudden you look back and it's gone?" said Russell Mothkovich, who lives along the famed Boone County road and says it's nothing out of the ordinary. "We read that one, and we had just bought a new truck two years ago. And of course, it's black."

Though residents who live along Bloods Point Road don't like the tales that depict their rural community as a haunted hot spot, outsiders certainly seem to get a kick out of it. The road is a destination for people searching for a scare.

That trend isn't likely to stop now that FEARnet has named Bloods Point one of the nation's 10 scariest roads in its "Streets of Fear" online video and On Demand series.

FEARnet, a multiplatform movie network of all things creepy, chose 10 roads from across the country with the scariest names and back stories for the second year of "Streets of Fear."

The road becomes so popular this time of year that the Boone County Sheriff's Department ups its patrols to try to curb vandalism.

"Other than the name of the road, I can't see the draw. I've driven on it many times. It's just a rural road," Lt. Phil Beu said. "Bottom line, if they go out there and they're found, they can be arrested. It's criminal trespassing like anything else. We are watchful because there has been a lot of vandalism."

Mike Rutlin, a shop teacher at Jefferson High School and member of the Forest City Paranormal Society, was interviewed for the series because of his experience with the legendary hell hound.

While he was driving down the road with a friend, they heard the sound of twisted metal dragging behind them. Just then "there was a huge dog head in the window, growling and barking. We were doing probably 40 mph. This thing came out of nowhere," the 37-year-old said.

"I hate to make it sound like a bad horror movie, but it was a huge head, and it had the red eyes. It was in the window of my car. ... It seemed like forever at the time, but was probably just for 10 seconds and then it vanished."

But with every good horror tale comes the matter of separating fact from fiction.

Take one of the most famed stories, for instance. The legend that a school bus filled with children crashed over a bridge on Bloods Point Road, killing everyone inside. The popular story goes that if you stop your car in this spot and put it in neutral, it will be pushed across the bridge by ghosts of the children. Toss a little baby powder on the bumper, and you'll even see their handprints, according to the tale.

A look through Register Star archives came up with no record of the crash. The Register Star tried to authenticate the tale in 2003, also coming up with no results.

"The bus accident doesn't exist," Rutlin said.

Here's what is confirmed: The road is named for Arthur Blood, who settled there in the 1830s.

Some say Blood's family consorted with a witch, leading to the hauntings. Others say if it weren't for his last name, the tales would never have been born.

Robert Morris, 55, who has lived on Bloods Point Road for 28 years, has never seen or heard anything supernatural, despite the fact his home is "supposed to be" haunted. His wife has lived there her whole life without so much as a trace of a ghost, he said.

Source: Rockford Register Star
http://www.bnd.com/breaking_news/story/971446.html