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Legs With No Body, Running Along The Road

gattino said:
The article is worth reading by the way for the comments section which is stuffed with readers telling their own ghost encounters.

https://www.theguardian.com/comment...e-in-them-more-than-we-care-to-admit#comments
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This is a fascinating article - but just how true is its central contention viz that interest in ghosts is very much the thing nowadays? That the word on the street and the tittle-tattle in the workplaces is all of things spectral?

She is writing from Sydney, Australia so possibly her comments are localised. (Although I've never seen Australia as a particularly spooky kind of a place!)

Is this true of the UK? (I'm out of the country so I wouldn't know).
 
Zeke Newbold said:
This is a fascinating article - but just how true is its central contention viz that interest in ghosts is very much the thing nowadays? That the word on the street and the tittle-tattle in the workplaces is all of things spectral?

She is writing from Sydney, Australia so possibly her comments are localised. (Although I've never seen Australia as a particularly spooky kind of a place!)

Is this true of the UK? (I'm out of the country so I wouldn't know).
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I don't know Australia that well but there is apparently plenty of high-strangeness in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales (eg https://www.bluemountainsmysterytours.com.au/blue-mountains-ghost-bus-tour)
 
Zeke Newbold said:
This is a fascinating article - but just how true is its central contention viz that interest in ghosts is very much the thing nowadays? That the word on the street and the tittle-tattle in the workplaces is all of things spectral?

She is writing from Sydney, Australia so possibly her comments are localised. (Although I've never seen Australia as a particularly spooky kind of a place!)

Is this true of the UK? (I'm out of the country so I wouldn't know).
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My first, cynical, instinct was that Iike another feature from the same paper which I posted a few days ago, it sounds like a bit of journalistic back scratching ....she accounts for this alleged fad for ghosts by claiming we're all gripped by a podcast by a fellow journalist which in reality almost none of us have heard of ( I've started listening. Seems good. But if I had a water cooler I doubt I'd have heard no other topic of conversation around it.)

I will make a small wager with myself that the presenter of said podcast is not a stranger to her.
 
gattino said:
The article is worth reading by the way for the comments section which is stuffed with readers telling their own ghost encounters.

https://www.theguardian.com/comment...e-in-them-more-than-we-care-to-admit#comments
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But what teases some of these comments are!!!
As a retired nurse I’ve worked in some old hospitals with long histories. I could write a book on colleagues supernatural experiences. Why should I doubt ghosts exist?
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Please write the book already!
I worked in two different crematoriums.

The first was, by crematoria standards, a very old, imposing stone built item on a hill above a large cemetery. The lads there and I experienced so many odd things in the course of our daily work. We weren't spooked in any way, and took these as part of the job. These events were seen by all three of us on most of our working days.
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Arrghhh! I will die of curisosity and then I will have to haunt the person who posted that comment!
 
I'm almost through the Ghost Story podcast. It's extremely interesting and recommended but, with only two episodes to go I can report the paranormal aspect is mostly a side note. The show is actually a true life family murder mystery with lots of twists and turns.

So the idea presented by the guardian journalist that it's kick-started a paranormal Renaissance in popular culture, or even just among her friends, is complete balderdash. The article is definitely looking like a disguised advert for a mate's show.
 
Me and my now ex-wife witnessed a disembodied foot in a nylon stocking with painted toenails on the Washington DC Metro years ago. It was moving unusually fast under a seat. It accidently kicked the back of the foot of a woman in the seat in front who moved her feet forward instinctively.
 
Matt said:
Me and my now ex-wife witnessed a disembodied foot in a nylon stocking with painted toenails on the Washington DC Metro years ago. It was moving unusually fast under a seat. It accidently kicked the back of the foot of a woman in the seat in front who moved her feet forward instinctively.
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That story needs elaboration! Not least what everyone's reaction was to seeing this?! What do you mean by it moving unusually fast? What, if anything , was above the point where the foot appeared? It was definitely a flesh and blood foot, not a...I don't know...model of some kind?
 
gattino said:
That story needs elaboration! Not least what everyone's reaction was to seeing this?! What do you mean by it moving unusually fast? What, if anything , was above the point where the foot appeared? It was definitely a flesh and blood foot, not a...I don't know...model of some kind?
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Nobody else seemed to notice it, maybe because it was under the Metro seat. It's hard to describe in words about the movement. The toes were moving more like a hand and fingers. And it flapped about like a fish out of water. I could see up to about the knee until it disappeared behind the seat. It looked like a woman's lower leg and foot.

I've tried finding a non-paranormal explanation. There was a man reading a paper in the seat where the foot should have been sitting if it had a body. I thought maybe he had slipped one of his feet out of his shoes and it was him doing it, but I could see his two legs and shoes and still the disembodied leg was still there. I don't think he would have been able to move his leg that fast and not move the rest of his body either. He seemed to get really spooked at one point and rolled up his paper and got off quickly.

When we got off the Metro I looked in the seat gap to see if there was anything there but it was empty.
 
Matt said:
Forgot to say, we were on the right side of the Metro carriage facing backwards and the seats with the weird foot were on the left facing forwards. We were about 8 feet away I guess.
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Both of you did see it? It's not a possibility that you dropped into a light sleep and dreamed?

For how long was it visible to you?

I'm having some trouble picturing the movement of the foot. Was it moving upright as it would attached to a leg? You do mention that you could see it up to the knee.
But the flapping like a fish and the movement like a hand and fingers makes it difficult for me to picture other than it being sideways under the seat.

No one else appeared to react as though they saw it eg startled as you were? Was the foot very clear to you or hazy, out of focus?
 
brownmane said:
Both of you did see it? It's not a possibility that you dropped into a light sleep and dreamed?

For how long was it visible to you?

I'm having some trouble picturing the movement of the foot. Was it moving upright as it would attached to a leg? You do mention that you could see it up to the knee.
But the flapping like a fish and the movement like a hand and fingers makes it difficult for me to picture other than it being sideways under the seat.

No one else appeared to react as though they saw it eg startled as you were? Was the foot very clear to you or hazy, out of focus?
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We both saw it and were both definitely awake. It was visible for about a minute I think.

The position of the lower leg and foot was like someone on the seat behind had slid down and put there foot under the seat in front. That's how it managed to touch the woman in front who had her legs tucked under the seat.

It was a solid looking human foot but it didn't seem to act like a foot. It seemed to act like an excited dog on a lead. I know it sounds ridiculous.

Nobody else seemed to notice it. If I remember correctly there weren't many people in the Metro carriage. It was week a night and we were going to a friends house for a party. Funnily enough it was October 31st.
 
Matt said:
We both saw it and were both definitely awake. It was visible for about a minute I think.

The position of the lower leg and foot was like someone on the seat behind had slid down and put there foot under the seat in front. That's how it managed to touch the woman in front who had her legs tucked under the seat.

It was a solid looking human foot but it didn't seem to act like a foot. It seemed to act like an excited dog on a lead. I know it sounds ridiculous.

Nobody else seemed to notice it. If I remember correctly there weren't many people in the Metro carriage. It was week a night and we were going to a friends house for a party. Funnily enough it was October 31st.
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So, it being Halloween, I wonder if it was a very realistic prop? It is odd that no one else noticed, but maybe they were in on the supposed joke?
 
brownmane said:
So, it being Halloween, I wonder if it was a very realistic prop? It is odd that no one else noticed, but maybe they were in on the supposed joke?
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It was right under the seat so maybe that's why it wasn't noticed. We could see it because we were facing the seat from the opposite direction. I don't think it was a prop, the toes were really wiggly. It seemed like it had a mind of it's own.
 
Matt said:
Odd thing was we found it more amusing than disturbing at the time, we were sort of giggling about it as it happened. Maybe because it didn't really make any sense.
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At what point did you stop seeing it. Did it just disappear? I suppose what I am getting at it, could it have been some practical joke involving a remote controlled bit of gadgetry (I have an artist friend who used to do movie special effects, including remote controlled sculpture, and it's the kind of thing he would do). Could someone then just have picked it up and pocketed it? I realise it was practically in full sight of you the whole time, from the description. Could someone have been reaching through from under the seat behind? From the description, it really does sound bizarre.
 
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SimonBurchell said:
At w

At what point did you stop seeing it. Did it just disappear? I suppose what I am getting at it, could it have been some practical joke involving a remote controlled bit of gadgetry (I have an artist friend who used to do movie special effects, including remote controlled sculpture, and it's the kind of thing he would do). Could someone then just have picked it up and pocketed it? I realise it was practically in full sight of you the whole time, from the description. Could someone have been reaching through from under the seat behind? From the description, it really does sound bizarre.
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When I'm thinking about explaining it away I sometimes wonder if the bloke behind the seat had something to do with it, because I think when he got up it was gone. My memory is probably not remembering correctly because I think it was almost 20 years ago now.

But if it was some sort of prosthetic leg it was the best I've seen than in any film. And it looked like a very articulated solid female lower leg, much too big to hide without noticing.
 
Matt said:
When I'm thinking about explaining it away I sometimes wonder if the bloke behind the seat had something to do with it, because I think when he got up it was gone. My memory is probably not remembering correctly because I think it was almost 20 years ago now.

But if it was some sort of prosthetic leg it was the best I've seen than in any film. And it looked like a very articulated solid female lower leg, much too big to hide without noticing.
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One of those inflatable "marital aid"-type rubber dolls, popular with hen parties, football fans and students after a sniff of the barmaid's apron?

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maximus otter
 
Matt said:
We both saw it and were both definitely awake. It was visible for about a minute I think.

The position of the lower leg and foot was like someone on the seat behind had slid down and put there foot under the seat in front. That's how it managed to touch the woman in front who had her legs tucked under the seat.

It was a solid looking human foot but it didn't seem to act like a foot. It seemed to act like an excited dog on a lead. I know it sounds ridiculous.

Nobody else seemed to notice it. If I remember correctly there weren't many people in the Metro carriage. It was week a night and we were going to a friends house for a party. Funnily enough it was October 31st.
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Do like this one.

The motion described suggests to me something dangling down and moving as the train moved across jointed track, points, corners etc. Underground/Subway trains aren't the smoothest ride. My first through was perhaps loose fabric hanging from the seat, but then of course it then disappears when the man gets off.
 
Paul_Exeter said:
Do like this one.

The motion described suggests to me something dangling down and moving as the train moved across jointed track, points, corners etc. Underground/Subway trains aren't the smoothest ride. My first through was perhaps loose fabric hanging from the seat, but then of course it then disappears when the man gets off.
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It was definitely a foot, and it was solid enough to make the woman in front move her legs forward. One possible explanation I thought of was that the man behind was a bit of perv and had slipped his foot out of a shoe, but he would of had an incredibly long leg.
 
Matt said:
It was definitely a foot, and it was solid enough to make the woman in front move her legs forward. One possible explanation I thought of was that the man behind was a bit of perv and had slipped his foot out of a shoe, but he would of had an incredibly long leg.
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So intriguing, of course we have to consider possible rational explanations but it is just so high-strangeness yet almost mundane.
 
Excellent find! Yes, that's it. It might be easier to visualise with that picture.

We would have been sitting in the seats where the man in the white shirt is sitting, by the number 3. The first seat where the man in blue is standing would be where the woman who was kicked in the back of the legs was seated. And behind her was the seat where the disembodied foot was.
 
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Matt said:
Excellent find! Yes, that's it. It might be easier to visualise with that picture.

We would of been sitting in the seats where the man in the white shirt is sitting, by the number 3. The first seat where the man in blue is standing would be where the woman who was kicked in the back of the legs was seated. And behind her was the seat where the disembodied foot was.
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So that rules out fabric dangling down as it is a plastic composite seat shell. It is also a clear, unhindered view of whatever it was.

My thinking right now is that trains like planes last a lot longer than cars and undergo more than a few refurbishments over the years, so was the seating layout different in the past and some sort of time-slip/manifestation of a seated women in the past was interacting with you and the passengers in your present?
 
At the time I thought about looking to see if there had been any deaths on the line but realized I was falling into stereotypical ghost folklore. And I'm not sure I believe in ghosts. Not as the survival of dead people anyway. If it was the ghost of a deceased person I would expect them to be just sitting there, but the movement of the foot was just so odd. People don't move there feet as weirdly as that.

I've also thought about parallel dimensions, time-slip and shared hallucination.
 
For me the salient points are:

*You had a suspicion at the time that the man reading the paper had something to do with it (and the phenomenon finished after he had hastily left). Our first hunches are often correct.

* The `foot` was not behaving like an ordinary foot - but wriggling about like `a dog on a leash` (i.e drawing attention to itself).

* It was sufficiently physical to cause someone - a woman - to move their own foot away from it.

* This happened on October 31st - Halloween, a day which I understand Americans take really quite seriously and which is a time of general pranksomeness and tricks.

* Foot puppets are a thing:


So - as a provisional solution - the details need fleshing out (no pun!) - I am going to propose that the gentleman with the newspaper instituted some sort of seasonal prank using his own foot disguised as a woman's foot.
 
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