Minor Strangeness

[Human_84]

I booked a hotel room and was appalled to open the bathroom door and find 4 crickets hopping about. I shut the door and came back about 2 minutes later and the little guys had totally vanished. There are no cracks or holes anywhere so it seemed they held a quick impromptu meeting and took the party elsewhere via the shower drain.

Now here's where it gets strange. I was lucky enough that my empty water bottle fit perfectly snug over the drain (snug enough where it stops the water from draining) and I figured it'll close off their little highway. So the next day, the drain was plugged and I noticed one just next to the shower curtain. For a millisecond the curtain came between me and the cricket and then it was suddenly gone. Now the bathroom is over sized and mostly tiled in white with some light browns. While it only takes 5 seconds to find a large black cricket in a white room, I spent the next 5 minutes baffled. It wasn't on the shower curtain, my towel, nor on me; it was simply gone.

 

[Sollywos]

I booked a hotel room and was appalled to open the bathroom door and find 4 crickets hopping about. I shut the door and came back about 2 minutes later and the little guys had totally vanished. There are no cracks or holes anywhere so it seemed they held a quick impromptu meeting and took the party elsewhere via the shower drain.

Now here's where it gets strange. I was lucky enough that my empty water bottle fit perfectly snug over the drain (snug enough where it stops the water from draining) and I figured it'll close off their little highway. So the next day, the drain was plugged and I noticed one just next to the shower curtain. For a millisecond the curtain came between me and the cricket and then it was suddenly gone. Now the bathroom is over sized and mostly tiled in white with some light browns. While it only takes 5 seconds to find a large black cricket in a white room, I spent the next 5 minutes baffled. It wasn't on the shower curtain, my towel, nor on me; it was simply gone.

Not disputing your observations especially as it occured in a pristine environment but I had been thinking of posting this little bit of minor strangeness and it sort of fits in. However I'm not meaning to cast aspersions on your experience.

My silly bit of minor strangeness:-

Came down the stairs glanced into the sitting room and saw my son on the settee. Carried on towards the dining room and heard washing up being done in the kitchen beyond and that had to be my son as there were only us two (and the dog) in the house!!

Yikes !!!!!!!

I was terrified reality had suddenly shifted, if son was in the sitting room and in the kitchen there must be two of him and what would happen if son in sitting room came through and met son in kitchen ... which would be the 'real' one?

This was way too scarey to contemplate and all sorts of quantum reality stuff went through my head but before concluding that there had to be a simpler explaination I went down the route of wondering if it was the dog moving his food bowl round but no, for various reasons that couldn't be it! A ghost? mmm. By then I had bravely (ha ha yes I was that spooked lol) and it was indeed my son so who the hell was in the sitting room? Nervously I went back up the hall and peeped in.

Fekin eejit ... my brain and eyes and yes my belief that he would be there had made a whole son out of a patchwork throw that had slipped so as a wide blue jeans coloured border was vertical from seat to floor. duh!

So why didn't I think the obvious first? The image of my son in the sitting room had been so complete is why. An image constructed with a minimum of visual clues and based on what I expected to be there not what actually was.

So it actually turned out to be not strange at all but was a personal illustration of how easily our brains can be deceived. It also illustrated to me how much our beliefs can override our observations and other evidence. I dont think it hurts from time to time to do a spring clean of our beliefs ... what are they based on how did we come by them? One of the reasons I so enjoy this forum is that seems to be exactly what is happening here.

 

[EnolaGaia]

... So it actually turned out to be not strange at all but was a personal illustration of how easily our brains can be deceived. It also illustrated to me how much our beliefs can override our observations and other evidence. I dont think it hurts from time to time to do a spring clean of our beliefs ... what are they based on how did we come by them? One of the reasons I so enjoy this forum is that seems to be exactly what is happening here.

Thanks, Sollywos ... That's an excellent illustration of how we cursorily sketch in peripheral elements when we're not paying sufficient attention. This leads to mistakes in situation awareness, and subsequent facts or observations to the contrary can flip you into Twilight Zone mode.

 

[Iris]

Human 84 hope the creatures didn't end up in the bedcovers anywhere.
The last 2 Probus trips we went on my friend was bitten by white tailed spiders so now we throw the covers right back so they have to make the beds properly.

 

[GNC]

Human 84 hope the creatures didn't end up in the bedcovers anywhere.
The last 2 Probus trips we went on my friend was bitten by white tailed spiders so now we throw the covers right back so they have to make the beds properly.

I always check my bed for spiders after getting up one morning a few years ago and looking round to see a squashed spider in the bed. I suppose I should be glad it didn't try to retaliate as I descended on it the previous evening.

 

[Vida Loca]

I recall some years back a light bulb springing loose from a Bayonet fitting in the ceiling and landing on the sitting room carpet - it didn't smash. The carpet isn't dense pile.

 

[Mythopoeika]

I recall some years back a light bulb springing loose from a Bayonet fitting in the ceiling and landing on the sitting room carpet - it didn't smash. The carpet isn't dense pile.

That happened to me when I was a teenager. I was visiting my grandparents and I was lying on the carpet in the lounge, reading a book.
The light bulb fell from the fitting and landed on the carpet right in front of my face. It was unbroken but hot to the touch. I got a cloth and used it to put the bulb back in the fitting. Bayonet fitting, in case you ask.

 

[ShadyCavalier]

I always check my bed for spiders after getting up one morning a few years ago and looking round to see a squashed spider in the bed. I suppose I should be glad it didn't try to retaliate as I descended on it the previous evening.

I once dreamed there were spiders all over my pillow, and I woke up in the midst of manically shaking the pillow back and forth

 

[INT21]

My wife received a phone call from our daughter this morning. She was calling from work.

She asked if I was alright.

My wife replied that I was and was actually in the kitchen making coffee.

It seems that my daughter was in her works warehouse (quite small) checking some products on the shelves and she turned around and I was stood in the room. I'm not sure yet how I 'went away'. I'll have to call in and see her tomorrow.

There are only three people working there. One man and two women. And the man is half my age, slightly built and does not look anything like me at all.

Buy she was so sure of it that she felt the need to check.

Apparition, vardogger ?

INT21.

 

[Iris]

When my youngest was little she would think there were spiders around her bed.
We worked out it was after she ate anything with 102 in it that it happened.

 

[Human_84]

My wife received a phone call from our daughter this morning. She was calling from work.

She asked if I was alright.

My wife replied that I was and was actually in the kitchen making coffee.

It seems that my daughter was in her works warehouse (quite small) checking some products on the shelves and she turned around and I was stood in the room. I'm not sure yet how I 'went away'. I'll have to call in and see her tomorrow.

There are only three people working there. One man and two women. And the man is half my age, slightly built and does not look anything like me at all.

Buy she was so sure of it that she felt the need to check.

Apparition, vardogger ?

INT21.

This one begs some clarity. You mean to say that while on the phone with your wife, your daughter saw you in her warehouse?! Am I correct to assume that your home does not double as a warehouse for your daughter? What were your daughter's exact words?

 

[catseye]

I have the opposite problem to you, Sollywos, in that my brain seems incapable of seeing things that are right in front of me and very obvious, if they aren't in the format I expect to see them. For example, if my sink plunger is in the bathroom on its end (so, looking like a sink plunger) I can find it. If it's lying down, and therefore not 'sink plunger' shaped, it is literally invisible to me.

I was looking in my undersink cupboard for my colander on Sunday to drain some veg. Convinced it wasn't there, I used a sieve instead, only to find the colander sitting happily upside down, with its little metal feet in the air, in the cupboard where I'd already looked several times. It wasn't 'colander shaped' you see...

 

[INT21]

This one begs some clarity. You mean to say that while on the phone with your wife, your daughter saw you in her warehouse?! Am I correct to assume that your home does not double as a warehouse for your daughter? What were your daughter's exact words?

No, she was sorting items on a shelf, partially turned and saw me stood at the end of the aisle. She then left the warehouse section and returned to the office (the unit is in an industrial area some two miles from my house) and contacted my wife.

I don't know the exact words used as I didn't take the call. But I received an Email from daughter that said 'not so much an apparition, I started to turn and saw you stood at the end of the aisle; just stood'.

Basically that's all there was to it. You now know as much as I do.

This is the second such 'appearance' within the family. The other one i have covered elsewhere in this site.

INT21.

 

[Mythopoeika]

When my youngest was little she would think there were spiders around her bed.
We worked out it was after she ate anything with 102 in it that it happened.

Tartrazine?

 

[brownmane]

I booked a hotel room and was appalled to open the bathroom door and find 4 crickets hopping about. I shut the door and came back about 2 minutes later and the little guys had totally vanished. There are no cracks or holes anywhere so it seemed they held a quick impromptu meeting and took the party elsewhere via the shower drain.

Now here's where it gets strange. I was lucky enough that my empty water bottle fit perfectly snug over the drain (snug enough where it stops the water from draining) and I figured it'll close off their little highway. So the next day, the drain was plugged and I noticed one just next to the shower curtain. For a millisecond the curtain came between me and the cricket and then it was suddenly gone. Now the bathroom is over sized and mostly tiled in white with some light browns. While it only takes 5 seconds to find a large black cricket in a white room, I spent the next 5 minutes baffled. It wasn't on the shower curtain, my towel, nor on me; it was simply gone.

Crickets are a sign of good luck in some Asian traditions.

 

[brownmane]

I have the opposite problem to you, Sollywos, in that my brain seems incapable of seeing things that are right in front of me and very obvious, if they aren't in the format I expect to see them. For example, if my sink plunger is in the bathroom on its end (so, looking like a sink plunger) I can find it. If it's lying down, and therefore not 'sink plunger' shaped, it is literally invisible to

I so understand. If I am looking for something, and I think that what I'm looking for is black and it turns out to be red, I cannot find it.

 

[mikfez]

I have the opposite problem to you, Sollywos, in that my brain seems incapable of seeing things that are right in front of me and very obvious, if they aren't in the format I expect to see them. For example, if my sink plunger is in the bathroom on its end (so, looking like a sink plunger) I can find it. If it's lying down, and therefore not 'sink plunger' shaped, it is literally invisible to me.

I was looking in my undersink cupboard for my colander on Sunday to drain some veg. Convinced it wasn't there, I used a sieve instead, only to find the colander sitting happily upside down, with its little metal feet in the air, in the cupboard where I'd already looked several times. It wasn't 'colander shaped' you see...

If the thing I'm looking for doesn't fit the image in my brain it becomes camouflaged.
e.g. I was looking for cornflower in the supermarket, it usually comes in a blue drum with a red lid but they'd repacked it in a blue cardboard box - it was in the same place as usual but I had to ask an assistant if they had any - when she pointed it out it still took a while to register.

 

[escargot]

As i've mentioned before, part of my job involves dealing with lost property. Many lost items are black.

Purses, wallets, phones, specs/specs cases, iPads/tablets, Kindles, clothing/hats/gloves, books, you name it, if it's black you're going to lose it. Put it away before you forget about it!

(Best black lost property item so far was a battery-operated gel cock ring. I left that where it was!)

 

[catseye]

As i've mentioned before, part of my job involves dealing with lost property. Many lost items are black.

Purses, wallets, phones, specs/specs cases, iPads/tablets, Kindles, clothing/hats/gloves, books, you name it, if it's black you're going to lose it. Put it away before you forget about it!

(Best black lost property item so far was a battery-operated gel cock ring. I left that where it was!)

Everso slightly wondering a) where it was that the cock ring got lost (bodily crevice/ice cream van floor/by the frozen chickens in Tesco?) and b) how someone managed to lose it and not notice...

 

[onetwothree]

I so understand. If I am looking for something, and I think that what I'm looking for is black and it turns out to be red, I cannot find it.

I have this with books. If I'm looking for a particular one, I have to actually read the titles out loud before I can find it. Even though it's quite clearly there, in front of me and I can read.

 

[hunck]

(Best black lost property item so far was a battery-operated gel cock ring. I left that where it was!)

I was wondering where that went. The built-in radio was a nice feature.

 

[Anonymous-50446]

I was wondering where that went. The built-in radio was a nice feature.

I think the cup-holder was surplus to requirements though.

 

[Ladyloafer]

Recently I was walking from my home to the supermarket up through a Main Street and passed a path branching off from it.The path leads up to a park so not unusual to see dog walkers going that way.As I looked down it I saw a girl of about 16 and a boy of roughly the same age both standing facing forwards,arms slightly out from their bodies.They were so still,side by side but a couple of metres apart.I stopped and looked at them and they remained like that for a while,facing away from me,as though they were blocking the path from the other direction.I was uncomfortable and walked on but I still wonder what that was all about.Thoughts?

Zombies?

 

[SugaryGhost]

Zombies?

I hope not,a zombie apocalypse is my worst nightmare :0

 

[Anonymous-50446]

I hope not,a zombie apocalypse is my worst nightmare :0

Meh. They're slow and easy to kill. Bring it.

 

[Ermintruder]

They're slow and easy to kill

And fictional, which is a major plus-point when it comes to killing them.

In other news: there's a twee Sunday evening tv programme running on ITV just now (UK forum members will probably know exactly what level of horrific feel-good mediocrity is beamed across the isles at this time of the week). It's a new prog called "What Would Your Kid Do?", which is a weird sociological experimentation in truth-or-consequences morality crossed with parental child-shaming.

But what I find hugely-strange about the programme is that the studio audience, as well as being conventionally located in front of the viewer (in the mid-ground between the victims and the remote viewer)....is ALSO located *behind* the presenter/victims in the middle.

Looking back towards the viewers. And it feels really strange to have Them staring out of the tv screen, at Us. Disproportionately odd. And all under a strange purple-blue light....

I cannot remember >ever< having noticed a tv audience looking back at me, out from my screen. I know they aren't really seeing me. But they are.

 

[Naughty_Felid]

Recently I was walking from my home to the supermarket up through a Main Street and passed a path branching off from it.The path leads up to a park so not unusual to see dog walkers going that way.As I looked down it I saw a girl of about 16 and a boy of roughly the same age both standing facing forwards,arms slightly out from their bodies.They were so still,side by side but a couple of metres apart.I stopped and looked at them and they remained like that for a while,facing away from me,as though they were blocking the path from the other direction.I was uncomfortable and walked on but I still wonder what that was all about.Thoughts?

Drugs most likely. Synthetics can "zombify" people.

 

[Dick Turpin]

Just a quick one about the things that happened in my old house. There’s not many stories left to tell to be honest, and the below was the first thing to happen there for about 2 years

Several years back, it was around this time of year, I was sitting at the kitchen table helping my eldest Daughter with her homework, my youngest Daughter was in the living room watching TV, and the missus was upstairs with my 6 month old son.

A sudden noise made us both look up from the laptop, and look in the same corner of the kitchen to where my Sons car seat/carry seat was, (Car seats / carry seats for Children that age are often slightly boat shaped)

The thing was rocking all of it’s own accord, it put me in mind of the Daniel Ratcliffe women in black rocking chair scene, (although it wasn’t rocking as violently as in the film)

My Daughter looked quizzingly at me, and I said that the cat must have been in it and caused it to rock as he jumped out, although that wasn’t possible, as over my Daughters shoulder through the kitchen window, I could see the cat sitting cleaning himself on top of the Garden shed.

I never did get to the bottom of what caused the rocking to happen, so I put it down to just another weird happening in that house.

 

[AnonyJoolz]

Walking to the bus stop in a small Somerset market town early this evening, I met a lady with a bird. He's called Jasper and is a juvenile Harris's Hawk.

I explained to my niece, who was a bit astonished, that this kind of thing seems to happen to me a lot and I'm very lucky to have interesting random encounters! She kindly took the photo for me. (Jasper was on his way home from a training flight over nearby open common land)

 

[Austin Popper]