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Minor Strangeness (IHTM)

Yesterday I was expecting a book to be delivered by Australia post. I was in the lounge all morning as it was a miserable wet day.
I looked out of the window and saw the postal van delivering a parcel to a house further down the street and thought that I would soon get mine.
It drove down the court but went past and stopped outside the neighbour's house to deliver something and then drove off.
I was a bit disappointed and opened the door to see if it was still raining, and there, on the mat was the package.
I can't work out how it got there as normally only one delivery a day comes and normally I'd see someone coming up to the door.
 
Yesterday I was expecting a book to be delivered by Australia post. I was in the lounge all morning as it was a miserable wet day.
I looked out of the window and saw the postal van delivering a parcel to a house further down the street and thought that I would soon get mine.
It drove down the court but went past and stopped outside the neighbour's house to deliver something and then drove off.
I was a bit disappointed and opened the door to see if it was still raining, and there, on the mat was the package.
I can't work out how it got there as normally only one delivery a day comes and normally I'd see someone coming up to the door.
Mailmen are known for arriving when you are at the shower and the battery in your wireless doorbell just died. There are many other unfathomable ways they get unnoticed; perhaps they all have fairy blood.
 
Frances said until she died that the fifth photo was real. This photo is from an eBay auction, archived at [ https://web.archive.org/web/20200825065719/https://www.ebay.com/itm/153976111038 ]:
s-l1600.jpg

Yes, I read The Unexplained article:
https://www.lockhaven.edu/~dsimanek/cooper.htm

Yes, I read Polidoro's essay on The Skeptical Inquirer (page 24):
https://skepticalinquirer.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/29/2019/03/SI-ND-17.pdf

Yes, I think the fifth photo is fake:
cotte-1504525032602-SSPL_10436091_HighRes.jpeg

I think it is fair to provide Frances statement on it, at least for reference purposes.
 
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A minor one happened to me this morning. I was at a friend’s, helping them unload the dishwasher - as you do. I took out two tall glasses, asked where they went, and put them away in the appropriate cupboard. About ten minutes later I opened the dishwasher to check it was empty... and the two glasses were back in there. I checked the shelf in the cupboard where I’d put them and it was indeed empty. Both of us remember me asking where they went and my putting them there. There are no other glasses like them in the house. And we were both in the kitchen the entire time. Very strange!

Were the two of you talking about something else while this happened? Is it possible that the exchange "Where do these go?" "In that cupboard there" interrupted your conversation so that you thought you'd completed the action whereas you'd only said it?

If not, then the glasses were probably moved by 'Them' :worry:
 
Were the two of you talking about something else while this happened? Is it possible that the exchange "Where do these go?" "In that cupboard there" interrupted your conversation so that you thought you'd completed the action whereas you'd only said it?

That sounds plausible. In fact I explained something like that to Techy recently when I had obviously misappropriated his property for purposes of malice he'd misplaced something.
 
Were the two of you talking about something else while this happened? Is it possible that the exchange "Where do these go?" "In that cupboard there" interrupted your conversation so that you thought you'd completed the action whereas you'd only said it?

If not, then the glasses were probably moved by 'Them' :worry:
Well, it’s possible of course, but I remembered physically putting the glasses away and somebody said they saw me doing it. It actually felt a bit more like one of those glitch in the matrix kind of things.
 
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It's weird how the mind can play tricks on you. Go to see my closest friend yesterday as I have for 20 years or so. Mid morning and all curtains closed and his car is on the drive. A few knocks on the door and no answer. He is often slow at getting down the stairs due to health problems so I wait a bit and knock on door again, getting a touch anxious. Then I hear his footsteps on the wooden staircase which leads directly into the small front porch, so I wait for door to be opened, but nothing. I ring his phone no reply. Now worried I phone his daughter who lives 200 miles away to learn that the Police had had to force entry on Sunday and found him dead in one of the bedrooms. Family had been trying to contact me but had an old number.
Quite what I had heard I don't know. Probably I wanted to hear his footsteps and so I did.
RIP Peter - friends like you are very hard to come by and you are irreplaceable.
 
It's weird how the mind can play tricks on you. Go to see my closest friend yesterday as I have for 20 years or so. Mid morning and all curtains closed and his car is on the drive. A few knocks on the door and no answer. He is often slow at getting down the stairs due to health problems so I wait a bit and knock on door again, getting a touch anxious. Then I hear his footsteps on the wooden staircase which leads directly into the small front porch, so I wait for door to be opened, but nothing. I ring his phone no reply. Now worried I phone his daughter who lives 200 miles away to learn that the Police had had to force entry on Sunday and found him dead in one of the bedrooms. Family had been trying to contact me but had an old number.
Quite what I had heard I don't know. Probably I wanted to hear his footsteps and so I did.
RIP Peter - friends like you are very hard to come by and you are irreplaceable.
Not wanting to be the skeptic, but it is hard to tell the difference between something you recall and another that really happened. Due to your altered emotional state--you mention getting a touch anxious before hearing the steps--the memories could have felt more vivid, or your sensitiveness to a ghost be improved. As it often happens in these cases, it is impossible to tell. One thing you can say for sure about Fortean phenomena, is that they actively do not like to be proved. I read too many stories on recording devices, even redundant ones, failing spectacularly while being used to record paranormal activity.

Here is a quote from a review, made by James McClennon, of George Hansen's book The Trickster and the Paranormal:

For example, I witnessed paranormal spoon bending. In 1982, I watched researchers conduct an experiment with Masuaki Kiyota. A spoon was propped up in a manner so that if it were touched it would fall over. Kiyota bent the spoon without touching it, but later it began unbending. Two video cameras set up to document this experiment failed to function and everyone laughed at the absurdity of the situation (the trickster was at work).

Taken from the first paragraph in [ https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc799350/m1/4/ ].
 
Not wanting to be the skeptic, but it is hard to tell the difference between something you recall and another that really happened. Due to your altered emotional state--you mention getting a touch anxious before hearing the steps--the memories could have felt more vivid, or your sensitiveness to a ghost be improved. As it often happens in these cases, it is impossible to tell. One thing you can say for sure about Fortean phenomena, is that they actively do not like to be proved. I read too many stories on recording devices, even redundant ones, failing spectacularly while being used to record paranormal activity.

Here is a quote from a review, made by James McClennon, of George Hansen's book The Trickster and the Paranormal:

For example, I witnessed paranormal spoon bending. In 1982, I watched researchers conduct an experiment with Masuaki Kiyota. A spoon was propped up in a manner so that if it were touched it would fall over. Kiyota bent the spoon without touching it, but later it began unbending. Two video cameras set up to document this experiment failed to function and everyone laughed at the absurdity of the situation (the trickster was at work).

Taken from the first paragraph in [ https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc799350/m1/4/ ].

Skeptic away:D. Not suggesting it was his ghost at all. ( freed of his somewhat faltering body I'm sure he would have better things to do than traipse down the stairs in his old home! ) Merely that I "heard" something which sounded very much like my mate coming down the stairs, which I have heard literally hundreds of times. It wasn't recall - only yesterday after all. I expected to hear him and my mind filled in what obviously were the gaps. Just slightly weird that's all.
 
It's weird how the mind can play tricks on you. Go to see my closest friend yesterday as I have for 20 years or so. Mid morning and all curtains closed and his car is on the drive. A few knocks on the door and no answer. He is often slow at getting down the stairs due to health problems so I wait a bit and knock on door again, getting a touch anxious. Then I hear his footsteps on the wooden staircase which leads directly into the small front porch, so I wait for door to be opened, but nothing. I ring his phone no reply. Now worried I phone his daughter who lives 200 miles away to learn that the Police had had to force entry on Sunday and found him dead in one of the bedrooms. Family had been trying to contact me but had an old number.
Quite what I had heard I don't know. Probably I wanted to hear his footsteps and so I did.
RIP Peter - friends like you are very hard to come by and you are irreplaceable.

Sad story. A slightly similar thing happened to me in the early 90s. I was in the kitchen and out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw my friend walking past the window. I went straight to the front door, expecting to hear a knock, and none came. So I opened the door and nobody was there. I put it down to my mind playing tricks with me. Anyway, a few days later I found out he'd killed himself around the same time as I thought I'd seen him.

As an aside to your story, I've heard other tales of people being heard coming down stairs after they've died. A friend of mine - pretty much a sceptic - said he was gathered with his family for a wake in the living room of a deceased relative when they all heard someone coming down stairs. Naturally there was nobody else in the house.
 
RIP Peter - friends like you are very hard to come by and you are irreplaceable.

So sad to hear about the loss of your friend Pete I expect it's left you feeling lonely.

I gather it wasn't totally unexpected but all the same it's very hard. Who knows in what ways we are connected? As said upthread it's not easy to assess these things that happen to us, they are after all very personal. So yes it could have been your mind filling in the gaps but maybe with a prompt from your friend as being the best way of getting through? Maybe that's just being fancyful but sometimes taking off the rational hat does no harm.

(((((((Pete S)))))))

Sollywos x
 
Skeptic away:D. Not suggesting it was his ghost at all. ( freed of his somewhat faltering body I'm sure he would have better things to do than traipse down the stairs in his old home! ) Merely that I "heard" something which sounded very much like my mate coming down the stairs, which I have heard literally hundreds of times. It wasn't recall - only yesterday after all. I expected to hear him and my mind filled in what obviously were the gaps. Just slightly weird that's all.

I am sorry to hear you've lost your good friend, that must be hard.

How strange to think you heard him. Perhaps you did, who knows?
When you've visited in the past he'd be pleased to see you and happy to come down to let you in.

If he was still lingering in spirit he might try to do the same thing. Lots of people have similar stories, as we have seen on this very page!

A close relation of mine 'saw' another relation driving a big posh car through town. He grinned and waved and she waved back, and thought 'Wow, where's he had THAT from? I hope he comes back and offers me a lift!'

He disappeared over a bridge and she carried on to the shops, and later learned that our mutual relation had died around the time she saw him.
 
It's weird how the mind can play tricks on you. Go to see my closest friend yesterday as I have for 20 years or so. Mid morning and all curtains closed and his car is on the drive. A few knocks on the door and no answer. He is often slow at getting down the stairs due to health problems so I wait a bit and knock on door again, getting a touch anxious. Then I hear his footsteps on the wooden staircase which leads directly into the small front porch, so I wait for door to be opened, but nothing. I ring his phone no reply. Now worried I phone his daughter who lives 200 miles away to learn that the Police had had to force entry on Sunday and found him dead in one of the bedrooms. Family had been trying to contact me but had an old number.
Quite what I had heard I don't know. Probably I wanted to hear his footsteps and so I did.
RIP Peter - friends like you are very hard to come by and you are irreplaceable.

My condolences. Take care.
 
Years ago I saw this sign outside my home town on way to work -

Winged cattle again.jpg

Winged cattle. A bit weird.
The sign was eventually replaced with a 'Slippery Road' version or summat which was a shame.
Today we saw it again, about 10 miles from its original site -

Winged cattle now.jpg

Looks the same to me.
But why?
 
Years ago I saw this sign outside my home town on way to work -

View attachment 29876

Winged cattle. A bit weird.
The sign was eventually replaced with a 'Slippery Road' version or summat which was a shame.
Today we saw it again, about 10 miles from its original site -

View attachment 29877

Looks the same to me.
But why?

No, it's "cattle carrying an anvil" sign - I thought you know that?
 
Years ago I saw this sign outside my home town on way to work -
View attachment 29876

Did you post your photo of the sign (in its earlier location) here on the forum? If so - where?

Here's a photo of the same sign in its original location ...

flying cow sign_thumb[2].jpg

I cannot find any source for the photo, but it was borrowed and used on two blogs years ago (2010 / 2012):

http://lawactually.blogspot.com/2010/07/flying-cow.html
http://sciencefictionfantasystamps.blogspot.com/2012/10/fun-with-trivia.html

Could this be your original photo of the sign?
 
On closer inspection ... The more recent sign you saw isn't the same as the first. For one thing, its lower right-hand corner isn't bent. The image and its placement within the triangular field isn't the same, either ...
 
Did you post your photo of the sign (in its earlier location) here on the forum? If so - where?

Here's a photo of the same sign in its original location ...

I cannot find any source for the photo, but it was borrowed and used on two blogs years ago (2010 / 2012):

http://lawactually.blogspot.com/2010/07/flying-cow.html
http://sciencefictionfantasystamps.blogspot.com/2012/10/fun-with-trivia.html

Could this be your original photo of the sign?
On closer inspection ... The more recent sign you saw isn't the same as the first. For one thing, its lower right-hand corner isn't bent. The image and its placement within the triangular field isn't the same, either ...

Yup, the location and execution of the sign are different. It's still winged cattle though.
I took the first photo with the bent lower corner myself on way to work. The ones you've provided are the same so someone's nicked it, the cad.

The first photo, the one I took, is the same as the blog ones. I only posted it on Facebook. It's my photo.
The second is about 10 miles away and I took it today, thinking it was the same sign being thriftily re-used but as you say, it's not. How weird.
 
Years ago I saw this sign outside my home town on way to work -

View attachment 29876

Winged cattle. A bit weird.
The sign was eventually replaced with a 'Slippery Road' version or summat which was a shame.
Today we saw it again, about 10 miles from its original site -

View attachment 29877

Looks the same to me.
But why?
Could it be a sign warning of the danger of killing cows on these roads. I frequently come across a farmer herding his cows down a road into an adjacent field.
 
On closer inspection ... The more recent sign you saw isn't the same as the first. For one thing, its lower right-hand corner isn't bent. The image and its placement within the triangular field isn't the same, either ...
I agree 'EnolaGaia,' the two cattle signs show quite a few differences between them - and I don't think that that, what-ever-it-is, is meant to be depicting a wing... (a poor effort if it was) "but what" is the question? One thing for sure ~ it definitely will never fly!
 
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Could it be a sign warning of the danger of killing cows on these roads. I frequently come across a farmer herding his cows down a road into an adjacent field.
Yup, there are warning signs on rural roads for all sorts of hazards. Where we live it's mainly about cattle and shitty slippery roads.
 
Fake sign. Clearly some local wag has decided to erect a 'flying cows' warning sign.
No such sign exists in the UK Highways signage.
There is a sign to warn of 'livestock ahead' which is a cow, but facing in the opposite direction.
 
Yup, the location and execution of the sign are different. It's still winged cattle though.
The second is about 10 miles away and I took it today, thinking it was the same sign being thriftily re-used but as you say, it's not. How weird.

I think I have an explanation for how there came to be 2 similar signs years and miles apart. It goes like this ...

Some rural would-be street artist (let's call him Back Road Banksy) decided to prank on an existing hazard sign depicting a cow silhouette.

NOTE: If you inspect both images cloesly (see below) you'll see that the shape / placement of the two 'wings' aren't the same. The two signs may have been done at different times by different Back Road Banksies.

In both cases BRB used the same technique. He made a stencil of a 'wing' (e.g., a sheet of cardboard with the wing's silhouette cut out of the middle). The differences in the 'wing' shape imply two different stencils were used.

All that's required to prank the sign is to reach it (e.g., via a ladder) with the stencil and a can of black spray paint.

See my annotated version of the second / later sign. There are 3 telltale clues suggesting the 'wing' was spray-painted onto an existing sign.

It would appear BRB wasn't as careful when executing the second / later sign. The smudge and the blob of dripping paint suggest sloppiness.

NOTE: It would appear Techy (I presume ... ) might be stowing something in a handlebar pouch ... Tell him to take more care next time ... :evillaugh:

WingedCow-1.jpg

WingedCow-2 copy.jpg
 
I agree 'EnolaGaia,' the two cattle signs show quite a few differences between them - and I don't think that that, what-ever-it-is, is meant to be depicting a wing... (a poor effort if it was) "but what" is the question? ...

Perhaps the Bovine Xenomorph (a la Alien) bursts out of a cow's back rather than its belly. :thought:
 
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