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Mystery 'Lost' Items

This has happened to me for years, and like many of you I've always asked politely for the Little People to return whatever it is that's gone missing, and it's usually turned up within a few hours, somewhere blindingly obvious that I couldn't possibly have missed. The only time this didn't work was when I was staying in Chelmsford with my bf (Chelmsford has a lot to answer for) and wearing a beautiful gold, opal and diamond ring my great aunt had left me. I remember sitting on the bed, getting ready for work, and putting the ring on my middle finger. We then walked off to the station to go to work. Anyway I got on the train, looked down at my hands and realised the ring wasn't there. It wasn't in my pockets either. Surely if it had fallen off I'd have felt or heard it?
After work and for many weeks, we both searched his house, pulled the carpet up, the works. It never turned up despite many a plea to the little people, pixies (including Frank Black) gnomes, gremlins and even St Anthony (my Nan even gave me a statue of him to try and get the ring back!) but it never returned. When he moved to London and we moved in together we had one final search and gave up. Very, very bizarre.
If anyone in Chelmsford finds a Victorian gold, opal & diamond ring, please drop me a line!
Happy new year one and all, by the way!
Snowberry
 
I recently searched high and low for a CD, which I wanted to copy to my iPod.

Spent ages looking for it. It is one of a set, the rest of which I had already 'done'.

Eventually I gave up and moved the set to another shelf.

:shock:

The whole set! All the CDs were there.
I cannot understand how that happened, unless someone is pulling my leg.
 
We once lost a fork which never turned up. It was one of only 3 remaining of a certain set. Last time we saw it was when the bf carried it into the kitchen along with the rest of the dirty dishes; it did not fall on the floor or go underneath a cupboard or anything. As I was washing up later I noticed the fork wasn't there. We moved a few months later and it never turned up.

We also had a more exciting one recently. On Friday afternoon, a friend came over and dropped off an envelope containing $200 cash as payment for a computer I'd sold her. I opened the envelope (a plain white business-size specimen), counted it, then put it in a cubbyhole of the bf's desk, intending to deposit it this week. That cubbyhole contains only a few other empty envelopes and my bf's chequebook. On Sunday he was paying bills when he suddenly asked me where the envelope with the cash was, as it wasn't in the desk. I thought I might have chucked it in my purse but no dice. We tore the entire desk apart and even went so far as to go through the garbage. At one point I muttered "give it back, please" under my breath. I've been hanging 'round you lot too long. ;)

A few minutes later, bf walked up to the desk and triumphantly pulled out the envelope, and hand to god, it was NOT there before. We had torn the desk apart, and had carefully sorted through the contents of that cubbyhole several times.

Still waiting for that labradorite and onyx necklace to turn up though. :( (actually I think it went home with a sticky-fingered visitor)
 
We have the problem of disappearing plates.
It`s only one specific set - a small set of *I believe* 6 plates. Maybe 8. They are all almost identical, except they carry different lines from the same poem on them.
Some days, we`ll have the entire set. Most of the time, however, we have any number of plates between 1 and 6. I will have seen the full stack of plates in the cabinet, then later go to use them and there only be one. Of course, no one has used any of them and we only keep the plates in one place. I always get frustrated, complain to my husband that we don`t have any little plates - and then just when we decide to buy a set, they`ll all be there.
Scarier still, there have been times when there have been MORE plates than there should have been. 3 plates in use, 2 still in the sink.... But a full stack in the cabinet. Of course, this only happens when I`m not trying to get a plate - I`ll notice it, think how amazing it is that they`re all there, wander back to the table and then it dawns on me that there is no way all the plates could be there as they are on the table.
It`s sad in a way, because I don`t even know how many there really are. And I have never been able to read the full poem... It`s odd, because sometimes I`ll be using a plate and realize that it has a line on it that I can`t recall reading before.

Another recent problem - disappearing baby wipes. We only keep them in two specific places - either on the table, or between two candles on our television stand. Anywhere else, and my son gets them and uses them as a step.
About once a week, they will simply not be there. I`ll look in both places, then track myself to see if I simply forgot to put them up... Check again and they`ll be there, in their normal spot, in plain sight. It`s quite frustrating.
 
tamyu said:
Scarier still, there have been times when there have been MORE plates than there should have been. 3 plates in use, 2 still in the sink.... But a full stack in the cabinet. Of course, this only happens when I`m not trying to get a plate - I`ll notice it, think how amazing it is that they`re all there, wander back to the table and then it dawns on me that there is no way all the plates could be there as they are on the table.
It`s sad in a way, because I don`t even know how many there really are. And I have never been able to read the full poem... It`s odd, because sometimes I`ll be using a plate and realize that it has a line on it that I can`t recall reading before.

Fascinating. You have the basis of a short story or television program here. Go for it!
 
im certain its pixies or boggles or something. i shared a certain apartment with a friend of mine once, and this kind of thing was a daily occurance for him. i started to plan on it, every time we went out anywhere, i tried to get him to hustle because i knew, without fail, there would be a half hour search for something important. wallet, keys, money, cigarettes, it was always something. and id watch him search and search, then id turn around, lay my hand down, and there it would be. most puzzling was when I watched him looking for a book, search through a stack of books carefully one by one to no avail, then i subsequently found it in that same pile. weird. once we moved out of there, though, it mostly stopped.
the problem i have is things turning up in the freezer. i knocked the remote off the arm of my couch once and it just vanished. not on the floor, not under the couch, nowhere. so i sat and watched tv for a while longer, and a few hours later i got up to get a drink. i open the freezer to get some ice and, hey presto, theres the remote. i swear i hadnt been in the kitchen at all since i lost the remote. ive also found in the freezer: my keys, scotch tape, and money. it doesnt happen much anymore, as the freezer is now the first place i look when i lose something. damn pixies.
 
ElishevaBarsabe said:
Fascinating. You have the basis of a short story or television program here. Go for it!

The big thing is, I don`t really want to think too deeply about it. I really don`t want to start being afraid of my plates... I think I may copy down the poetic lines sometime though. I usually don`t pay too much attention to them, so that part is probably just my forgetting the line between readings, and nothing fortean.
 
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fnordish said:
the problem i have is things turning up in the freezer.

Wonder if cold temperatures are involved in a significant way in this phenomena. How could that proposal be checked?

And, fnorish, trying to be delicate here, but--um--could items turning up in the freezer be a factor of your age? My husband, just turned 50, leaves things in the oddest places--although never in the refrigerator, yet. He'll have some object in his hand, get distracted by something else like a phone call, put the object down, and later have to spend a bit of time looking for the object again.

I discovered while in university that I was going to be completely and absolutely hopeless at remembering where my keys, purse, pencils, notebooks, and so on were, so I developed a strict routine: keys get clipped to purse immediately, purse goes into cabinet, mail goes into the blue box, computer stuff that I'm referring to (books, print outs, and so on) go into the basket on the floor next to my office chair, library books go into the magazine basket in the living room. In case you get the wrong idea, my household is not terribly neat--it is an assortment of piles of stuff, but the piles are in categories most of the time, else I'd be really at a loss.
 
sminky~ said:
I'm a knitter. Every time that I have to sew up seams on an item, things seem to go smoothly. I get the project sewn. Then my yarn needle disappears. Every time!
So if there is a gnome or something in my house, it must like to sew or knit.

Just a random silly thing.. I was reading this thread from the beginning, and read someone's suggestion to ask for the thing back.

A couple days ago, when home sick from work, I was knitting and was just about to finish a project. I was having trouble remembering exactly how to end it (I'm just a beginner) and so I took the needle that my work was on, got up from the couch, walked about ten feet to the computer, looked it up, and went back to the couch... only to find that my other needle was gone. In the few days since, I've torn the house apart looking for it, and have had no luck at all. I have two cats, but also have hardwood floors, so I'd think I would have heard it if one of them knocked it off the table or something (as I was close nearby the whole time).

So, I was reading this thread from the beginning, and read someone's suggestion to ask for the thing back... so I said out loud, "Can I have my knitting needle back, please?" and then scrolled immediately down to your post about always losing knitting tools. :shock:

-Kat
 
The Boggarts keep taking items of mine every day namely...my hair :D
 
tamyu said:
ElishevaBarsabe said:
Fascinating. You have the basis of a short story or television program here. Go for it!

The big thing is, I don`t really want to think too deeply about it. I really don`t want to start being afraid of my plates... I think I may copy down the poetic lines sometime though. I usually don`t pay too much attention to them, so that part is probably just my forgetting the line between readings, and nothing fortean.
Could you post the lines here?

They might provide a Clue... [ryn puts on deerstalker hat, and polishes magnifying glass.]

If you don't know the author, someone here may recognise the poem.
 
sminky~ said:
I'm a knitter. Every time that I have to sew up seams on an item, things seem to go smoothly. I get the project sewn. Then my yarn needle disappears. Every time!
So if there is a gnome or something in my house, it must like to sew or knit.

Your darning needles disappear, too? Wow, I thought this problem only happened to me. I just had to purchase a new pack of 5 needles this week.

Where are they all going?

And what are they doing?

:shock:
 
ElishevaBarsabe said:
And, fnorish, trying to be delicate here, but--um--could items turning up in the freezer be a factor of your age?

oh no, i really doubt that. unless my minds starting to go at 25. but then, i suppose senility isnt a huge step from my natural state of constant bewilderment, so its possible its somehow just me being hideously absentminded. or maybe time is inappropriately nonlinear at my place. i have to doubt that, though, because things stopped appearing in my freezer once i started looking there first. now they appear in seemingly random places.
 
I'm new here and have been dying to finally be able to post something, what with the 24-hour waiting period and moderator approval.

I've heard stories about disappearing objects from two different people, so it's maybe not as rare an event as one might think.

I've had the occasional experience, like things that were just one moment ago there disappearing and then showing up somewhere else weeks later. I heard about asking the fairies to bring them back, too, and got a missing necklace back in that way.

However, the two stories I'm talking about are of a different kind.

1. A former roommate of mine (and a devoted rockhound) went digging with his girlfriend one time. He was taking a snack break, spooning out half a watermelon, when the spoon got "hooked" in the melon's flesh and flew out of S.' hand. S. said he watched as the spoon -- almost like in slow motion -- twirled end over end in the air, coming down in a long arch and landing in a tiny, scruffy bush. Of course, you guessed it, it was gone. Even though S. searched the bush (which he said was not thick and there were no animal holes/burrows underneath) for almost an hour, he couldn't find it. It never showed up again.

2. Even more amazing: my boss, who is a staunch atheist and science buff and has basically called me insane many times for my spiritual/paranormal/etc. beliefs, grudgingly related the following story (I actually had to pry it out of him, asking him if he really never, ever had anything weird happen to him that he couldn't explain). He said he had a major fallout with his then-wife. They happened to be in the bathroom, yelling at each other, and he got so frustrated that he threw a shampoo bottle (not at her). It landed in the small space between the toilet and the bathtub, never to be seen again. He said (just like S.) that he tore apart the bathroom to find it, to no avail.

Now imagine how many people that might happen to who just think the object rolled somewhere underneath, and just shrug and forget about it...

I totally buy the "dimensional portal" theory.
 
faith2faith said:
...he threw a shampoo bottle (not at her). It landed in the small space between the toilet and the bathtub, never to be seen again. He said (just like S.) that he tore apart the bathroom to find it, to no avail.

Could it have been the case that before he had time to go looking for it, assuming he didnt get on his knees mid-argument, his (then) wife had picked it up, still angry and threw it away or something.
 
Oh, in that case he'd never make a claim like that. I'm sure he has thought through every single possible explanation.

You don't know him, this is a guy who will ALWAYS try to find a natural/scientific explanation for everthing. If he saw a ghost right in front of him, he'd rather believe that he were mentally ill than to acknowledge there might be something to it... seriously.

Once, when I told him about a supernatural experience of mine that was witnessed by other people, he actually suggested an episode of mass psychosis... :)
 
faith2faith said:
Once, when I told him about a supernatural experience of mine that was witnessed by other people, he actually suggested an episode of mass psychosis... :)

Well, mass psychosis is one possible explanation... Lets try and be inclusive here.

To be honest, what I feel, is that when something becomes "lost", it is an inability of someone to find it with the usual tools/approaches. I somehow cant find it in me to accept that because something cannot be found, it has undergone some fundamental atomic change and slipped into another dimension.

Two examples:

I once sold a car to a friend of mine for £1. It was great car, and he was a good friend, and that was the deal we made. A few months later the car disappeared from outside where he lived. It was reported to the police and was never to be seen again. Do you think a case could be made for paranormal activity/parallel dimensionality?

Also, ever found a website using google? And then gone looking for it a week or so later, trying different search terms that you were sure had returned the site you found and you need to get to again? Well, maybe you used different search terms or googles tables have been updated. Would it occur to anyone to think the website had been sucked into another dimension or been spirited away by strange beings?
 
Well, IMO the two examples you bring really don't fly. A) if my car disappeared from a parking space in front of my house, I'd think someone stole it (or I parked it somewhere else and forgot about it -- has happened to me), and B) if I can't find a Google site, I'd think I used different search words before or Google has removed the site for whatever reason, or maybe the domain name is not valid anymore.

In other words, perfectly natural explanations. I think it's kind of disrespectful to assume that everyone in this forum is either a New Age flake willing to believe just about anything without asking questions, or insane. Personally, I'd call myself a skeptical believer. I don't assume supernatural causes unless there's really no good "natural" explanation. And I'm almost sure that, if only our sciences were a little more advanced, there'd probably be "natural" explanations for many of the now unexplained things as well. However, given the current status quo, there are things that you just can't explain away...
 
Yup, well said! I agree. Rigorous reality checks are always in order. That way, when we really can't explain an event away, we can start thinking of it in Fortean terms.
 
This happened to me on sunday. Actually rather freaked me out

My wife went shopping and we decided that when she'd finished we'd go for a late lunch, so we arranged to meet at the pub.

Whilst she was shopping, I got ready and whilst I was shaving, she called on my mobile. I got to it too late and as I picked it up she hung up. So 'cos I had no money left on the mobile I called her back from the house phone. At this point, in the living room, i still had my phone.

However, once shaved and dressed, i could not find my phone anywhere. I turned the flat upside down and looked for more than 20 minutes - more than enough considering I live in a very small, one bedroom flat

Eventually, severely exasperated, I gave up (i would have called it but couldn't remember the number) and left to meet the wife.

Upon returning a few hours later, we opened the front door to see my mobile laying exactly in the middle of the floor of the entrance hallway (a floorspace about 2m sq.)

There is absolutely no way on earth that the phone could have been there when I left the flat. To get into any room of the flat or to leave the flat you need to walk across where the phone was lying and I walked back and forward across that space multiple times whilst looking for the phone. I could not have avoided seeing it or even stepping on it.

Short of my wife trying to drive me mad by sneaking in to hide the phone, waiting till I've gone and then replacing it, I have no idea how it could have got there

PS - I have never experienced anything vaguely Fortean - although my brother claims to have seen a UFO, which is a source of much sibling mick-taking
 
My story kind of relates to losing things. However, I seem to have the ability to find missing objects than no-one else can, no matter how long they look for. Apparently (so my mum tells me) even before I was talking in full sentences I would find missing objects that my parents/brothers/sister couldn't find. For example my mother would be in the kitchen and say something like 'I cant find my bloody purse'. I would then toddle off into another room, before returning with said item. After I had done this a few times my parents began to use my as a human bloodhound whenever they lost something and it has carried on until recent times. I am now 27 and still have the ability to locate stuff within, usually within a few seconds, but it never takes longer than a few minutes. My sister even phoned me to go over to her house (15 mile drive) when she lost her engagement ring. She had been looking for it for a few hours. I managed to find it within a minute or so of being in the house, which was especially strange as it was only the second time I had been in the house as she had just moved in. It was actually in a room in a cupboard that I didn't even know existed. I went straight to that room and the cupboard was the second place I looked. The first place being the chest of drawers right next to the cupboard.

When I am looking for something I never let my family/friends come with me to find the missing object as I believe it will stop me from finding it. I don't know why I feel that way, but I just do. I have never actually let them accompany me to see if it has an affect so don't know if this is the case. I feel that if I do let them it will kind of break the spell/I will lose my ability. Also, I never ever tell them where I have found the object. I think at first (as a kid) I did this as it made me appear all mysterious and superhuman. But now it has become a part of the process. Again, I feel that if I tell them where I found the object then my ability will disappear.

I don't know whether I have some kind of strange ability, or whether I just think in a rational way that helps me locate missing stuff. There are some incidents I can recall where I have quickly found stuff in strange places, which makes me think that the rationally thinking theory is wrong - but maybe these were just flukes. I don't really know.

Reading this back I sound kind of freaky but I can assure you that I am a intelligent (just got my degree results back yesterday - got a 1st class with honours, get in!) and rational bloke. I'm not prone to having a wild imagination and I will always try to explain things scientifically before considering/accepting a more paranormal explanation.
 
TommyK13 said:
I don't know whether I have some kind of strange ability, or whether I just think in a rational way that helps me locate missing stuff. There are some incidents I can recall where I have quickly found stuff in strange places, which makes me think that the rationally thinking theory is wrong - but maybe these were just flukes. I don't really know.
Tommy K, maybe you can help locate my pal's car..? (see above)

Theres always the theory that one person looking for an object will look in the same places over and over and someone else will routinely look in a different set of places. Is that cognitive dissonance - getting someone else to proof-read your work?

However, you seem to have a particular gift for locating stuff, although presumably there are times when even you are flummoxed?. Id be inclined to test your theory of the talent not happening when someone else is around.
 
Someone I knew very well was excellent at finding lost things, right from when he was small, very much like Tommy K.

He unfortunately died, but he is the person I now ask when things go missing. They always turn straight up. :D
 
Tommy K, maybe you can help locate my pal's car..? (see above)

Theres always the theory that one person looking for an object will look in the same places over and over and someone else will routinely look in a different set of places. Is that cognitive dissonance - getting someone else to proof-read your work?

However, you seem to have a particular gift for locating stuff, although presumably there are times when even you are flummoxed?. Id be inclined to test your theory of the talent not happening when someone else is around.

The only thing that I can remember being missing for a long period is a gold ring that belonged to me. This was fairly recently and it eventually turned up after a few months under my bed. However, as far as I can recall, I never actually had a real look for it. It is a ring that I used to wear on my little finger, but is a bit small to keep on for sustained periods so sometimes I would wear it - if I was going out or something. One day I went to put it on but it wasn't in the place I usually keep it, but as I was in a rush to go out I didn't bother looking elsewhere. The ring has no sentimental value and I wasn't overly bothered about it so I don't THINK that I had a search for it at any point. Perhaps if I had then I would have found it (probably would as under the bed is pretty obvious). Of course it is also possible that I did look for it and didn't find it. I cant honestly remember.

Whether there are other things that I have failed to locate I don't know - I tend not to trust my memory too much as I believe we can be selective (memory wise) to support our own purposes/wishes/ego etc. All I know is that my family and friends regard me as someone who can find things that are lost. One of my friends has muscular dystrophy, which means our group of mates spend a lot of time at his house as it is difficult for him to get about. Whenever anything goes missing at his house (tv remote, CD, Computer game, lighter, bottle opener, rizzlas etc.) I am always the one who is charged with finding it. The rest of them don't even bother looking beyond the table or the floor in front of them - they know that I will find it on my own. I did get annoyed with this at one point as it seemed that they were taking the piss and I had to do all the work. But having refused to look for my mates car keys once and being annoyed at him searching for them for 15 minutes, I went to the fridge to get another beer and couldn't help but have a quick look round. I found the keys almost immediately in the fruit bowl in the kitchen. I decided then that it was just less hassle to look for stuff myself. It is funny because I have never really discussed my ability to find stuff at length with any of my mates - they just know and accept that I am the best man for the job. This acceptance from my friends that I have the ability to find things is something that I haven't even questioned until I started writing this post. It is a role that I have just kind of adopted.

As for testing my theory regarding not being able to find stuff when someone else is around, im not too sure. It is a double edged sword. Like I say, I feel (for some unexplainable reason) that if I did it would spoil my ability - and I mean in the long term, not just during the search for that particular object. This could be handy round at my mates house, as in future I could sit back and enjoy a smoke/beer whilst they all looked for the missing object. On the other hand, what if I am late to an appointment and cant find my car keys? I may curse testing my theory. I think I will just leave it as it is. Why risk ruining what is (on the whole) a good thing? My instincts are usually pretty good and im sticking with them on this occasion.
 
Previously on this thread I wrote about losing an audio CD of a prophecy that was pronounced over me by a pastor who said he had the gift. Well, I listened to it once, then told Missus Prof "I'll put this where I won't lose it." It promptly disappeared. This was several years ago. A couple of times I've asked the wee folk to please return it. I've searched our cottage to no avail. I had a hunch it was on the bookshelves, and when we moved them from one side of the room to other, which meant moving each and every book, I thought I'd find it. Nope. This past week I asked the chap who recorded it for me if he still had the original recording. Of course, he answered, he never throws anything away (single chap). Yesterday Missus Prof asked me to dust all my books, and arrange them instead of piling them. You guessed it, I picked up "The Search For Significance", and the CD plopped out!! I leave it to you whether this was a case of 'borrowing' or not !!??
 
I just had an odd experience with disappearing, appearing items.

In Japan, the bank issues you a bank book. I`m not sure how banks work in other countries, but the bank books we receive are almost as good as a bank card. You insert them into an ATM where all your transactions are printed. You can also use the book to actually make transactions.
In other words, the bank book is very important.

I keep all my bank books together in a drawer, or in my purse. I do all my banking on the same day, so they`re never separated.

Somewhere along the line, I noticed one of them was missing. Sometimes my husband will do the banking and leave one in his bag, but this time he hadn`t. I searched all through the house, everywhere I could think of. It was nowhere. I gave up and figured it would eventually turn up and that I must have misplaced it... Or at the worst my son found it and used it as a toy.

After it hadn`t turned up for a few months, I gave up and went through the painful paperwork to cancel the old one and get a new one.

Last night, after 6 months of it being MIA, I was cleaning up in the kitchen. My husband and son were asleep. I heard a strange scratching noise from our living room area (The kitchen counter opens to the living room, so the area was in view at the time.) It sounded like an animal scratching, but I had just shut both of our cats in their room for the night. When I went to investigate, the old bankbook was lying on the coffee table - a table that I had just wiped down minutes before, and that we didn`t even have when the thing disappeared.

All very odd.
 
reusing an old thread here to express my annoyance at the little people that steal things in my flat. Last October I needed my passport, I seached my flat from top to bottom over a period of days and the bloody thing was nowhere to be found. Had to go through all the rigramole of cancelling it and then getting it reissued and the assocated costs.

This morning I was looking for my cheque book which had also vanished from its normal place and found my old passport, sitting on the lower shelf of my coffee table in plain view where my cheque book would normally be.

After swearing at the fairies for taking it in the first place I asked them nicely if, after all the trouble they had put me through, would they consider giving it back quickly as I needed it today. I walked into my bedroom picked up my bag and there, sitting in it bold as brass, was my cheque book.

I never put it in my bag so I don't know how it managed to get in there. I live alone so no-one would have moved it there without me knowing about it, but at least I got it back. I hope that they have had their fun with me for the time being.
 
Spoons, teaspoons specifically, I'll do dishes on a monday night and put them all away (8 of them), Tuesday morning I've only got one left. If thats not strange enough a week later I've got tea spoons again, just in a different pattern than the rest of my flatware. Haven't lost a fork, knife or soup spoon in the over two years I've lived here. I also go through this with clothing but thats an entirely different story.
 
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