The Fractal Hall Journal

Sweet Lord Cthulhu on a landspeeder, isn’t the American election over yet? I am so very, very sick of reading about that doddering old bastard and that loon he’s got running with him. Well, let’s face it, it’s that loon that most people seem to be writing about, and I’ve reached a saturation point where I no longer care. Am I not concerned with matters of global political significance? Of course I am. That’s why I just want them to hurry up and get on with whatever it is they need to get on with so we can all return our focus to impending economic catastrophe and building nuclear bunkers in our gardens. Because “Jabbing Russia With A Pokey Stick” had become a popular past-time of late and that has always turned out so well before.

I don’t know, it’s always easy to roll your eyes at how fucking bugnuts the world is, because you don’t have to look too far to find the crazy at any given point in history. But the whole creationism thing has really been eating at me recently. You kind of expect it of our fellows across the Atlantic (and I don’t mean to have a mean old jab or anything, but it does seem to come up a lot over there), but I get really itchy when it crops up in British newspapers as a thing. I mean, we all know it’s crazy? Don’t we? It’s just a stupid thing the media wants to make a drama of, right?

Then again, the politicians have recently started taking pot shots at women’s reproductive rights, and I thought that particular battle had been won a long time ago (ho, ho). It just doesn’t take much effort for matters to regress.

How depressing. Let’s have some links.

A three-year Southampton University study into the “out-of-body experience” phenomenon has kicked off. Because we are all cursed to never learn from the mistakes of Kiefer Sutherland in Flatliners.

Alien tat of the day: Almost five hundred quid’s worth of coffee table. If I could, I would buy all of the outrageously priced Alien and Predator junk I could get my hands on, and keep it all in one room tastefully decorated by Giger himself.

Irish novelist Eoin Colfer has been hired to write a sixth Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy novel. Now, this is an interesting story. Not surprising, because Douglas Adams’ books have always been incredibly popular, and who wants the gravy train to stop just because the author’s dead? I’m sure plenty of fanboys are screaming bloody murder.

But. I always felt the fifth Hitchhiker’s was awful, and a terrible way to end the series. And Adams always said he intended to do a sixth. I’m not what you’d call a dedicated fan of his, which makes it easier for me not to mind so much, I suppose. And I’ve never read any of Colfer’s work, but he really is phenomenally popular so he must have something going for him. I just really want a better ending than Mostly Harmless. Seriously, it was such a downer it really spoiled my enjoyment of the earlier books. So I’m certainly picking this one when it comes out.

And finally, a few bits of sad news from the music industry; the deaths of Pink Floyd’s Richard Wright and Motown’s Norman Whitfield. I’ve mentioned before that I’ve been getting my prog on recently, and probably appreciating the Floyd more than I have in the past. And Whitfield, christ, just look at a list of songs he co-wrote. Those are some of the greatest records ever made. And he was right. War is good for absolutely nothing.

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1. Fractal Fact: The official elementary particle of the Journal is the gluon.

2. I’ve just heard an awesome bit on the Virgin Radio (soon to be known as Absolute Radio, as they constantly fucking remind us) morning show, where the DJ discusses whether or not the basement studio they’re broadcasting from is haunted. 1 Golden Square, where the station’s based, is allegedly built on a plague pit. Then again so is, you know, the rest of London.

3. In a list of films the world really doesn’t need, a new set of Terminator films written by the genius behind The Net and Terminator 3: Big Pile Of Wank, and directed by McG is perhaps at the very top. Christian Bale’s presence suggests it won’t quite be the dire, useless waste the AvP films are, but still. What’s the point?

The thing is, there are some things that work nicely in films as throwaway comments useful for world-building, but suddenly take on unwarranted weight in sequels or prequels. Like the “Clone-Wars”. One of these things is the mention of rubber-skinned T-600s in the original James Cameron film. Now McG wants them to be a major part of the new series, only eight-foot high with built-in gattling guns.

That is one of the most spectacular examples of missing the point I’ve ever seen. Bravo, Mr McG. Bravo.

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Brief, yes. Very brief. Unacceptably brief, one might say. But on time, at least.

Right, first of all, while the Penguin Book of Ghosts is a very good book, it’s unfortunately (for me) a collection of the ghost stories already published in The Lore of the Land, so back off to Amazon it goes. Also, I’m getting 404 errors on the Telegraph links from the other day while the other newspaper links still work, so no more clicky for them. Is this right-wing newspaper punishing a left-wing blogger? YOU DECIDE.

More on the hotbed of spectral activity that is Ludlow (Ludlow?).

And returning to the Fair Country, a couple of months ago an NHS trust in North Wales apologised to a patient after (amongst other things) one of her nurses claimed to have seen a ghost.

And finally, a video link. Turns out the place where Byker Grove was filmed may be haunted. It’s already cursed ground, of course, having launched the careers of both Ant and Dec.

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It turns out that Britain really is in the grip of a UFO invasion. At least, it is according to the Torygraph (via Warren Ellis). Now, I’m pretty sure the (ahem) “quality” daily isn’t owned by Murdock. Or, for that matter, Marvel. And they’re usually pretty hostile towards the BBC. So we can rule out advertising stunts for the X-Files, Secret Invasion and Doctor Who, respectively. Strange shit is indeed afoot (or aflight), although I haven’t heard of much in the way of abductions, implantations or probings. At least, no more than usual for Cardiff on a Saturday night.

The rest of the papers are getting in on the action, too. The Guardian recently featured a ghost-busting weekend in Ludlow (Ludlow?) as a recommended activity holiday. The Indie’s ran an article on ten scary tales from folklore, and if we hop back to the Telegraph for a sec, we’ve got Civil War ghosts showing up on camera.

Man, I could eat this stuff up with a spoon. I should turn the Journal into a Paranormablog.

The Independent article is particularly interesting to me because it’s written by Jennifer Westwood and Jacqueline Simpson, who authored the absolutely indispensable book The Lore of the Land, one of the most comprehensive volumes of English folklore I’ve ever seen. It was recommended by Neil Gaiman on his site a couple of years ago, and it’s one of the best suggestions I’ve ever got from the internet. Yes, even better than instructions on how to use Mentos to blow up Diet Coke. The article includes extracts from The Penguin Book Of Ghosts, so you can bet that just jumped to the top of the buy list. Sorry, hardback collection of The Rise And Fall Of The Shi’Ar Empire.

One of my major ambitions has been to contribute to a great work of reference (stop giggling at the back, I’m being serious. You all know this site is an official nerd-haven). I’d love to tackle a book like the one above that dealt with Welsh folklore. Even though the whole lack of focus and short attention span thing may well get in the way.

The Haunting Breaks mentioned in the Guardian sound pretty cool too. Long term readers may recall a trip to Edinburgh I mentioned here last year. We actually went on one of the Edinburgh ghost tours, into one of the vaults beneath the streets. It was pretty effing scary, even for people not as easily terrified as I am.

The only problem with the tour was the vague worry that an actor would jump out on the tour group for a cheap scare. It didn’t happen, which I was glad for, because you don’t pay your money for a ghost train, you want to get creeped out by spooky stories, stone circles and dark rooms. The whole point of going is for the chance of maybe seeing a real ghost, and cheap tricks would have really soured the experience. Then I found out not long ago from a mate who lives in Edinburgh that some of the tours do have “jumpers” on them, which is seriously disappointing.

Returning to the Telegraph one more time, Archaeologists are planning on opening a long-sealed chamber beneath a Mexican pyramid. I don’t know about anyone else, but with all the weird shit above, is this a fantastic idea? I mean, I’m jumpy enough about the Large Hadron Collider as it is, but after watching The Mist, I’m somewhat concerned about the consequences of anything that may lead to tentacled insectile monstrocities roaming over the planet.

In other, lighter news, and as a palate cleanser to the end of the world as we know it, I caught Kung Fu Panda the other day. Damn, it’s a great film, way better than any of the Shreks or the Cars or the Monster Houses we’ve been plagued with recently. It may well be my favouritest CGI cartoon ever, although that may change as soon as this Friday, what with Wall-E’s arrival on these shores. And impressive CGI aside, I’d actually have rather seen the entire film done in the stylised animation form that the initial dream sequence was made with. The best thing about the movie, and I know it’s been said by many people before but it bears repeating, is that it’s a genuinely great action film, as well as being hilarious. Seriously, the bad guy’s escape from prison was absolutely riveting. Speaking of which- Lovejoy as the voice of an evil snow leopard? Who saw that one coming?

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Not too long ago, The Sun had a front-page bit on a UFO being seen above Cardiff, before being chased by a Police helicopter across the Bristol Channel and disappearing.

I was irrationally excited about this. The reason I liked the X-Files so much, and by extension the reason I’ve been inflicting a couple of hundred episodes’ worth of meandering commentary on your good selves about it over the past few months, is due to a fascination with UFOs (and ghosts, and lake monsters, and other paranormal weirdness) I had when I was a kid. So a local sighting is pretty cool, and not just for making pithy Torchwood gags.

The BBC news, of course, has to go and piss on everyone’s chips by soberly reporting that, yes, a flying object was spotted that wasn’t immediately identified by the crew of the helicopter, but that there’s plenty of boring regular stuff up there that a crew wouldn’t necessarily be able to identify straight off the bat and anyway, the rules say they’re not allowed to go haring off over the River Severn on a jolly, so they didn’t. At least the Beeb reported it. The other news sources didn’t bother, which just tells me they’re All In It Together, Suppressing The Truth.

It’s not the first time UFOs have been seen in my neck of the woods, actually. Back before the First World War, when things were gearing up for conflict and the populace were aware of the Germans building huge balloon thingies, and were somewhat concerned about the possibility of using them to drop stuff on British cities (a fear that, as history tells us, wasn’t what you could call unfounded), many reports were recorded of zeppelins being sighted around the country.

Here’s a question: do humans really see odd shit in the sky, or is there just a widespread psychological fault that makes us think we see odd shit in the sky? Whatever the origins of the odd shit, back at the turn of the last century the little green men of popular culture hadn’t quite taken hold yet, so the oddness was attributed, as is the cultural habit of the British, to the Germans.

I’ve got a ton of books on the supernatural. Whenever I go on holiday, I always pick up a couple of tourist targeted volumes. You know the kind. Local, small-press stuff, with questionable proof-reading values, glossy paper, stuffed into spinner rack in the Visitor’s Centre with titles like “The Ghosts of Alberta” in a spooky wobbly font. I’ve also got a load of large-page hardback titles, a format not unlike the Beano and Dandy annuals, picked up on the cheap from remainder book stores. In fact, if I recall correctly, Brother Paul has a stack, too, all filled with the kind of deadly serious matter-of-fact articles about abductions and devil dogs that are terrifying when you’re twelve. I find them terrifying now, but then I’m a soft-touch scaredy cat who was reduced to quivering jelly by “An American Haunting”, so I may not be the most objective commentator.

A mention of your home town in books like this is going to stick with you. As part of an overview of the Mystery Zeppelin phenomena, one of the articles told the story of a man who saw one of these craft land on Caerffili Mountain, and got close enough to hear the occupants speak in a foreign language he didn’t recognise before scurrying back to the balloon and heading off over Cardiff. Classic UFO encounter.

The reason I bring this up, is that last week The Sun runs another UFO story, a full front-pager this time, on UFOs being sighted over a military base. This made me think two things: firstly, that’s a few slow news weeks we’ve been getting. Secondly, that’s nicely timed, considering there’s a new X-Files movie coming out in a few weeks’ time.

The last thought chilled me. Really. Because The Sun is owned by Rupert Murdoch, who in turn owns Fox- who produce the X-Files.

I’m not saying the aliens are here and are in league with News Corp (or am I?), but it’s no bloody coincidence that this stuff is getting on their front page- is getting a prominent, dedicated section of The Sun’s website, in fact (no link to The Scum from here, though, oh no. No clicky for Rupert)- on the run-up to the new movie. That kind of blatant manipulation really is spooky.

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