Case no 0006 - Dr Who?

I have had an exchange of emails with my friend Russell, and also quite an agitated phone call. He sent me a video. He said it showed the face of Elizabethan mathematician/magican Dr John Dee in a can of paint.




For some reason the video played upside down on my computer so I couldn't see the face. There followed a phone call from Russell who had just come back from a school fete with Sachi and Mio - they visit events like this as prospective parents, to check whether the schools will be suitable for Mio. He said it was ridiculous that I couldn't see the face in the can of paint. He said that even Mio had looked at it and pointed and said, 'Face'. I said he should have taken the can of paint to the school fete and asked the other parents if they could see a face in it. I said he should have got irate if they said no.

He sent me another video.




I seemed to recognise the face so I posted this photo on Facebook hoping the face recognition software would suggest a name to tag it with, which it didn't. However, there was a thrilling development. My friend Serena said it looked like the fourth Dr Who, Tom Baker.



Conclusion: Evidence of time travel.

Case no 0005 - American Gothic

INVESTIGATOR: Helen Smith

Notes: I saw the man from this painting (American Gothic by Grant Wood) on the Tube yesterday. I got on the Victoria line going southbound from Oxford Circus and sat down directly opposite him. He was a tall man and he was wearing a pinstriped suit and resting his hands on his knees. I recognised him immediately. Although his clothes were different and he wasn't wearing glasses or carrying a pitchfork, his expression was strikingly similar to his expression in the painting. I stared at him but I didn't speak to him. He left the train at Victoria.

The painting is from 1930 and can be seen at The Art Institute of Chicago. It was painted in oil on beaver board.

Anything else? The Art Institute of Chicago tells us that Grant Wood used his sister and their dentist as models. Other sources tell us that his sister was called Nan Graham Wood and the dentist was called Dr Byron McKeeby.

This photo shows Nan and Dr McKeeby standing next to the painting. Dr McKeeby doesn't look much like the man in the painting - only his glasses are similar. The man on the Victoria Line opposite me yesterday looked exactly like the man in the painting, except for the glasses. Perhaps Grant Wood used his dentist's glasses as a prop and that's what persuaded Dr McKeeby to go along with the subterfuge?

I know that I should have used my phone to try to take a picture of the man on the Victoria Line as evidence. But taking clandestine pictures of strangers seems intrusive and I wouldn't feel right about publishing it here, even if I'd managed to get a decent shot of him.

However, if you compare the photo of Dr McKeeby to the man in the painting, it's difficult to believe that he was really used as the model. His head is too narrow at the top and he's not tall enough. His ears are different. His mouth is different. And take a look at Nan's expression in the painting. She looks pretty much the way you'd expect someone to look if confronted with evidence of time travel.
 
What does it mean? It's evidence of time travel.
 
Also see: Katie Pitts's theory of time travel.

Categorised under: Time travel.

Messages from America

just quickly, messages from the universe came thick and fast in america. i got 's' 't' 'r' 'o' 'f' 'i' 'i' through either missing or doubled letter misspellings. maybe america is closer to some sort of 'portal' for messages from the universe. maybe because i was more relaxed i was more able to see the messages. or maybe i am just becoming more alert to them in general. below are some examples of the missing or extra letters.

so far i've got the message 'it is for...' from the letters, i will keep working on it xxx ps, couldn't work out how to put this on the 'msgs from the universe' pg L xxx

One of our agents is missing

It has been very quiet here at SBI as one of our agents is missing. She has been spotted in America.

Units of Forgetfulness

You and I have been out and about a lot in recent days - you've been working, I've been going to parties - and nothing paranormal has happened. That, in itself, seems quite paranormal, unless you take the view that paranormal things only happen to people who stay in most of the time by themselves.

One thing that caught my eye last week was the report in the Guardian newspaper that West Midlands and Surrey police are offering a £1.5bn contract for private firms to investigate crime and detain suspects. Do you think we should tender for it? I would enjoy the investigation but I wouldn't enjoy detaining suspects. I imagine it would be a bit like having builders in the house - lots of cups of tea and coffee, and trips to Tesco up the road to buy them chocolate biscuits and muffins. Of course, builders are usually here by consent. What is the etiquette when detaining suspects? Presumably the promise of a blueberry muffin would not be enough to keep the suspects here if they didn't wish to be detained. I could lock them in the cellar. But actually I'd hate to keep someone here against their will. You know how I feel about animal rights. It would not be possible to speak out so vehemently against the imprisonment of animals in circuses and zoos while keeping suspects detained in the cellar on behalf of the West Midlands or Surrey police.

No sooner had I started writing this post, complaining that nothing paranormal had happened, than something occurred that was very mysterious (frightening, even). I went to make a bread-based snack to keep my spirits up, to help me finish writing the allocated 1000 words of my novel today. I found the bread easily enough, but I couldn't find any almond butter to put on it, even though I'd bought a jar of it the other day. It ought to have been in the 'dry goods' cupboard by the washing machine but it wasn't there. I looked in the fridge and found it in there, of all places, with the cellophane wrapper still intact. And yet I knew I had opened it and eaten some of the contents (very almondy, if you 're wondering how it tastes.) Weird! Self-healing cellophane! We could make a fortune... However, further investigation revealed a second jar of almond butter in the fridge. This one had been opened.

Remember when I thought I had bought a jar of almond butter, couldn't find it and went out and replaced it? Now I have two jars of almond butter. But why? What does it all mean? One possible explanation is that the original jar disappeared in some kind of 'Brigadoon' circumstances for 17 days, only to reappear this afternoon. Another is that the universe is calling out to me, telling me that there is plenty of paranormal activity, if only I look closely enough. Another explanation is that it's a sign of forgetfulness. I don't know how many jars of almond butter I would have to buy before calling in medical professionals, or even if such people measure forgetfulness in units of jars of almond butter.

I would like to do further research on units of forgetfulness. I think of the heyday of science as being the time when scientists were inventing new units of measurement, don't you? The kelvin, the watt, the pascal, the ampere, the ohm, the volt and the joule. I would like to give my name to a unit of forgetfulness, or to anything scientific and esoteric.

Case no 0004 - Dog Mind Meld

Our attention was drawn to a cold case from 1990 by our friend Mr. Terence Dackombe in the comments of a previous post:

Here are the facts of the case as explained by TD:

"Naturally I have been very impressed by your extensive record of solving mysteries. Thus I am awarding you a multi-million pound* contract to help me resolve a mystery that has troubled me for many years.

In 1990, I travelled, by car, with my then girlfriend and her dog to Worthing. We went for a stroll in the sea; I was wearing tracksuit bottoms and a t-shirt. I had my keys, including my car keys in the pocket of the tracksuit bottoms. The pocket was rather shallow and when I emerged from the water and we had sat down, I noticed my keys were no longer in my pocket.

I imagined all sorts of possibilities for the next step - train journey home, pick up spare keys, return to Worthing and so on.

However, I said I would re-trace my steps. My girlfriend said it was a forlorn hope as we had no idea where we had entered the sea or retracted from it. I walked in a straight line from where we were seated, walked out into the sea to about the height I imagined we had reached, looked down and picked up my keys which were lying on the sea bed, about four feet below.

We returned, triunphantly, to Berkshire, with no need for spare keys. Was this a simple piece of good fortune, or was there 'special forces' at work?

It was a warm June day; we had never been to Worthing before; no other party was involved; the dog was useless and just sat down looking bored.

*May be re-negotiated.

Terence Dackombe, February 2012"

Our initial response:

Mmmm, this is a very interesting case. I know we said we were 'not for hire' but personally I'd consider doing anything for a million pounds, even a headstand.

Key words here seem to be: straight line, keys, girlfriend, Berkshire, Worthing.

Other significant elements might be: warm day in June, tracksuit bottoms, dog.

I do think it important that you recall the dog 'was useless and just sat down looking bored.' In fact, dogs usually like retrieving things, and they are seldom bored, which is why they make such cheerful companions.

It seems strange that the dog didn't join in the 'game' of looking for the keys. Did it affect looking bored while actually using special powers to take control of your mind and direct you to the exact spot where the keys had been lost?

I need to confer with my colleague but I believe that special forces were at work - a kind of dog/man mind meld.

I would categorise this under 'paranormal'.

We are trying to establish SBI's reputation as we are newly-established, and so we will waive our fee for this one.

We got in touch with TD ('Sir Terence') via Twitter to make further enquiries about the dog. We felt that if it was his girlfriend's dog, it might have been jealous of him. The response was significant:



It transpires that the dog was a Jack Russell called Rambo. Jack Russells, as we know, are highly intelligent:



So, it was TD's birthday! Very interesting. Presumably Mary-Ann had been making a fuss of him that day.

Conclusion: The dog, Rambo, was jealous of TD and wanted to discredit him. Rambo used some kind of mind meld technique that day in Worthing. First, Rambo caused TD to lose the keys in the sea. Next, the dog propelled TD towards the sea in a straight line, like a remote controlled human toy, to retrieve them. The 'bored' appearance of the dog was due to intense concentration.

The straight line is important: humans rarely walk in a straight line; it would be more usual to use a frantic wiggle to cover as much ground as possible in the hunt for the keys. It emphasises TD's robotic, controlled state. Also, the dog couldn't resist making it clear that he knew exactly where the keys were, by sending TD directly to their location without deviation.

By using TD like a toy, Rambo was attempting to demonstrate his superiority to him to Mary-Ann. The dog's intention was to ruin the relationship.

Categorised as: Paranormal.

[n.b. pictures posted by a model.]

Opening an eye onto another realm

This morning, just before the alarm went off, I opened my left eye too quickly and tore open the old wound in the vitreous jelly of my eye. Perhaps 'wound' is too extreme. It's a tiny vertical cut caused by inadvertently poking my eye with the plastic tab from a pair of sunglasses in TK Maxx in Croydon - you will remember that I had to drive home with my eyes mostly closed, with you shouting stop-start directions and navigating. It was serious enough that I had to go to the eye hospital at St Thomas's. I like visiting hospitals as it brings to mind the opening sequence of one of my favourite childhood TV programmes, The Six Million Dollar Man, and makes me feel studied and important. Still, I didn't enjoy it enough to want to recreate the experience by poking myself in the other eye. It's healed now but it hurts when it sometimes reopens (usually in winter, when I've had the central heating on and the air in the house is very dry), and it makes my eye flood with tears.

In light of the conclusions you drew yesterday about your auditory hallucinations, I thought perhaps the universe was opening my eye onto another realm. Now we have one eye open, two ears open, and a mouth open here to tell the world about our paranormal investigations.

We need to get on and recreate some of these investigations for our readers before the universe tears us a new arsehole. Have you seen the trailer for Of Dolls and Murder? Dioramas have been created using real-life crime for CSI students. Assuming that our readers are students of the paranormal, or at any rate interested in our investigations, we could consider creating a diorama of the paranormal. When I say 'we' I mean you.