Thread: Tales of the Unexplained

In light of the various threads where we are chatting about ghosts, ufos, poltergeists and haunted kitchen appliances, why not have a thread especially for sharing such personal tales of the unexplained?

Whatever it might be - if it was odd, creepy, fascinating, baffling or illuminating and it happened to you, why not share it here?

I'm no stranger to phenomena myself so am happy to share that I've had a plethora of unusual experiences - from 'Anomolous Lights', out-of-body experiences and apparent 'electrical sensitivity' to being clumsily followed by what can only be described as 'discarnate footsteps'.

So... do tell....

WARNING

Warning: This is an Old Thread This discussion is older than 60 days. information contained in it may no longer be current

Is electric sensitivity where you can't shop in Zavvi cos every time you touch the shelves you get a shock?

Other than that, I feel I am distinctly lacking in otherworldly attributes.

I don't really have any first hand experience of the supernatural - or at least not of anything I feel is definitely supernatural! But my day job involves working a couple of times a year at properties run by a particular organisation that manages a number of historic properties throughout Scotland. It's really funny, the staff there are under strict instructions not to emphasise the creepy/spooky/potentially haunted aspect of the properties they steward (never mind the fact that that is precisely what overseas visitors want to hear) but every single steward I have met through them has a story to tell...

Coooooerrr.............53 years on the planet, 40 years in astronomy, 30 years in and around witchery and "Ghost Hunters" down here and I have NEVER "seen" or "heard" or "felt" anything that has not been explained away. But, in saying this, Louise and I have (and this is where I make my self look stupid in front of Kittie!), "seen" two different dogs in the house and one cat, out in the communial private car park we both have "seen" numerous men walking back and forth.

IN 1973 I was walking the dog in Cumbernauld at Ash road in Abronhill and both the dog and I stopped rooted to the spot by a "something" coming through the snow storm at us from a field next to the bit of land we were standing on. I cannot describe it at all, all I know is that "Something" was there and it terrified us both.

As for UFO's, as in alien space craft? Yeah, right, I really, really believe in them..............Not! I have got something like 9,000 hours of night time observation time under my belt with naked eye, binocular and scientific grade telescopes, if we multiply that time by the amount of amateures there are on the planet in the same time frame it comes down to MILLIONS of hours and NOT ONE Astronomer has seen an alien space craft. I am NOT saying they do not exist, just that WE who activley are out there hunting the skies have seen nowt.

Ok, with all due respect to Kittie and tarot readers and astrologers etc in the MoB. I have been out MANY times with local "Ghost Hunters" in Dorset and Scotland over the years and all I have ever seen are people scaring them selfs.

Before you all start hexing me and slating me, let me say this to you all. I cannot prove nor disprove whether ghosts exist. The only "Ghost Hunters" etc that I get involved in by slagging them of are those who are total charletons and are taking money from vunerable people or, who activly go around gobbing of how they see "ghosts" and or UFO's every day of the week and communicate with them via aluminium pyramids in their living rooms!!!

I know I have just totally contradicted what I wrote in the first few lines but..............It could have been me not thinking properly or a smell reminded me of one of my dogs or a cat we had etc and so forth.

But, I STILL reckon Count Dracula is the greatest and I would also love to be My Lady Neerti's First Prime

OK, I'll give you a few ...

My UFO sighting - a large bright white light in the sky, about the size of the sun (as it appears to us) but oval, about the intensity of a street light. As we looked at it, it suddenly zoomed off at high speed with no apparent acceleration until we could no longer see it.

In my old family home, at extremely infrequent intervals, there would be a smell of burning, like matches or candles, when nothing had been lit. The day after the smell was noticed, there would always be bad news - but the smell wasn't there at every occassion we received bad news.

My older brother once lost a prized personal posession. He turned his bedroom upside down to no avail. The next day it was sitting in the middle of the floor, where there was no way he would have missed it if it had been there the day before. His explanation was easy - to this day he believes I took it and put it back when I felt guilty. But I know that I didn't, and that nobody else would do. He bullied me quite mercilessly when I was a child, so it's easy to see why he assumed I was out for revenge. But after that incident, other things would disappear and reappear, but only in that room.

Now, there are probably completely mundane explanations for all of these, and I'm sure they sound pretty mundane too, but they make me think hard, because I personally cannot explain them

I have quite a few - I'm the type of person who is always being accused of being psychic by my friends! However the one I'll talk about here illustrates many of the problems that afflict parapsychology - namely it happened when I was on my own and was entirely subjective. Anyways a couple of weeks after my grandfathers death I was round picking up my grandmother to take her out for something or other and while I was in the house I noticed that one of the carpets had slipped out from under it's gripper so I said I would grab a screwdriver and sort it out while she was gone. Anyway I had just finished repairing and screwing when I got an overwhelming sense of someone in the room and then felt some sort of ruffle my hair (not quite the right phrase but the closest I can come up with) in the same way my grandfather used to when I was younger. I was absolutely scared witless by this to begin with but that soon passed and actually it was quite nice as I felt that I got a chance to say goodbye as I hadn't been at the hospital when he died.

Anyway I know that this looks vary vague and any skeptic would immediately dismiss it as my mind playing tricks on me but I fond it very hard to ignore as the feelings were so defined and the feeling of presence so strong.

I haven't had any personal experiences but when I was younger (about 14-15) I sat one evening talking to my mum. She had had a drink, but she was telling me about the voices she heard. She told me I had a guardian angel who was a friend of mine who had died when I was 10, and she was over my left shoulder.

She told me that she had been communicating with someone she thought was called Brittany & she was associated with our neighbour. She spoke to the neighbour and she said she had a best friend called Bethany who died when they were little as well.

She also told me about the time she went for hypnotherapy when she was trying to give up smoking & lose weight and the hypnotherapist regressed her to find out the root of the problem. She recalled her "previous life" in such detail I could not think she was lying. I have read that people recall things that they have seen in movies and think they are past lives though...

I have since tried to talk to her and she refuses, saying she was just drunk.
I'm a scientist so am skeptical by nature, but when I was at school I used to read books about the unexplained when we had reading time in the library, and I still get pretty scared by Most Haunted even though I don't believe its real! :lol:

Well other than the shattering-wine-glass incident (which was absolutely terrifying at the time!) I can only share two admittedly second-hand ones...
First one was a bit odd- my father-in-law (a vicar) died three weeks ago after a nasty but thankfully short run-in with cancer. The night he died, I found my husband crying in the bedroom- never seen anybody cry like that- and once I'd settled him down and wiped his nose etc, we got the phone call saying that his father had died, which while it was expected, it wasn't expected that soon. That night he got up and went to stargaze in the back bedroom and was poking around with the telescope when he heard his father's voice very clearly, with a slight chuckle, saying "Go to bed with your wife!". He slunk back and promptly woke me up by putting his cold feet on my leg, and says he felt very, very calm.
The other is from a friend of mine- I'm the resident piper (Northumbrian) at Chillingham Castle, which is supposed to be the most haunted castle in Britain, and the owner, Sir Humphry, is a good pal. I've personally never seen/heard/felt anything odd there, although another friend who was Humph's right-hand man has been seen several times by other staff in the Great Hall which he'd helped restore. Now Humphry is a fine-art dealer, and a couple of years ago bought what he thought was a Victorian oil-painting on board of an Elizabethan-style lady. Turned out it was an original portrait, probably painted from life, of the niece of Mary Queen of Scots, which was nice for him! He has an original oil of Mary Queen of Scots (as we all do!) so he hung them next to each other, and went off to do some research. Turns out they hated each other- the next morning the painting was on the floor. He picked it up, made "Oh bugger!" noises, and hung it up again. The next morning it was back on the floor, with the hook ripped out of the wall. More "Oh bugger" noises and he poked a bigger hook in the wall, whacked it a bit harder with a hammer, and hung his picture back up. The next morning- and I saw the evidence that afternoon- the picture had been wrenched from the wall and flung 6ft across his study, the hook was ripped out again and the wire across the back was broken. I have an archaeology degree and an interest in forensics- I can't see how that wire was cut, if you bend wire and wiggle it till it snaps it has a little hooky shape at the end, if you cut it with a clipper the ends are flat like spades, if it's stretched or metal-fatigue'd the broken ends are pointed...these ends were flat, and looked like they'd been lasered or something.
Humphry took his picture under his arm and hung it in a different room, where Mary or whoever has remained quiet ever since.
Very wierd!

Avra xx

I wish I hadnt read this now :cry:

Ive had some spooky experiences too, but wont bore you with them AGAIN :lol:

At the moment though, Ive been experiencing a horrrible feeling of dread and anxiety for a friend who is travelling around South Africa. We're really close and my predictions for him have all come true-for example when he went to Spain last year I told him he would see a girl, who looked almost exactly like me, while he sat outside a cafe/bar-which he did. Often I can feel what he feels so Im abit anxious but its probably generalised worry as Im used to regular contact (but bearing in mind he phoned about two weeks ago to say he was having an amazing time.....) :worried:

I cant sleep.....

Axx

Avra that is an ace story about the paintings!
I live in Edinburgh and love it when people come to visit so I can take them on ghost tours. I've been on loads and never seen anything exciting happen but i always get really worked upand convince myself that i have heard/seen something - its great!

heard a few wee stories like when my dog got hit my a car half an hour later my gran heard her barking at her door ( she had a very distinctive howl so couldn't of been ny other dog ) and when we phoned my gran to say the dog was dead she told us she'd thought she'd heard Meggan had been at the door before we'd even told her what had happend - it was like Meggan had gone to say goodbye...awwwww

a girl at work was saying she had a friend with a ghost and he smelt of old spice - they always do!! - and had a penchant for stealing zippo lighters...