Ray's X-Blog

Charles Hickson And The Nutzoid Charles Hickson passed away on September 9th; he was 80 years old. If you're not familiar with the name, way back in 1973 (October 11, 1973 to be eXact) he claimed to be abducted by weird robotic aliens. The story was that Hickson and a friend from work (Calvin Parker) were fishing from a pier near Pascagoula Mississippi when an UFO suddenly appeared and strange floating creatures exited from the craft. Each one was roughly humanoid in shape but with wrinkled elephantine skin, pointy nose and ears, and clawed-hands. The strange beings grabbed the two men and levitated them inside the alien vessel for examination. Then the aliens floated the two men back to the pier, releasing them, and then the otherwordly visitors left as quickly as they had arrived. In a state of shock the men went to the local sheriff's office and told their incredible story. The word got out and soon Hickson and his friend were the focus of media attention. I remember s

Men And The Monsters They (Allegedly) Made Man, the Freemasons can't catch a break. Almost every conspiracy theory smears the Masons with some sort of shadowy evil. In the book, Man-Made Monsters by Dr. Bob Curran (2011), that apparently harmless fraternal order is tied in with the artifical creation of life. What kind of life? Take a look at the book's sub-title: A Field Guide to Golems, Patchwork Soldiers, Homunculi, and Other Created Creatures . So we're not talking about cute little beings like Smurfs or Teletubbies. The author doesn't buy in to all the negative stories told about the Freemasons, especially the one that says the Masons inherited the secret of artificial life from the Knights Templar. Dr. Curran only describes the tales, questionable records and urban legends he encountered when researching his work. The book is categorized as Paranormal/Mythology which the emphasis on the mythology part. Back in year 1119 the Templars were founded in the Holy

Another Adventure With The Computer Printer From Hell Envelopes. That should be easy. Just call up your address list on the computer and then have the laser printer do the rest. I follow the directions in the user's manual, opening the front feed panel and adjusting the guides to the width of an envelope. I also made sure to open the back panel where the envelope will pop out, addressed. OK, the envelope goes through but it comes out crinkled. Check the manual. Gee, I forgot to release the two green tabs in the back panel opening, dropping down a long piece of plastic into a new position that supposedly will stop the wrinkling. So I release the green tabs, one on each side. No go. The error button comes on. Printer won't print. Hit the magic green Go button seven times. No go. Invoke the eldritch name of Cthulhu seven times. No go. Tap the ruby slippers together seven times? Forget it. I flip the plastic piece inside the rear opening back into place and the error

Texe Marrs: Space Cowboy Calls Out The Illuminati Is Satan Jewish? That's the impression I get after listening to a recent shortwave radio broadcast by Texe Marrs, the host of Power of Prophecy . I remember Texe (that's his name; Google it) from years ago when I started my zine, back when I covered the SW conspiracy beat. But after a while Texe and the others on WWCR started to repeat themselves. I happened to come across the Power of Prophecy program when Texe announced that this was the most important broadcast he has ever made. He mentioned the Illuminati. OK, it was a quiet Sunday night, nothing on the boob tube to watch, so I decided to spend an hour with Texe so see if he had another new angle on the Mega-Conspiracy. And since it was September 11th -- well, I don't have to explain that to you, unless you've been in a coma under a rock for the last ten years. From his HQ in Austin, Texas, Texe sends out his warnings through his Power of Prophecy Ministries ab

Zine Zap: Grunted Warning "No jail for ham attack" "Banana fear put straight" "Penis taken in evidence" Actual headlines from actual articles collected by zine editor Stuart Stratu in Down, Under AKA Australia. Grunted Warning is a gritty digest-sized pub (8 1/2 by 11 inch pages folded lengthways and stapled into a booklet) with a quirky quickly-pasted lay out, photos and news clippings chopped and then thrown together. The rough design adds to the rough quality of the subject matter. For example, "With S&M a scar is born," an article about two Czech porn producers who put a few actors in the hospital with their sado-masochistic production. (Ouch.) But don't get the impression that GW is all about sexual perversion and scandal. Check out "Giant rats kill babies" and "Rats ground Qantas flight." Or the clipping about the Russian scientist who thinks ET contact will occur in a couple of decades. (Based on what?

Budd Hopkins: An Era Ends? My only regret at this point in my life are that there is not a larger pool of qualified people willing to continue this challenging work, despite the many lives that have been helped along the way, and despite the massive amount of intriguing data that have already been accumulated. -- Budd Hopkins, New York February, 2011 [Photo of Budd Hopkins: www.intrudersfoundation.org/inside.html ] Does the death of Budd Hopkins signal a turning point in alien abduction research? Without any formal degree in counseling -- he was first known as an artist -- Hopkins helped people who thought they have been abducted by aliens. He always faced criticism for his abduction research. One critic was his ex-wife Carol Rainey who wrote a revealing article in Paratopia magazine (January 2011). In "The Priests of High Strangeness" she portrayed her ex-husband as someone both gullible and also willing to overlook certain facts to make his case. In turn Hopkins wrot

Secret Of The Green Go Button They love to screw you for money. Especially with computer printers. I gave up wasting time with inkjet printers. I don't print that much that often which means the cartridge openings dry out and plug up. To clean them to have to use more ink (meaning more money). And sometimes no matter what you do, a cartridge stays plugged. The color inkjet cartridges are usually the ones that dry out. Print out a color photo and find it ruined with a purple overtone; the yellow ain't working. I gave up on the whole rip off when I couldn't get a cartridge to work, one half-full of overpriced ink. I decided that I would save money by printing my color images at a digital photo kiosk found at department or drug stores. For black and white printing I decided to go with a laser printer which is nothing more than a photocopier hooked up to a computer. I bought a low-price home unit made by the Brother Corporation. The cost per page was supposed to be much

Notes Of A Distraught Woman [Blue woman image based upon photo by Peter Delory. From the cover of Living With Your Husband's Secret Wars by Marsha Means.] I'm a single male atheist. So why did I pick up a self-help book intended for Christian wives with marital problems? The notes. I found the book in a cardboard box on the sidewalk, buried in a jumble of other titles. The FREE BOX sometimes offers intriguing works that the used book store tosses out, not seeing any value. Apparently the woman who purchased the self-help book didn't want it either, even though she marked it up with her handwritten notes, personal reactions to points raised by the author. It was an opportunity to glimpse into the mind of a devout Christian seeking answers through her faith. From what I gathered the note-writer was upset that her husband was cheating on her -- mentally, not physically. He enjoyed pornography. Yes, even thinking about sin is a sin. That'