WELCOME TO THE CFZ BLOG NETWORK: COME AND JOIN THE FUN

Half a century ago, Belgian Zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans first codified cryptozoology in his book On the Track of Unknown Animals.

The Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) are still on the track, and have been since 1992. But as if chasing unknown animals wasn't enough, we are involved in education, conservation, and good old-fashioned natural history! We already have three journals, the largest cryptozoological publishing house in the world, CFZtv, and the largest cryptozoological conference in the English-speaking world, but in January 2009 someone suggested that we started a daily online magazine! The CFZ bloggo is a collaborative effort by a coalition of members, friends, and supporters of the CFZ, and covers all the subjects with which we deal, with a smattering of music, high strangeness and surreal humour to make up the mix.

It is edited by CFZ Director Jon Downes, and subbed by the lovely Lizzy Bitakara'mire (formerly Clancy), scourge of improper syntax. The daily newsblog is edited by Corinna Downes, head administratrix of the CFZ, and the indexing is done by Lee Canty and Kathy Imbriani. There is regular news from the CFZ Mystery Cat study group, and regular fortean bird news from 'The Watcher of the Skies'. Regular bloggers include Dr Karl Shuker, Dale Drinnon, Richard Muirhead and Richard Freeman.The CFZ bloggo is updated daily, and there's nothing quite like it anywhere else. Come and join us...

Search This Blog

WATCH OUR WEEKLY WEBtv SHOW

SUPPORT OTT ON PATREON

SUPPORT OTT ON PATREON
Click on this logo to find out more about helping CFZtv and getting some smashing rewards...

SIGN UP FOR OUR MONTHLY NEWSLETTER



Unlike some of our competitors we are not going to try and blackmail you into donating by saying that we won't continue if you don't. That would just be vulgar, but our lives, and those of the animals which we look after, would be a damn sight easier if we receive more donations to our fighting fund. Donate via Paypal today...




Friday, January 08, 2010

OLL LEWIS: Yesterday’s News Today

http://cfztemporarynews.blogspot.com/

On this day in 1935 Elvis Presley was born. Several myths with a Fortean flavour have sprung up about the singer, not least that he faked his death and it was a lookalike that had died, allowing Elvis to leave the building undetected, or that his ghost stalks Memphis and Graceland (ala Marc Cohn’s song ‘Walking in Memphis’ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRjPhFbvfZ4).

My favourite Elvis story has to be his vision of Josef Stalin. There is little question that this actually happened because he had a crowd of witnesses with him at the time. The story goes that in 1964 Elvis was driving through the desert on his way to film ‘Harem Scarem’ when he looked up at the sky. Presley was shocked to see the clouds parting to form a man’s face, but not just any face, the face of Joseth Stalin. Because the cold war was in full swing this perturbed Elvis somewhat and he asked the various people in his entourage if they saw it too and they did. Elvis ran into the desert to try to get a better look at the clouds, shouting out for the other people who were on his bus to follow him. Eventually his spiritual advisor Larry Geller caught up with him. According to Geller this is what happened next:

"It's God!" Elvis cried. "It's God!" Tears streamed down his face as he hugged me tightly and said, "...I thank you from the bottom of my heart. You got me here. I'll never forget, never, man. It really happened. I saw the face of Stalin and I thought to myself, Why Stalin? Is it a projection of something that's inside of me? Is God trying to show me what he thinks of me? And then it happened! The face of Stalin turned right into the face of Jesus, and he smiled at me, and every fiber of my being felt it... Oh, God. Oh, God," Elvis kept saying.

Then he paused and added a peculiar aside. "Can you imagine what the fans would think if they saw me like this?"

"They'd only love you all the more," Geller said.

"Yeah," he said, "well, I hope that's true."

Make of Elvis’s road to Damascus moment what you will but this goes to show unsual things can happen to anyone. Regular readers of Yesterday’s News Today will also know I’m a bit of a fan of Al Stewart so I can hardly mention this incident without providing a weblink to Al’s song based upon it: http://www.last.fm/music/Al+Stewart/_/Elvis+At+The+Wheel

While I’m on the subject of Elvis and songs, though, it would be remis of me not to post a link to an Elvis song for you to listen to while you read today’s Fortean zoology news so here you go: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEO7uu1Pp8I

But enough talk of Elvis; here’s the real reason you’re here: it’s time for the latest Fortean zoology news:

'The bat swooped down and bit each of the men'
Why Nessie may have sunk without trace
Melbourne Zoo's pregnant elephant
Taiwan scientist discovers 'strawberry' crab
Alan & Fleck have an "Arctic Fox" of a time

“Where do you think that Arctic fox comes from?”
“Alaska.”
“Don’t be silly, Arctic foxes can’t speak!”

No comments: