Poultry Guys

Poltergeists (German for "knocking ghosts") are another class of spirit that seem to be found the world over under a variety of different names, though rather than going into the distinctions between different "types" of poltergeists, I'd like to focus on their shared abilities, as well as one very interesting point about them.

Poltergeists, by their most simplified definition, are entities that have the ability to make noises and move objects around independent of any observable external force. Usually the phenomena manifests quite suddenly, with often with no provocation on the part of the inhabitants of the affected dwelling, and tends to last between the space of a few hours to a few years at sporadic intervals of quiet and activity. While the phenomena can be mischevious-seeming at times, as there have been numerous reports of objects being tossed at individuals residing in a house afflicted with poltergeist activity, it is worth noting that for the most part the activity seems "dumb", that is to say there is no rhyme or reason to the actions it takes, and most objects that impact individuals seem to be projected with only enough force to make contact, and not nearly enough to hurt someone. However, this last point has two major caveats: one, that there have been rare cases of violent poltergeists that actively harmed those in their vicinity with forcefully thrown objects, scratches, beatings, etc (however, while this has been reported, it is in the -wildly- vast minority), and two, that most houses with a poltergeist tend to have a "center" of the activity, not necessarily a focal point or target of the phenomena, but someone who seems to always be present when the activity happens. Usually, this happened to be a child in the midst of adolscence, leading many to claim that poltergeists are actually subconscious manifestations of telekinesis by those "centers", their existence usually reasoned as an outlet for their feelings of agression, alientation, and other teenage angsty-wangsty issues.

Now, the big thing worth noting that I had no idea about until recently...supposedly lending support to the psychokinesis theory, a group of paranormal researchers in the 1970s were able to create an "artificial poltergeist" named Philip. See, what they did was make up a name and backstory for a fictional person, and by collectively meditating and visualizing the spirit, were able to supposedly make a table tilt and knocks to be heard in response to questions, with the questions answered as a person with the given backstory would answer them. Even more curious is that the table movement and rapping was supposedly caught on film, and that other parapsychological groups were able to replicate the same effects with different backstories and therefore different "artifical poltergeists". So the story goes that the original group continued to try and meditate with the intent of getting an actual apparition to appear, but upon finding themselves unable to, the project was abandoned.

A couple of questions pop out at me on hearing this. The biggest, though, is while it's an interesting story, why was the work discontinued? It may be that seeing an apparition would have been much more convincing an effect that just hearing knocks, and maybe I'm just being naive, but if I could reliably cause knocks to sound in response to questions without physical movement on my part, I'd be pretty damn excited with even that. So for me, the whole story should be taken with a Buick-sized grain of salt, but still, an interesting little story all the same...

 

Little Light

Will-O-the-Wisps, corpse candles/lights, ignis fatuus, corposant, jack-o-lanterns, fetch candles/lights, earth/ghost/witch lights...all these are names for basically the same phenomena, that of floating lights with no discernible source or carrier. However, while there are a multitude of names for this phenomena, there actually tend to be certain trends observable across the different names, and those trends form the meat of our discussion today.

So, what is the general meaning attributed to such phenomena? Well, this seems to fall into two major camps. One is that it's a phenomena that forecasts death at a given location, with the type of death warned of being dependent on the color or number of the lights. Usually the death forecast is that of the viewer or the viewer's loved ones, with small blue lights indicating a child's death, larger white lights for that of an adult, and a number of lights for a mass death, thought there have also been reports of lights in most other imaginable colors. It is important to note that in this particular framework, the lights in and of themselves are not sentient and therefore not inherently moral or malevolent, they are simply an impassive warning of a fate yet to pass. In this manner, while they are indeed unexplained phenomena, many attributed their viewing as a sort of divine intervention that allowed them to say their goodbyes to any affected. Also worth noting is the virtual impossibility of arguing with or avoiding this sort of phenomena (this sort also tend to be called the corpse/fetch candles/lights), as again, they are merely warnings and not direct enablers or participants in the fate of the viewer.

The second main school of thought holds that the lights are ghosts themselves, but the intent of these beings varies from culture to culture...though the general consensus is that it is wise to stay away (in fact, "ignis fatuus" literally means "foolish fire", named such after those who'd chase after it). Basically, the intent of the entities falls into two sub-categories. The first, and most benign -and- rare, is that of "unfinished business". In this case, the ghost is helplessly trying to signal any passerby to a particular area in the hope of them completing whatever task keeps them from crossing over. The most usual occurrence in this camp is that of a death in some far-flung area quite distant from the trappings of society (possibly also involving bringing a murderer to justice, if such a death wasn't accidental), and the entity's need for a proper burial for their remains, and according to some legends, they may possibly even reward the one who helps them by directing them to a treasure afterwards...though getting to the light in the first place can prove quite a challenge, as usually the terrain the first victim died in had to be a requisite level of treacherous to have caused them to die unexpectedly in the first place, so the task is not without risk.

Now for the other, more common sub-category. This sort is particularly malevolent and insidious, with the "nicest" of them causing travelers to become incredibly and hopelessly lost. More often than not, these lights are quite hypnotizing to look upon, overpowering the will of lesser individuals and leading them to their deaths. These entities are reasoned to be sinners that were for whatever reason denied entrance into heaven or hell, and are thus stuck on earth for all eternity, and that the boredom of such a fate has led them to treat us "fleshies" as playthings by tormenting us until such a time passes with which they get bored, at which point they end the "game" and consequently, the victim's life. It is worth noting that while there are supposedly a variety of ways to avoid and repel the spirits of this class, there are no direct ways to fight them.

As far as natural explanations go, these lights are usually reasoned to be fireflies or the ignition of swamp/carrion gas, but their occurrence across cultures with the same relative explanations leads one to wonder if there isn't something more to the tale of the mysterious lights...

 

Bad Ideas, Day 2: The Negative Ion Gun!

So, on a kick from my last posting, I'd like to continue the trend by offering another weird idea to the Wild Wild Webs as to how to unprovedly protect against/magnify the powers of ghostly happenings. Now, as far as my dumbed down version of the theory goes, paranormal activity is also accompanied by a positive ionic field of varying levels. Putting aside the very important point of whether "ionic fields" are actually bullsh-t or not,let's pretend that they aren't. According to current ionic theory, positive ions are, as they say in the academic community, "hella bad" for you, causing anything from general feelings of malaise and depression on up to suicidal ideation and actions or even death (though supposedly only in massive, theoretical or apocryphal amounts), while negative ions do good things, like lighten one's mood and sterilize the immediate environment. And while I could geek out and use positive ions as a link to the old tales of ghosts causing people to despair, age, or die due to "fright", that's not the point of this post. Let's talk tech-y (get it? Cause it's like "let's talk turkey", but with "tech-y"...fine, whatever).

My new idea kinda came to me as I was researching negative ion generators, with the intent of placing one in a hairdryer and using it as a "Negative Ion Projector", to counteract any dastardly positive ions I may come across during my adventures. Well, while I found negative ion schematics online, I also found that there is a thriving market on ionic hairdryers already...and I'm not too big a man to admit that finding this out sorta killed my enthusiasm to build one (as I said in the intro to this blog, I am a self-admitted hipster). So while I was closing all my open tabs in a positively forlorn manner, I found this little gem. I think that this picture could say more than I ever could...

On second thought, maybe not. Basically, this guy provided schematics to create a show-based static shocker to shock his friends. However, what I see is a personal negative ion field generator, and one that could be used as a potential shield against the negative effects of the potential positive ions associated with different forms of paranormal occurences...or maybe this is just me geeking out and trying to go all James Bond, Ghost Hunter. Of course, being that I have no real background in electronics, I have no idea what would happen if a positive ionic field happened to make contact with a negatively charged object like this, or if you'd even want to be in the same time zone when it happened...

 

EMF Theory, a.k.a. The Idiots Guide to Stun-Gunning a Ghost

So, I had a crazy idea today, and I wanted to share it with you, my steadfast readers. The basic theory is thus; supernatural activity is usually accompanied by EMF activity. That's the most basic summarization of one of the currently dominating theories in paranormal research, with some of the controversy cut out of the equation (some claim the phenomena observed are actually caused by the EMF fluctuations, but we'll leave the hypothesis at the more reasonable correlationary association). Anyways, EMF fluctuations/spikes/whatever are supposed to happen when things like poltergeist activities, apparitions, and phantom noises happen, so my question is what happens if you have an already existing EMF spike around when the fluctuations begin? Or also, if you let the fluctuations start, then trigger a massive spike?

Keeping in mind that I was a psych major that mostly kept to his own subject and gained most of his knowledge of physics from either a) Mythbusters, Bill Nye the Science Guy, or Mr Wizard, or b) listening to his physics-geek friends talk about "hypothetically awesome" tricks they should "totally pull sometime" while they were black-out hammered at a party (what can I say, U of A was a Party League school)...my idea is basically this: what if you trigger a stun gun before or during the phenomena? To be honest, because I don't have one, I couldn't say whether the stun gun would actually even cause an EMF spike, though my research into the topic (thanks Google) seems to indicate that it probably would (again, odd that there's no definitive answer to this). However, would a stun gun trigger an increase in noticeable phenomena? Would it cause any burgeoning phenomena to disperse? In my mind, I'd liken it to giving air to a candle, but whether it's enough air to cause the candle to blow brighter or to extinguish it entirely remains unsolved in my mind...you guys have any ideas?

Case Files: The Cheshire Dog, pt. 2

So, you got to see what I saw. Here's how I responded.

 

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Hey everybody!

 

So...I have a couple more random thoughts in no particular order to toss into the conversation, so here we go...!

 

1. The discomfort associated with the memory by the original/main subject of the phenomena...why? Is this due to how the subject ended up rationalizing the experiences, or possibly the negative feelings she associated from her social support at the time rubbing off enough on her to negatively reinforce the topic as a whole? Or did something bad happen after the dog started to appear? I'd be curious to hear -why- she dislikes talking about it...

 

2. I understand everyone has a different eye for details, and it may just be me, but mentioning a "buried treasure" seems somewhat incongruous, and I'd like to know more whether the mentioning of that particular point was just coincidental or if there was something behind that. Did she get the feeling like the dog was guarding something? Or was it just a flavor detail?

 

3. Large and wavy fur would indicate a large likelihood of a herding or hunting dog, if I recall my dog show assistant experience at all correctly, though probably more likely herding. They're both known for their unusual intelligence, as well as being pretty aces at athletic feats...though if we could get a better ID on the breed we may have more traits to go on. Either way, this probably wasn't a "stupid dog", which leads me to my next point...

 

4. Bachelor lived there. 1930s. Any background on Señor Richy-Britches or a history of his pets (if he had any)? Seems like it'd make sense for him to have one, given the time and social climate, and (BIG jump on this line of logic) if he was a bachelor and died as such, then his only constant, deepest emotional contact would be his faithful hound. Also, a better idea as to the layout of the house and which rooms were which might also give insight into the issue, which I personally see as a toss-up between two off-the-cuff-completely-not-based-on-anything-other-than-an-educated-guess theories (assuming the manifestation of the phenomena was not explainable by conventional means [which seems difficult, as I imagine trying to reconcile a ghostly Cheshire Dog with reality isn't the easiest thing to do]): either a) she resemble(s/d) someone who abused/killed the dog in life, and he always manifests with the terror/hatred he felt towards the original or b) the "master" still dwells there (as a spiritual manifestation) and the dog feels she is getting too close to him and is attempting to protect him from the intruder. I personally lean more towards the second, from the note about her noticing the footsteps when no one else did (at least initially) as well as the fact she saw it often in her room, which I'm thinking may have actually been originally the master's room or possibly the "pet room". So, if that were the case, then it stands to reason that she'd be pretty high on the spectral dog's doo-doo list, so to speak. Keep in mind, that was all based on a -large- number of logical assumptions which are more than likely wrong, so I broker no offense to anyone saying that they think those are ludicrous working theories :P

 

5. Like YYYYY and ZZZZZ said, memory loss or "blanking" after a traumatic or logically irreconcilable event is quite common. I probably wouldn't call it amnesia per say, since I bet you dollars to donuts that she probably could tell you other events that happened in her life at that time, she simply denied the experience at such a basic level that it ceased to be a conscious memory, so as to allow her to put some distance between herself and the worldview-warping memory. There's a wide range of responses, from direct confrontation, to avoidance (as the primary subject appears to be exhibiting), to denial (conscious or subconscious), to amnesia, to fugue, to PTSD, to gosh knows how many different mental aberrances and abnormalities. To make a bad joke/analogy, pretend the mind is a baby...if Patrick Swayze taught us anything, it was to never put it in a corner, which it seems the "dog" forced it into in a manner of speaking. A relatively benign corner, but one all the same. Anyways, million dollar question: why mention it now? Was it the friend's mother's inexplicable experiencing of the basement noises that jogged her memory back to that spot?

 

6. As far as other weird notes and errata about the story as it stands...Ghost Dog: a movie starring Forrest Whittaker, if I remember from my Blockbuster video days. But, lots of occasions in tales for animals to become ghosts that appear with malevolence, both in an abused or protector setting, but also to occasionally warn of ill-fortune yet to come (doubtful, since there was ample time for that to happen and it doesn't seem like it did, and multiple manifestations don't usually occur). Also tales of playful animal spirits (though highly unusual for them to be playful with anyone outside their immediate family at the time of death, and also doubtful due to the palpable malevolence felt during each event). Lastly, in European and Middle Eastern countries, the sacrificing of animals and subsequent haunting of the premises where the ritual was done at is/was quite common, but actually as a form of good luck, if I'm not mistaken...but yeah, none of the other types of spiritual animals seem to match the simultaneously occurring aura of hostility.

 

Anyhoo, fun story, I'd be curious to see what happens next. Take care!

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And there you have it, a glimpse into my world. Have a good weekend!

 

 

Case Files: The Cheshire Dog, pt. 1

So a week or two ago, everyone in my paranormal research group received an email from one of our member, who received an email from a friend asking if she had any opinions about something that happened to her earlier in her life. I thought it was relatively interesting, so I copied a transcript of the email (it already had the names edited out, but even if it hadn't I would've, and I also removed a couple of specific geographical landmarks as well) with the intent of showing you the sorts of things we get asked to look into. Next entry on the blog will be my analysis of the story...

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It happened when we were 11 or 12 years old and afterwards we didn't mention it to each other again until we were over 40. At that point I wanted to confirm that it really had happened as I remembered it, so I finally asked XXXXX if she remembered "the dog." She said yes and confirmed that she remembered what I remembered, but the discussion made her very uncomfortable. Out of respect for her feelings, I can't make the story public, but I would like to tell you about it and see if you have any ideas about what it might mean.

XXXXX and I have been best friends since second grade and we grew up on the same street. She lived in a beautiful house that was built by a wealthy bachelor in the 1930s. He supposedly hid a stash of money somewhere in the house, but nobody ever found it. I loved her house. It was much fancier than mine and was surrounded by gardens and a filbert orchard. XXXXX loved the house too, but always said that there was sometimes something scary in it. She was afraid to be home alone and said that when she was alone she heard heavy footsteps on the basement stairs. Her parents laughed off her fears and told her she was imagining it. (Her elderly mother still lives in the house and for decades insisted that nothing was wrong with the house. A few months ago, XXXXX's  mom reported that she had locked herself in the bathroom because she heard banging in the basement and the sound of footsteps on the basement stairs. She assumed somebody had broken in, but later found no evidence of that.) That's the background to my story. XXXXX grew up in a house that frightened her, a house where she heard noises and occasionally saw things.

XXXXX was a believer. I wasn't. I tend to prefer rational, scientific explanations for things. I would entertain the notion of ghosts the way I entertain notions of vampires and werewolves. I love to get a chill up my spine from contemplating other-worldly beings and hearing stories, but I didn't really believe they existed. XXXXX and I brought very different mindsets to our shared experience. 

When we were 11 or 12, XXXXX told me that she had started seeing what she called a ghost dog. The first time she saw him was in the middle of the night. She woke up and in a shaft of moonlight, she saw a dog materialize next to her bed. It was a large dog with wavy black fur. He was sitting on his haunches, leaning forward, looking at her intently. It drew back its lips and exposed its teeth, as if it were snarling, but it was absolutely silent. As she stared at the dog, he disappeared. He frightened her. She said that she saw him many nights and was having trouble sleeping. 

Her house was surrounded by filbert orchards and we spent a lot of time playing among the trees. XXXXX said that the ghost dog had started appearing to her in the orchard. It always happened close to sunset. She insisted that she didn't walk around a corner and see him and he didn't jump out from behind a tree, the way a real dog might. He appeared and disappeared while she was watching. He always was in the same position and he always snarled silently before disappearing.

XXXXX's parents thought she was making it up and didn't want to hear any stories about ghosts. I was the only person she could tell. I listened sympathetically and said it sounded scary, but the truth was that I was just as skeptical about ghosts as her parents were. I didn't think she was making it up. I knew she was really frightened, but I figured she had psyched herself into it. I thought she had a recurring nightmare about the dog showing up in her bedroom at night and that she was so jittery that she was imagining she saw the dog in the orchard. That she jumped and ran at the sight of a stump, or something. I was in no way predisposed to see it myself.

Our mothers had convinced us that if we walked home alone after dark we were likely to be murdered, so whenever XXXXX and I visited each other and had to walk home after dark, we'd split the risk. The host would walk halfway home with the guest, then we'd split up and head home separately. Share the risk. Confuse any homicidal pervert with two targets. One evening I was leaving XXXXX's house and, as per our agreement, she was going to walk halfway home with me. She had a long driveway that was edged by a laurel hedge so dense that nothing could have jumped out of it. (We had tried to build forts in it and couldn't penetrate it.) Exterior lights from the house and the garage illuminated the driveway. We walked out of her back door, came around the corner of the house and started up the driveway. All of a sudden a dog materialized in front of us. It was the dog XXXXX had described: large, with black wavy fur, sitting on his haunches. I remember that it carried a real aura of menace. XXXXX and I grabbed each other. I was too frightened to scream. The dog exposed its teeth in a silent snarl that resembled a grin.  As we were looking at it, it disappeared. It didn't leap away. It faded away. 

This is as much as I remember and over time, I started to question the memory. It defies sense. XXXXX and I didn't tell anybody. I didn't validate her story to her parents. Why not? Somehow I still walked home, but it's hard to believe I wasn't too scared to do so. I can't remember what happened next and XXXXX and I seemed to have an unspoken agreement never to mention the event to each other. It's funny. It still feels like a moral imperative. I am hard-wired not to talk to XXXXX about it, as if it would betray our friendship to do so. For 30 years I mulled over the memory and over time it bothered me more and more. I finally had to ask XXXXX if it really happened. She told me that it did, but she doesn't want to discuss it further and I'm left wondering about my post event amnesia. Maybe amnesia isn't right, but I can't recall any aftermath to the event. It's like it happened in a void and had no logical consequences.

Have you heard of an animal being a ghost?  A ghost who deliberately appears before someone and seems to aim his malevolence toward the person seeing him? And have you ever heard of the kind of amnesia I experienced after the event?

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END TRANSMISSION.

Food For Thought

Anyways, that's the week, folks. I asked quite a few questions and, regardless of what the original intention was, don't really seem to be any closer to a codification system for the things I may encounter in the field here soon enough. However, I think that even coming up with the right questions to ask at all is the first step to even being able to wrap ones head around something new like this. I remember a linguistics teacher mentioning once how difficult it was to turn people onto the beauty and diversity of language, because if a society doesn't have a word for something it makes it next to impossible for someone within that society to try and conceive of it, which thereby makes trying to open your mind a much more difficult prospect than one would expect. Anyways, I'd like to think that by even trying to think of these paranormal phenomenons as something beyond "ghost story" and instead look at them as something that -can- be classified (or at least attempt to classify them), that in and of itself it the first step to maybe opening up the concept of a "ghost" in a way that hasn't been looked at in such a way. And yes, I don't have so much hubris as to think that I'm the first to ask these questions, but dang it, cut me some slack. o\One has to be able to run to the nearest Circle K before they can run a marathon, right? :P

Chiaroscuro (The Dynamics of Good and Evil)

Now, yesterday I opened up a small can of worms by briefly touching on the topic of possession. I'm going to get a bit further into that today, and if for some reason my reasoning or ultimate conclusions strike you as somewhat blasphemic, I apologize in advance. Anyways, possessions. What about them? Well, for starters, I think that the very concept of them are complete bull. OH SNAP! Yeah, I said it. I believe in the power of human belief and rationalization, and I also believe that the people so "possessed" are completely and utterly under the belief that they have no control over themselves, making the end result virtually identical to what we as a species believe "possession" to be. So how can I believe in the effects but not the concept? Easy. I simply believe that there is the ability to be given a spark of a feeling or idea, and depending on the sort of person you are, your own psyche does the rest. Like hypnosis, if you will. Certain individuals are highly suggestible, and thereby susceptible to hypnosis. And I bet you dollars to donuts that those same people would be (or depending on the situations, are) also more likely to run the risk of being "possessed" if the situation happens to have that as a risk. So, do I believe in human creativity and the occasional "mad lapse"? Sure. Do I believe in possession? No. Do I believe in the possibility of a supernatural phenomena being able to transfer impressions and feelings into other living beings? Maybe, but I find that alot easier to swallow than possession, so lets run with that. That being said, I propose the next major question that we ask in these cases is:

If established as empathic, where does the entity/phenomenon range between highly empathic (possessive) and neutral (doesn't transmit any feelings outside of those normally associated with inexplicable events)?

Next, let's talk morality. Man, we love to romanticize these stories, don't we? The good guy, the bad guy, the doomed guy, the tragic guy, the lover, the fighter, the coward, the blighter. We have so many archetypes present in the legends and tales, to try and help them conform to our sense of order in some way, to make them make sense in at least some small part. And while that attitude is completely understandable, it's inherently flawed. Seriously though, do we even want to try and pretend we know that a spirit by any definition knows/cares about "right" and "wrong" as we know it? They/it would be on a completely different plane of existence, and we want to try and enforce logic on that? I put it to you that there's no such thing as "good" and "evil" when it comes to the paranormal, only the effects of the presence:

Is the paranormal presence negative, positive, or neutral in aspect (is their overall effect on their surroundings one of darkness and decay, improving, or simply maintaining its surroundings)?

Again, these questions are to try and push past the idea of a ghost as a story and instead look at them as a testable, categorical phenomenon.

Something Wicked

So, yesterday I promised to get into the operationalization of what exactly consisted of a "haunting". In this case, I think a two part question is in order, just to try and drill down to the basics of what (general) elements are involved. The first bit is deceptively simple, and again, can be culled from most stories but is almost never stated outright:

What senses/forces are being manipulated in an inexplicable way?

 

This simple question alone allows one to straight up start classifying exactly what one is dealing with. Does it manipulate sound, by banging and slamming things (but never visibly)? Does it manipulate sight, by appearing as a shadowy figure or translucent being? Does it manipulate touch, by causing things to be visibly picked up and moved or by grabbing occupants of the property? That differentiation right there makes a huge difference in the sorts of patterns one sees reoccur throughout stories  and experiences. Also, while we're on the subject, I think that overall, there are five sorts of manipulations that can occur (from what I've read so far, anyways): sound, sight (a.k.a., a spectre), touch (also known as a poltergeist), environmental (including temperature control, taste, smell, and other physical factors), and empathic (those that cause intense feelings and [as I'll argue about tomorrow] possessions). I think that covers most of the bases, especially since each category of manifestation doesn't necessarily preclude any other category, but then we need to have the followup question depending on what categories it falls into:

 

If sound, are they abiotic (obviously created by non-living components, like chains clanking or doors slamming) or biotic sounds (those needing a living organism to cause, like footsteps, or whispering, or screaming)?

 

If touch, is the movement tracked while being in the same room with the moving objects, or is it only noticed after the inhabitants come into the area in question (do they see it happen or does weird stuff occur only when they're not in the room)?

 

If sight, is the shape humanoid or not? And regardless of that answer, is it luminous, shadowed, translucent, or normal-appearing? 

If environmental, is it small-scale or large-scale (in this case, is the experience confined to a restricted area or does the experiencer feel completely transported to another place and time)?

 

If empathic, what is the severity of the feelings felt (does the feeling feel like a vague impression, or is it severe enough to cause the experiencer to actually commit specific acts)?

 

So, with a basic question and a followup question as to specific parameters defining the phenomenon, we've basically summed up three quarters of almost every ghost story out there. Not that the "fluff" is unnecessary, building a comprehensive account of the happenings is important. But honestly, don't you think it would make things so much easier to just be able to discuss these things in more concrete terms rather than "you had to be there, but let me tell you what happened as best I can from beginning to end"...

What's In a Haunting?

In our first installment, let's discuss what the most basic aspects of a haunting are. Namely, the focus of the haunting, and the apparent reactivity of the haunting to outside stimuli.

 

Now, we'll get to the actual operationalization of a "haunting" tomorrow, but for today, let's just assume a haunting is a series of scientifically-inexplicable events that seem to share a common denominator of some sort. And that common denominator should be the first thing every investigator asks themselves:

 

What is the phenomena apparently linked to? Is it object, person, or location-linked?

 

This first descriptor seems highly overlooked as a major classification point, in my opinion. At most, it's a detail or footnote, never warranting an actual, careful classification overall. But I think this detail is quite important, seeing as most hauntings I've ever heard of are location-based, but there are a few that seem to follow objects and even fewer that follow people. That would indicate there are exceptions to the "rule" of location-based haunting, meaning that there exists some discriminating characteristics inherent to the genesis of the haunting itself...why/how would it bond to an ambulatory object or entity, or manifest itself in a stationary or mobile manner? This is a question that any working hypothesis of how ghosts operate should be able to answer. But enough of that, onto question two:

 

Does the phenomena appear to have a measurable stimulus response, in that it's behavior changes upon (independent) changes in the environment?

 

I was originally going to summarize this one as intelligent vs. unintelligent, but I realized this is a misnomer. If we are truly talking about apparitions as a scientific possibility, then we need to also accept that we have no way to gauge their logic, intelligence, morality, or anything of the sort...you could basically argue the same thing of trying to ascribe intelligence to a collection of lichen (if you believe in the non-intelligent "spiritual energy" angle) or an extraterrestrial (if you believe in the "independent visitor from beyond the veil" idea, where they retain shadows of their former feelings and faculties). In either case, they are so far outside of what we could consider a normal life form and the rules that govern one that I think we need to establish sentience before trying to determine intelligence. And the quickest way to determine that is to see if you can influence it. Can you make it more violent by playing a certain kind of music of yelling in an angry manner? Can you calm it by cowering or patting your grandmother's urn? If you can't then it's basically a force of nature, which doesn't mean it's not worth studying, it's just not worth trying to anthropomorphize a damn tornado.  If you can, then maybe we can start trying to treat it as something -possibly- more intelligent.

Boggarts of Beaverton

 Aoo! Somehow it doesn't have the same ring to it as the song I was hoping to emulate does. Oh, and if you mention Kid Rock, then you're dead to me.

ANYways, onto haunted spots of Beaverton! On a cursory search, this is what I've come up with thus far...(all taken from the Shadowlands directory online, which is spotty at best from what I've heard)

• Shiloh Inn - The upstairs sports den and Canyon room are rumored to be haunted. Many employees and guests report here footsteps and a conversation between a man and women but upon further investigation no one is ever there. On occasion things will be moved about on their own, cups, chairs, ect. 
• Valley Theatre - This old discount theatre has had strange poltergist activity for years. In 1994 during renovation work crews were "persued" by a ominous creature that liked to play evil pranks and stalk the workers. Several workers quit due to the strange happenings around them and refused to come back to the location. And to this day strange occurances still happen to workers and visitors at this old theatre. 
• Westgate Cinema - A shadowy figure has been reported lurking in the upstairs projector room that was formerly a living quarters. When chased, the shadowy figure vanishes down a hallway that leads to double-doors that never opened.

So, two theaters and an inn, huh? The first sounds poltergeist-ish, the second sounds almost Fay-like (unseelie) from its description, and the third sounds like some shade or wraith or something. Of course, that's assuming these buildings are even still up...one wonders what could go down in a commercial building like these to cause such activity from then on, and if there really was a great deal of activity, with it being commercial, why would it never gain more scrutiny? Meh, I dunno, but here's hoping I have the time and means to check some of this out soon, I'm getting the itch to actually check some of this out...