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The Easter bunny originates from an ancient Anglo-Saxon carnival. |
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Three seasonal supernatural mysteries
Reads: 460 |
Posted by Thoth on Thursday, December 25, 2008 (CST)
 Every now and then a query reaches me regarding a Horned Man, who is said to haunt the outskirts of Kirkby. This Herne-like figure was first reported in the 1890s (but probably seen much earlier) around Clarke’s Farm, off Glover’s Brow, which is now Prescot Road, leading to Melling Mount.
The figure looked like a crouching man with deer-like antlers, and was usually seen in the winter months. Whenever this peculiar humanoid ‘maninal’ was chased, it always seemed to go to ground at Bank Brook, where dogs sent to track the horned entity would lose its scent.
At Christmas 1897, a 10-year-old girl named Elizabeth Johnson, was staying at her aunt’s cottage on Shevington’s Lane in Kirkby, when she overheard the cook and maidservant whispering about a recent sighting of the Horned Man.
(Read More... The Bizarre | Word Count: 715 | comments? | Score: 4.5) |
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Missing plane's pilot had only student license
Reads: 117 |
Posted by Thoth on Monday, December 22, 2008 (CST)
 The pilot of a plane that disappeared in the Bermuda Triangle with 11 passengers aboard had only a U.S. student pilot license and should have never been allowed to fly, Dominican authorities said Wednesday.
Adriano Jimenez had been stripped of his Dominican license in 2006 because he was caught flying multiengine planes when he was only authorized to fly helicopters, said Pedro Dominguez, president of the Dominican Pilots Association. Two weeks ago, he had a minor accident while landing a small plane at a Dominican airport.
"An in-depth investigation was never opened to prevent what today we are lamenting," Dominguez said. Jimenez loaded 11 passengers onto a twin-engine plane in Santiago, Dominican Republic, on Monday and filed a flight plan for a landing in Mayaguana Island in the Bahamas, but he never arrived, according to the Dominican Civil Aviation Institute.
(Read More... The Bizarre | Word Count: 566 | comments? | Score: 5) |
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Ammon Shea left with onomatomania after reading Oxford dictionary from A to Z
Reads: 295 |
Posted by Thoth on Tuesday, October 07, 2008 (CDT)
 By any sane reckoning Ammon Shea is a vocabularian – one who pays too much attention to words. In a single, gruelling year, the sometime furniture removal man, busker and gondolier from New York has read the entire 20-volume Oxford English Dictionary from cover to cover.
He has returned from his adventure in the far reaches of the English language with a rich harvest of obscure and forgotten words to share: indispensable gems such as “deipnophobia” (fear of dinner parties) or “apricity” (the warmth of the sun in winter). In return he suffered back pain, problems with his sight and constant headaches.
As his book, Reading the Oxford English Dictionary, makes clear, Mr Shea’s feat failed to make him a better person, improve his conversation or make him appear more intelligent. Rather it turned him into a mafflard (a stuttering or blundering fool), bedevilled by onomatomania (vexation at having difficulty in finding the right word).
(Read More... The Bizarre | Word Count: 1059 | comments? | Score: 0) |
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Ripper 'claimed earlier victims'
Reads: 330 |
Posted by Thoth on Thursday, September 11, 2008 (CDT)
 Jack the Ripper may have killed his first victim 25 years earlier than previously thought, a retired murder detective has claimed in a new book. It is thought that Jack the Ripper killed and mutilated at least five prostitutes in the East End between August and November 1888. But Trevor Marriott says he may have struck in 1863 and 1872.
Mr Marriott will be presenting his findings at the Docklands Museum which is hosting an exhibition on the killer. The body of 28-year-old prostitute Emma Jackson was found in a brothel in St Giles, central London, in April 1863.
She had five wounds to the throat and had not been robbed. The case was never solved. Mr Marriott also uncovered a second case he believes may have been committed by the Ripper.
(Read More... The Bizarre | Word Count: 419 | comments? | Score: 0) |
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Taller, shorter, hairier
Reads: 285 |
Posted by Thoth on Wednesday, August 27, 2008 (CDT)
 China is today gloating over another world record that places it firmly in the big league .... or tall league, to be exact.
If the avalanche of Olympic gold medals weren't enough, the front page of today's official English-language China Daily trumpets the news that Inner Mongolian goat herder Bao Xishun has regained the title as the world's tallest living man after the holder of the record, Ukrainian Leonid Stadnyk, refused to submit to an official measurement.
Guinness World Records (GWR) released a statement overnight announcing that Bao - who measures 2.36 metres (7 feet 9.5 inches) - won on a technicality after Stadnyk refused to submit to being measured by GWR officials. Stadnyk, who lives with his mother in central Ukraine, is more than 20cm (8 inches) taller than Bao at 2.57 metres (8 feet 5.5 inches), according to a statement from his doctor tendered last year.
(Read More... The Bizarre | Word Count: 589 | comments? | Score: 0) |
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