HI AGAIN!

Well, I only missed the deadline by a month this time. Things are looking up! :)

The bigfoot world has been awfully quiet the last few weeks, what with Biscardi and the Georgia boys crawling back into the woodwork (where they belong. Whoops! Did I just say that out loud? Heh.)

Well, kind of. Apparently, they're trying to sell the suit on Ebay and doing a fine job of it. I'm wondering, does the freezer come with it?

CNN isn't calling me anymore to do interviews with Mike Galanos and some patronizing, dorkjob lawyer giggling like schoolboys over the existence of a bipedal primate in the wilds, so it seems the worst of it is finally over. Thank heavens.

I guess people don't care much about Bigfoot when the economy is going belly up.

Is this scary, or what? How many of you are wondering, like me, whether we're all going to be homeless and starving a few months from now? You know, it really makes me think about the big guys. Of course, everything does. It's an obsession, I think. I once found myself looking for bigfoot tracks in a muddy flowerbed outside the Gateway Mall in the middle of Springfield. Because there was mud. You just can't pass up good mud.

But I digress. This economic crap is making me think about them, because I know darned well that they could give a rat's patootie about what Wall Street's doing, whether there's a mortgage crisis or a credit crunch.

Credit? Can you imagine how a Sasquatch might synthesize THAT bit of information? "Whaddaya mean, 'credit'? You mean I can have all the deer livers I can possibly eat right now but I don't actually have to KILL the deer until next year?"

Huh?

It simply doesn't make sense, the way we're living. The American dream turned into something of an American nightmare when we weren't looking.

What ever happened to growing what we eat? When was the last time we looked at a Big Mac and thought about the cow grazing in the field that WAS that Big Mac, or some semblance thereof? We're so far removed from the natural world that we tend to only experience it through the distant lens of technological advancement: Binoculars. Telephoto lenses. Documentaries about nature in "living" color on our TV screens. In high-def, so it's "almost like being there". Here's a thought... Why not actually.. oh, I dunno. GO THERE? What's next? Smell-o-vision? Is it really necessary for us to insulate ourselves from the natural world so completely?

Are we really that afraid? Or is it simply a matter of being too busy trying to keep up the pace, to make the money to buy the stuff that will further insulate us from the world?

The big guys have it made. They don't care about the Dow. They don't flinch when news anchors, with appropriately long faces but sparkling, excited eyes, announce that many people have lost 30% of their 401k savings.

We live in boxes. We get inside littler boxes and maneuver them to other boxes where we go through the motions to make money to pay for all of the boxes we own.

Whatever happened to hoofing it?

To our barefoot friends, concrete is a strange, hard river that winds through the woods. It's a convenient place to not leave tracks, as long as those weird, hard, loud boxes with hairless, scared creatures inside aren't coming around the bend. Money is a moot point to the Sasquatch. So are fashion magazines, credit cards, cell phones, drive-throughs, computers, tooth whiteners, DVD players, and payday loans.

Bigfoot doesn't care about keeping up with the Joneses. And look at them now. We're going through a global crisis and are terrified that our "quality of life" will diminish. Meanwhile, the Big Guys are out there, eating, sleeping, traveling, pooping in the woods, doing their Big Guy stuff.

Have we, seriously, insulated ourselves so completely with artifacts of "convenience" that we've forgotten how to SURVIVE on this planet? Probably.

They haven't forgotten. And perhaps, the way things are going, we will soon be reminded.

The meek shall inherit...

Yadda, yadda.

ON THE PUBLIC SITE:

Not a lot of news here. Well, a little, but it's mostly not good. In my rush to modify the database to get the investigator's backend functional, I was tweaking the date field on over 1500 reports in the database... and promptly LOST all of the dates. Not the dates that the reports happened. The dates that the reports were entered. What does this mean to you? Not a whole heck of a lot. I lost the references to the latest reports that were published, so if you go to the "recent reports" section, you'll see zip. Nada. Nothing. But that's not too big of a deal, since there weren't any new reports published for a while anyway.

To me, it means going back through the database backups and entering, by hand, the dates on 1500 reports.

One step forward... 1500 steps back.

I had to laugh. It was that, or jump off the nearest bridge, and I can't swim worth a crud.

The good news, however, is that I'm getting ready to indoctrinate the first volunteer investigators shortly. That means more reports getting published. And that's good. Because last week there was a mob outside my house brandishing flaming torches, wanting to know where all of the "recent reports" are.

They're coming. :)

Uploaded 10/14/08:

Lots of members section updates today. I've been working on a large design project for the past month that's been taking up my (free - ha ha) time. Mom and Bob were kind enough to take Rowie down there for a couple of days (THANK YOU!!!!!), so I can finally sit down and get some work done here on the site. Between doing freelance design jobs with deadlines, running a household, caring for an almost-two-year old full time with NO daycare, and trying to keep up with Oregonbigfoot, I'm ready to crack. Seriously.

No.

SERIOUSLY.

The other day, during one of those few times when she was quiet enough to allow me to concentrate on something for five minutes, I was lost in design-land, working on a billboard design. The deadline was thirty-minutes-ago.

It was too quiet. I went into the living room and found Rowan, on the floor, with the cornstarch baby powder. E-V-E-R-Y-W-H-E-R-E. It looked like a hardcore 80's coke party gone horribly awry. She grinned up at me and said, "Powder?"

Today, I turned my back for 5 minutes and she came out of the bathroom, soaking wet. She's decided that throwing wipes in the toilet is enjoyable. She says "Trash" and heads for the toilet with a wipe in hand. However, today, she graduated to dunking a diaper in the toilet water. Repeatedly. And bathing herself with it. "Water!" she says. She looks proud. I'm thinking E-coli.

Anyway, for me a "vacation" means a quick nap, then a chance to start scratching all of this stuff off my to-do list for the site. And there's A LOT. So here I am. The house it blissfully quiet, Skye's in Portland on business, I'm sitting here without my wee beastie saying, "Mommy? Mommy? Mommy?" and handing me crayons and magnets and every other thing she can get her grubby little paws on and asking for crackers and Elmo and Teletubbies while my to-do list grows ever-longer and my brain slowly fries.

And to think... six months ago I said, "I can't wait til she can talk..."

The REALLY crazy thing is... I miss her.

I have almost certainly lost it. *grin*

More recordings from Mike Hall and members Bruce Densford and Bob Densford. I've revamped this entire section, with additional info, photos, audio recordings, etc. See the new menu for this section HERE

In these recordings, you'll hear a walking and unidentified speech sequence, as well as a recording of loud movements in the river . These sounds were recorded in the same area of TX where the guys recorded the walkup and coughing.

Also, updated Tom's journal for August/September. Member Nancy returned to the Basin Gulch area after the recent forest fires. Read the full report

This story was sent to me by someone who only wishes to be referred to as "L". He is a man well-known to me and is a very credible witness. What he describes here is something that I've heard many times from long-term witnesses. While I cannot explain "L's" story, I think it's an important aspect of research that deserves attention.

This fascinating recording is an audio snapshot of a moment in time: a group of folks sitting around a campfire, talking and laughing and trying to synthesize the event, after one of the hunting party has had a close encounter with a Sasquatch.

Eyewitness Cliff describes a lengthy encounter during a spiritual retreat in Alabama. Footprint photos. Also, see photos of the lifesize replica he created.

Send this one on to the skeptics in your life! ICHNOTAXONOMY OF GIANT HOMINOID TRACKS IN NORTH AMERICA (In layman's terms, that's Dr. Meldrum's scientific paper proposing naming the Sasquatch species based upon footprint evidence)

9 new recordings from Tim in TX. It's difficult to tell in some of these recordings whether Tim's simply getting dogs/coyotes or something more. Have a listen, and post your opinion on the forum!

Whoo-wee. That's a lot of updates. It's currently 10:23 p.m. I've been sitting at this computer, almost non-stop, since 8:00 this morning. My butt hurts.

One final thing left on the to-do list for tonight...

I thought I'd count all of the audio files, video files, photos and documents in the members section. I haven't taken a tally for a long, long time.

Here are the results:

Documents and articles: 131 pages
(these include historical documents, FBI freedom of information files regarding Bigfoot, eyewitness sketches, exclusive and detailed eyewitness reports and other evidenciary files)

Video Files: 52
(these include purported Sasquatch footage, much of it exclusive, eyewitness interviews, and footage from our research trips)

Audio Files: 82
(These include MANY bigfoot audio recordings not found anywhere else, eyewitness interviews and more)

Photographs: 394
(these include purported Bigfoot photos, track photos, tree breaks, and multiple other evidenciary photos. Nearly ALL are exclusive)

In case you've ever wondered why I have a members' section that requires a membership fee... that's why. Oregonbigfoot.com receives about 50,000 unique visitors a month. If I tried to host all of this on the public site, I'd be shut down within hours for exceeding bandwidth. But if you join now, for a measly $4.95 a month, you can check it all out!

My apologies for another short newsletter, but duty calls and I have to go pick up the wee beastie.

Have a safe and happy Halloween. I'll be eating all of Rowan's candy. It's bad for her teeth. And hey! If you really want to dress up as Bigfoot for Halloween, I know where you can get a great Bigfoot costume. It stinks a little, on account of it sitting in a freezer with some possum entrails and sheep testicles, but at last count, the bid was only up to $200,000.

No. I'm not kidding.

Rumor has it that Biscardi only paid $50k for it. How's that for resale value?

As always, please feel free to send along your comments.