Back in the 1950s there were all those reports of UFO sightings and it seemed everyone, everywhere was seeing flying saucers and little green men - mostly in the USA. All of it, well most of it, was complete nonsense.
It seems just a few of those sightings actually were of something "not of this world".
It was in 1959 in Iowa and it was a saucer shaped space craft. Three times previously similar crafts to this one had flown close to the surface of Earth to see what they could find out. This time though, this craft actually landed, dropped off 6 of its occupants then left again - not to return for another 10 "Earth" years. In that time the occupants who were dropped off spread out across the globe to try and investigate this world that was so similar to their own.
They were not green men, in fact, they looked very similar to the humans of Earth. This allowed them to blend in with the humans where ever they went in their quest for information. They communicated with each other by a series of vocal noises that sounded like clicks and pops and beats. But they did not spend much time together while they were on Earth. As soon as they landed they all went their separate ways to gather their information then to meet up again in 10 years when the craft that dropped them off would pick them up again to return home with all the knowledge they had gained.
This all went well. They all spent the 10 years learning, without being discovered for what they really were (mostly) and gathered back together in 1969 and returned home to their planet to let the others of their kind know exactly what they had found about the Earth.
All of them, that is, except for one...
This is his story...
Saturday, June 9, 2012
Whales
I'm driving along a 6 lane highway in a large capital city - 3 lanes on each side of a central median. Me and my 2 daughters on one of our little road trips. It's raining heavily, water streaming down the sides of the highway, so much so that it eventually covers both sides of the road so that all you can see between the buildings and the center median is water - the kind of water you see miles out into the ocean where no land is visible.
You would expect my car to just sink, my daughters start panicking, but my BMW handles the conditions supremely even to the extent of skimming across the top of the water like a speed boat and I have complete control.
"Look, what's that?" Maddie says, pointing just ahead of us.
It is a pod of Southern Right Whales arching toward us on our side of the highway. I have to swerve to the very left, then the very right to avoid them, the Beemer handling brilliantly atop the smooth ocean watered road.
Next we see 6 or 7 dolphins playfully heading our way and I can't see any way around them. So I hit the brakes, the car slows quickly as if it is on smooth bitumen, and I do a quick U-turn through a gap in the median as the dolphins continue happily along the other side of the highway.
We head back up the hill from whence we came and we see a small hotel/restaurant to turn in to, to stop and catch our breath from the unusual excitement of our journey. It's a white, mediterranean style building and we park and run through the rain into the nearest entrance which just happens to be a quaint Italian restaurant. We sit at a table by the wall and notice that what we thought was just a cleverly decorated wall with Italian themes and artwork is actually a giant touchscreen computer monitor.
After telling the friendly restaurant manager about our episode with the sea creatures he suggests we try to find out more on the computer wall. So, with a few touches and grand gestures across the wall we learn that the same thing is happening all over the place. Next a complete map of the world fills the whole wall and we see little whale icons appearing where ever there have been sightings of whales similar to ours - including our sighting on our highway. Then more and more icons start appearing. Some on roads, some on mountains, some in deserts. Soon there is not a major land mass that isn't covered in whale icons...
You would expect my car to just sink, my daughters start panicking, but my BMW handles the conditions supremely even to the extent of skimming across the top of the water like a speed boat and I have complete control.
"Look, what's that?" Maddie says, pointing just ahead of us.
It is a pod of Southern Right Whales arching toward us on our side of the highway. I have to swerve to the very left, then the very right to avoid them, the Beemer handling brilliantly atop the smooth ocean watered road.
Next we see 6 or 7 dolphins playfully heading our way and I can't see any way around them. So I hit the brakes, the car slows quickly as if it is on smooth bitumen, and I do a quick U-turn through a gap in the median as the dolphins continue happily along the other side of the highway.
We head back up the hill from whence we came and we see a small hotel/restaurant to turn in to, to stop and catch our breath from the unusual excitement of our journey. It's a white, mediterranean style building and we park and run through the rain into the nearest entrance which just happens to be a quaint Italian restaurant. We sit at a table by the wall and notice that what we thought was just a cleverly decorated wall with Italian themes and artwork is actually a giant touchscreen computer monitor.
After telling the friendly restaurant manager about our episode with the sea creatures he suggests we try to find out more on the computer wall. So, with a few touches and grand gestures across the wall we learn that the same thing is happening all over the place. Next a complete map of the world fills the whole wall and we see little whale icons appearing where ever there have been sightings of whales similar to ours - including our sighting on our highway. Then more and more icons start appearing. Some on roads, some on mountains, some in deserts. Soon there is not a major land mass that isn't covered in whale icons...
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