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The Alternative Fortean Times
(beware of imitations) http://www.combat-diaries.co.uk Part of The Why Files Network Panzerben's Combat Diary 18 for February/March 2004
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Fishpot Carter A Sceptic Speaks
Don’t miss this chance to get acquainted! Recover your tendency to disbelieve! Fishpot Carter lectures at the Brentford Leisure Centre, Magonia Mechanics Hall 7.30, May 9th 2004. Light vegetarian lunch is available, price two John Pilgers or use your Fellow Travellers Union Credit Card. Everyone in attendance at this event will be given this splendid example of true Proletarian Art on good bathroom acrylic. It combines stirring skill with a sympathetic rendering of our late Magonian Chairman’s wise yet poignant face. Surely all revolutionaries who are concerned that Art should “serve the people” will draw inspiration from this wonderful masterpiece and work hard to emulate its militancy in every cultural area. All good Pelican folk hail People’s Art and roundly condemn the elitist swine who inhabit the swamp of Imperialist post-modernist belief. Self-educated Fishpot Carter, known as the King of the Real is universally worshipped as the great caster-out of all imagination, fantasy, and mythological structures sponsored by ego, media, and the advertisements of rampant bourgeois consumerism. Although Fishpot was accused of being in some way responsible for the mass suicide of some two-hundred psychosocial rationalists, 50 psychiatric social workers, and 350 social-scientific factual experimenters at the 2003 Pelican Logic Festival in Wigan Railway Hall, our Master and Chairman was nevertheless re-birthed at the Sceptics Unconvention and is now once again ready to cast out Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and especially them there U-FOARS (sic). Fishpot’s philosophy makes sense. You will be back at work in no time at all, and you will come to love your tasking, roles and responsibilities. After a sermon by Fishpot, no more will your mind wander. The Master Fishpot himself guarantees that ordinary folk will never again be led astray by dreams, intuitions, inexplicable nostalgias, and destructive weird ideas from nowhere that have no proper socio-economic reasoning behind them. Once a proper bedrock reality (the Fishpot world) is established, then all whims and fancies, all useless things of the ego, all heightened awareness and so-called spirituality are seen for what they are: dangerous illusions to be cast aside. Take the Fishpot Carter Life Lowering Course (price two John Pilgers and half a Claire Short) and every nit and zit of elemental transcendentalism will be burnt away. Fishpot guarantees that you will be a channel-surfing amoeba of a Nobody again in no time at all, and the literal truth of mundane factual objectivity will possess you like the wrath of that ultimate advertisement called God “An enema for the mind” Manchester Social Workers Journal LATEST NEWS FROM BRENTFORD
In the pelican catacombs beneath Brentford Leisure Centre, two young sceptical logicians in Objective Factual Training discuss which hero of Fishpot’s Corporate Scientific Rationalism they should consult first as to the ultimate truth of Spirit, Matter, Fact, and Destiny. The Fortean Times Anti-UFO prophets, Prod and Tonto, are immediately left and right respectively, and the Brentford Polonius is the tall thing in the middle of the left row. This photograph was taken by our very own Ron Mensche who penetrated the British Fantasy Watch Skeptical Unconvention in his usual impenetrable disguise as hall porter. As can be seen from above, everybody had a swinging time. Our roving reporter is ideal for such a mission. His sense of wonder is his greatest strength. Says he, the blue skies are wonderful, as are lakes at midnight, and the face of Marilyn Monroe (that dates him!) but his fundament is definitely a Friday Cortina, made by a mediocre god in training. When he joins finally the equally distressed fundaments above, he hopes they all will be suitably impressed. Panzerben briefs his assault squad prior to yet another a raid on the Skeptical HQ at Brentford Leisure Center Your Editor Squeaks There have been many complaints that the Combat Diaries are elitist, anarchic, and full of Right-centred chauvinist individualism. There are accusations also of lack of respect for facts, science, for common sense, and something called proper authority. A reasonably accurate description, but as a set of brand names, these words are not brilliantly original, although they will suffice. All cultures are sales lines, and judging by the hits we are getting, there are a lot of high IQ shoppers who are coming back for more, though they grit their teeth as they jump through the hoop. This is a fortean site, and it is the only entity in Britain dealing with fortean matters. The only rules we obey are those non-rules put down by Charles Fort in The Book of the Damned, Alfred Jarry in Ubu Roi and Andre Breton in the Surrealist Manifesto. And quite often we throw even those overboard. As such, we don’t give nose-picking info in penny-wrap linear sound bites. Neither do we pile sand grain upon sand grain and call the resulting house of cards “knowledge.” We require a concentration great than the interval between commercial breaks. If you can’t keep up, then drop out, put some pop-tarts in the microwave and go back to watching China Chee in the middle of the afternoon with the blinds drawn. The monosyllables and the short sentences may not be a very classy way of suicide, but it is cheap and effective, good enough for a proletarian way of death. And it is quicker than a Prozac plunge from the 15th floor of the tower block. Do that, and we will guarantee you’ll be interviewed by Mel Gibson’s Lord God of the Sales Office within a very short span of media time. If that doesn’t deter you, nothing will. Stay alive on the other hand, and the mundane will kill you just as fast as a bullet, and just as fast as the deity of the Sales Office. So switch off the peasant culture and forget everything both the Left and the Lord has fed you for too many years. You are special, you have transcendental holistic powers, you are unique, precious and in no way are you measured by what comes out of your arse. Get back to reading, and get yourself into difficulties fighting for information, just like the SAS. Don’t let them tell you that you’re just an ordinary piece of shit who doesn’t count and is of no significance. You are a human being, the most fantastic thing in this universe, and you are worth infinitely more than China Chee or the Jesus cartoons. So switch the damn idiot’s lantern off and get reading and thinking with the cyberspace guerrillas of the Combat Diaries. Don’t let the social democrats and the sceptics from old tin chapels tell you that you are not infinitely big, you cannot escape your limitations, that you are a daft little bozo that lives in a box-cell full of fear and bills and threats, watching unlimited episodes of Panda Girl, and that’s all there is to it, that’s all you are good for. And don’t let them tell that there are no intelligently controlled vehicles zipping around the atmosphere. Meantime, for all those bracing themselves for the Preparation for the Landing on Planet Earth, here is yet another monthly anthropology of inspirations for all reconstructed folk. We would like to thank all our writers, conscious or unconscious of their contributions as they might well be in this speedy modern world. Lacking contributions, we write them ourselves. Makes no difference. Life is a Janus-faced Holon. It doesn’t matter in the universal script whether you come in on cue or not. This is a media world! We thank our contributors again, and would like to point out that Dr. Jack Sarfatti has asked us to explain to our viewers that only 25% of the Destiny Matrix material printed in the last issue of the Combat Diaries was his own. I personally wish to thank Jack Sarfatti for choosing me to write the Foreword to his latest book, and for introducing me during his recent visit to London, to Uri Geller at a private dinner party. This was a fascinating experience, full details of which will be included in Combat Diary 19 for April 2004. Colin (Bad Man) Bennett IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT The Alternative Fortean Times is mounting an experiment in the publication of high-quality literary fiction. We are starting with short stories, and we intend to give the first few chapters of a particular piece, requesting a fee of £2 for the rest of the story, delivered to your door by attached document. The first story is The Lanternslide Girl by George Shenston. This is a brilliant story about a 19th century mind sensing the very first hint of the approach of the twentieth century. If you want to be thrilled by a new kind of fiction, then purchasers please send an order to sharkley1@panzerben1.fsworld.co.uk and we'll give you an address to send the money to. FLASH NEWS!!! Fortean Times discovers wierdness!! Read all about it!
Patricia (the Bad Girl) Farson reports. See Part 2 of Fortean Times and the New Cromwellians , the work in progress by the Jewish Princess of the Combat Diaries. “It took the British a thousand years to put cafe tables on the sidewalks and pavements. Moving at the same rate, many thought that it would take that perfect shrine of native English Bohemian conservatism, the Fortean Times, even longer to re-discover weirdness under the Magonian ice cap. But the result of drastic corporate revisionism directed from above in the counter-Magonian direction has resulted in as great a social comedy as the attempt to put that modern alchemical substance called “real information” on TV. The Fortean Times is now blasting out worn-out scrapings of tired old weirdness at a rate calculated to scare the horses in the street.” FLASH NEWS!!! Betty Baxter travels yet again into Chaos and Complexity!
Betty Baxter’s previous piece, The Great UFO Crash/Retrieval Syndrome in Combat Diary 14 has aroused as great an interest as Patricia Farson’s Fortean Times and the New Cromwellians in Combat Diary 12. In Perfect Advertisements: A Theory of Searches we have a form in which personal experience is collaged from other sources rather like musical composition. This forms a motif of several levels of visionary searches within the body of a single text. With all its bewildering variety and perplexing questions, the ufological quest is an authentic modern vision. Yet it has been little explored as a metaphysical resource. “Quite contrary to most researchers I specialize in investigating phenomena for which there appear to be perfectly adequate explanations. The more complete the explanation, the more diligently search I. To my mind, the main characteristic of explanations is that they tell you to go away and not waste your time looking further because there is nothing to be found. Coming from a distinguished family with a security services and military background this very much goes against the grain of my ancestral trait.” Contents of current Combat Diary 18 for March/April 2004
Chapter 1: Perfect Advertisements: A Theory of Searches Betty Baxter Chapter 2: Fortean Times and the New Cromwellians 2 Patricia Farson Chapter 3: Lantern Slide Girl (pay-for download) George Shenston Chapter 4: Chronicles from the Edge Yvonne Cook Chapter 5: A Short Encyclopedia of Modern Visionaries Anon Book Reviews: Super Cosmos Jack Sarfatti The Time Traveller’s Wife Roger Highfield Film Review Mel Gibson’s Passion Brent Ables
Meet the Team of Panzerben: I have not repeated the staff biogs because of the pressure on bandwidth. The biogs are available on the previous Combat Diaries. They are fascinating, so flicker back and have your life changed.FORTWATCH
Patricia Farson Bobo ‘Tang’ Guitane Some day soon Sister Patricia intends to take time off from writing her novel Memoirs of a Fallen Programmer to build an alchemical chamber on the third floor of the House of Panzerben. That’s the good news. The bad news is that her new boy friend, Bobo “Tang” Gitane is soon coming out of his six-month social confinement in Pentonville. Since the said Bobo (alias Joe Priml of California, alias Sid Thatcher out of Barnsley South Estate) is a complete ****wipe who has a ufological mendacity record as long as your proverbial arm, we look forward to his arrival at Panzerben HQ and his inevitable requests for food, clothing, money and accommodation. There are no prizes for guessing what our combined reply will be to such requests from someone who has been called one of the prime conspiracy-mongers of the Western world. For his straw palliasse and ship’s biscuit he will have to tell us more than a tale or two. Warning: approach with caution. She is a serious woman.
INVESTIGATIONS
Dr. Betty “Shackster” Baxter from Darkest Knightsbridge, said to be the greatest computer hacker since the great Fred Klaxon of Wakefield (RIP), who disappeared in mysterious circumstances. She is now hard at work in her Faraday cage on the next episode of The Great UFO Crash/Retrieval Syndrome, whose title is Journey Into MJ12. Warning: being fifth on the CIA kill-on-sight list, she is well protected.
DEFENCE AND SECURITY
Our two Security guards (Sidney and Cyril above) have now left us and have been replaced by Team 1. Sidney is taking time off to complete his book on Samuel Johnson, and Cyril the Psychopath, after taking our advice, has decided to go into deep and thorough detox as a voluntary patient at the house of David Foxter Johnson, a super-psychiatric friend, (though unlicensed) of ours in Ladbroke Grove. Their replacements, Team One (as we call them) arrived one night under mysterious circumstances asking for water in Scottish accents not heard by ny Scotsman on this earth. The vowels alone sounded as if they had been constructed by a cross between an old kitchen mangle and a super-computer. Other than that, we have hardly heard them speak at all. They refused a straw palliasse, and therefore we do not know where they sleep, if they sleep at all. Once Patricia discovered them both hanging upside down quite naked, like bats from a roof rafter of the top attic. But since their eyes were open, we assumed that they were not sleeping. We did ask them their names, but they appeared not to know what we were talking about, so we call them Mo and Jo. Payment appears to them to be as obscure an idea as a name. Since they do not appear to eat, this matters little. As a protection team, they are perfect. Already they have caught and ejected various sceptical individuals who have tried to gain entrance to the house of Panzerben without permission. They appear to sense scepticism like dogs discover corpses under collapsed buildings. Their constant night patrolling has caught several other intruders from various sceptical organizations. Roving Reporter
A retired private detective, the proud boast of Ron Mensche is that with his lavatory-attendant looks and appearance he has been able to penetrate many a suspicious corporation and Intelligence front. He operates on what he calls the anti- James Bond effect. Put simply, this means that if you look like nothing, people see nothing. His two recurring nightmares are (a) being banished to the North of England and (b) being on a BBC executive committee that is deciding whether something called The News is to be on at Ten or Ten past Ten. His memoirs Still on the Trail are in preparation. In his youth he was the crooner Cliff Dorn who sang with the Harry Bence and Don Smith bands. He had the fabled privilege of making one of the the very last 78rpm vocal titles ever produced, Twistin’ in Newcastle. In between several UFO abductions (of which we will hear more later), Ron pursued yet another subsequent career as what in the 1970s could be called a prototype Alternative Comedian. With the stage name of The Dregs, he was often injured, being chucked out of pubs, beaten in alley ways, and thrown into duckponds many times for asking questions which some say should never have been asked. Here are some of them, culled from his 1980s scrapbook. He is all in all a nice man, even if we have to force him into the hot tub at gunpoint.
-How you do know that a man who can walk on water has any problem with a crucifixion?
-If it hurts it is not the truth
-Mundane claims need mundane evidence
-Television is peasant culture -Since He said to Peter “Thou shalt deny me thrice before cockcrow, did He have knowledge of the future? -Why did God create Cliff Richard? -Why the present tense is used in astronomy and astrophysics? -I have a criminal nature. I do not want to be socialized. -I have never learnt anything through pain and suffering. I have only ever learnt through pleasure. As an brassbound true Englishman I realize that unfettered pleasure is a difficult concept for me. Best answers and comments get a signed copy of Colin Bennett’ Politics of the Imagination. Their responses will be published in the Combat Diaries. For Combat Diary 19, Ron is preparing a block-busting feature on Stanton Friedman, the MJ12 ufologist. It is called Ufology and the Outsider. Mr Friedman has of late got into the habit of applying a marks out of ten “reality” test to ufological thinkers who do not behave like an East German Commissar of the 1950s, or indeed like a Gauleiter of an earlier epoch. Ron is editing a recent rapid-fire e-mail sequence between Stanton Friedman and our very own Colin Bennett which might prove to be very interesting to all Combat Viewers. Domestic
Elmon Siedlitz There have been yet further serious developments on the kitchen front. After Elmon decided to form a rock group with his partner Siedlitz, the pair became quickly dissatisfied with their tricky agent, David “varmint” Voortrekker (alias Connie Spitzer, alias Carl Burrell-Morton and others too numerous to mention), seen here below. The left image is from a rather grainy Security Services shot from a hidden camera. The second was sketched by one Albert, a dying alcoholic in Brentwood just before he was shot and killed by one John Thorpe, his drug-dealing nephew. Strangely, this rather arch picture has served as a valid entry into many covert organization. Such appear not to notice the Boer War rifle, the Guevara beret, and leather “wireless straps” of the old Condor Legion. These were taken from bankrupt stock of Albert’s estranged film company (MBU, or Massive Bears Unlimited) whose assets were seized by his son, later jailed for killing his girlfriend, a previous Director of MBU. All in all, we think Vootrekker did well for £1.50, which he took back (with other things) from the top of a tea chest after Albert fell asleep just before the entry of John Thorpe. Hearing gun shots, Vootrekker sped on his way, as was his wont.
Voortrekker laid claim to have been a South African mercenary soldier, a Legionnaire, and a Wall Street banker amidst many other things. What he did not tell anyone was that he was on the run from the police and security services of no less than ten countries, not to mention his three wives and two girl friends. Of course such a fascinating history would have been a prime asset in rock n’ roll, but it was his ideas on what he called concept development that led to his downfall. On the left below is his first sketch of a suggested form for Elmon’s possible transformation into a Star. Centre is his similar suggestion for Siedlitz. It was reckoned that not even Camden Train Shed Venue on its wildest nights would accept such images. Our valiant pair did however, keep Voortrekker’s suggested name for the group, an action which drenched our two valued house cooks in suspicious litigation from equally suspicious countries, some of which grew melons under flags of convenience and could not be traced on any map. This name is RCubed, or Retro Rock Revival. Both our heroes are extremely excited about the possibilities, which usually means trouble. We are all tense and expectant in the House of Panzerben. This pair serve three fine meals a day in our house to 8 people, assisted by Deaf Meg and her alcoholic daughter, ex-lance corporal Kathleen, late of 4th Armoured Brigade domestic staff, amongst other things. Watch this space as the promotion tour of Retro Rock Revival gets under way, and we are all down to fish and chips in the House of Panzerben.
Elmon Seidlitz Vortexion and Fan Since the suggested operations were judged to be illegal, our future stars have have now, under the direction of their new agent the New Super Retro Man (above, right) christened Vortexion, changed their image, illustrated by the gig shot below:
Elmon is on the right, Siedlitz is on the left (padded out with Latex injections which were later removed by liposuction.) This first date was marred by several unfortunate events. A clutch of drunken lesbian railway carriage cleaners (all of vast girth) taking objection to the whole affair on principle alone, shot firework rockets at the UFO balloon suspended from the roof. This caught fire and exploded, cascading down a thousand alien dolls that had been inside it. All these in turn burst with loud reports. This caused a panic-surge to the doors, which like all British escape doors (mentally and physically) were profoundly locked, barred, and bolted. The hall being only one third full saved lives, but not dignities. And thereby hangs a tale. For cheapness, the “free” catering had been entrusted by Vortexion to Dogbox Johnson, an ex-circus nazi, who lived in a trailer-trash park by the Grand Union Canal just by the old Ladbroke Grove Charnel House. Johnson himself worked for Southern Outfall Drainage Ltd, and was a caterer for local organizations in his spare time. However, his reputation was not founded on his slightly out of date sandwiches and cakes, bought from his friend, Ephraim the Blackmailer, who stole them in the first place. No, Dogbox was renowned for his clever avoidance of the amount of litigation generated concerning the removal of his family’s septic tank. Suffice it to say that all these things combined caused yet more trouble. A good number of the audience. reeling back from the locked doors, were obliged to go through all their natural motions simultaneously as Elmon launched his signature song I’ve Been Abducted. It did not help at this point that a man laid down his EAT LENTILS FOR LESS LUST placard and produced a gun. The man (one Peter “foul” Thomson, a well known agitator) mounted the stage, and headed towards a terrified Seidlitz. He then made a clumsy attempt to rape poor Seidlitz at gunpoint, only to be wrestled down by Team 1 (see above) who had been hired for the night. The gun of course was from Woolworths. All in all, the events were not exactly what could be called a proper introduction to good society. After a thorough scrub down in our hot tub, this pair were thankfully put back in the kitchen where they duly prepared an excellent pheasant dish with herbs, followed an excellent sillabub, curdled with wine and whipped to a stiff froth. Needless to say, all our motions remained quite stable. RETREAT, COUNSELLING AND CONFESSIONS
Another unique facility of the House of Panzerben.
George Shenston, and his assistant, Mavis Powell (middle, above) are in charge of all Pelican Rescue Duties. They have been joined recently by sister Margot Fontez (right, above) who came originally as a belief-casualty. She is a dropped-out professional shrink from Nottingham, and will no doubt have a lot to contribute. We do hope that this splendid trio will continue to run the Panzerben Rescue & Reform Scheme for UFO & Parnormal Unbelievers (environmental grant applied for). Margot Fontez will specialize in taking good care of our unique collection of fallen manic-depressive nail-biting po-faced pelicans, dazed and confused rationalists, and all those who suffer from exposure to deadly fundamentalist doll-radiation from the wide-screen Nikon, this being the only alien invasion that counts. The full story of this community-conscious unit will be told eventually in the Combat Diaries of 2004. 24-hour emergency service for Confessions from casualties from all the sceptical chapels is available. Camp beds are reserved for difficult moments of doubt about the Real. Cold Turkey isolation, hot cocoa and sick bowls are available free of charge for all crises of belief in Fact and “concrete evidence.” Special care facilities are available to treat the nightmares of garage-rationalists, boot-and-barn skeptics, and the fear of the over-educated, fallen left-liberals, and any other suchlike who come to the House of Panzerben for holistic relief. George and Mavis have now proved that they are strong enough to cope when crises of Belief occur and Magonians try to snatch back fallen pelicans, as Christians try to snatch back converts who have wandered into infamous "cults" and have to be replugged into the wide-screen Nikon immediately, as if it were a life-support machine. Our thanks and greetings go also to others too numerous to mention who pour in and out of the House of Panzerben seeking comfort, shelter, and what little treatment and advice is ours to offer. These faces cannot be shown due to many issues and considerations and mishaps extraordinary. These mainly involve Social Security, Probation officers, Social workers, the banks, the police, the judiciary, psychiatrists, the Law, alien abductors, Men in Black, the Security Services, and in certain cases Parents, film & TV producers and parents. Many of these young escapees are suffering from bad liberal burn from the everlasting idiot’s lantern, and conversations about gear boxes, DIY, sport, and something called the Economy. Unfortunately we have to hand back many of those who have made it successfully over the perimeter wire, if only to see living screens that offer better viewing and in most case at least, have no license fee. All live within a square mile of the Martyr's Memorial, Portobello Road, and only leave it on pain of death. Come night, and we all pull the beautiful devastation over us like a magical cloak of forgetting. Watch this space, and send your articles, books for review, cartoons, poems, ideas and letters to: colin@combat-diaries.co.uk the old address combat-diaries@thewhyfiles.co.uk will last for the next six weeks. The general enquiries address is sharkley1@panzerben1.fsworld.co.uk Colin Bennett’s books
Politics of the Imagination (the life, work, and Ideas of Charles Fort) given Anomalist Award for Best Biography, 2002. Foreword by John Keel, the author of The Mothman Prophecies.
Looking for Orthon (the life of George Adamski, UFO visionary extraordinary) “Bennett probes the innards of 20th century society with an intellectual and literary dexterity seldom encountered in popular works on UFOs.” Foreword by John Michell, the author The Flying Saucer Vision.
We are supporting also Headpress Publications Manchester, who are the leaders in cutting-edge avant-garde publications in Britain. Here are some of their current titles, and we will be keeping their List up to date. Check out their full catalogue at their web site: www.headpress.com j
After that, you will all be ready for your Combat Diaries Archive Box Number 1. Press here to download this box, which includes selections from previous Combat Diaries: 1. Deconstructing the B-29 Colin Bennett2. The Latex Princess Colin Bennett3. Another One that Never Were Alan Goss-Custard4. Fortean Times and the New Cromwellians Patricia Farson5. New Criteria of Diagnosis Carole Smith6. Roswell Reverse Engineering Bill Sherman7. Memetics Jack Hardy8. The Great UFO/Crash Retrieval Syndrome Betty Baxter9. Microchip Implants Luukanen-Kilde
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