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The Alternative Fortean TimesPanzerben's Combat Diary 15 for December 2003
http://www.combat-diaries.thewhyfiles.co.uk Yuletide Greetings to all Combat Viewers
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A group of Believers return from a winter raid on the Pelican Skeptical Headquarters in Brentford Leisure Centre |
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A sketch by the Seething Elmon of a recent rehearsal for the Alternative Fortean Times Christmas party, 2003
NOW! Ladies and gentlemen! Here is a treat for all you discursive interpreters, sceptical rationalists, and all Cartesian Connoisseurs of Certainty. These two images are facsimiles of rehearsed events. As such they are derived from partially organized reflections of abstract concepts which in themselves were not fully formed at any one time. As such, these images are in no way intended to be even a limited measure of that old box of clapboard tricks called the real. The identities of the separate moments depicted above have now been observed, and therefore individual sanctions have been made as regards their possible occurrence and progress as events. Although it must be admitted in some way these complex images are approximations of sense-material received through the clocks and measuring rods of the modern camera, it must be borne in mind that this recording instrument has a history of conspiracies second to none. The optics were filtered down through Isaac Newton’s alchemical preoccupations, and the digital chips fought their way in principle out of Michael Faraday’s bouts of mental illness. As a means of managing and interpreting experience therefore, the camera is somewhat suspect as a procedure for recording events within the common octave of appearances. Therefore we must bear in mind that often what we see is not what we get. But no matter; these depictions will become atmosphere, tastes, smells to infinity; acceptance and rejection of them and their varying levels of the substance of belief will become as foliage on the old garden walls of the mind. And as they say in Brentford Leisure Centre, you don’t get many of those for a pound.
Throw on another Yule log and enjoy!
Blessings, The Bad Man
Your Editor Squeaks
Well hello again all good Combat Viewers, a happy Xmas to you all, and welcome to Combat Diary 15 of The Alternative Fortean Times, and once again the editor wishes to thank the contributors. We have been asked by many Combat Viewers to include more Chapters, but the trouble is that The WHY? Files is now almost burning out the server, and might go pop if we add any more material. Meanwhile, take the seasonal opportunity to download the best free Yuletide bundle on planet Earth, this being the Combat Diary Christmas Box. This would make an ideal seasonal gift for all Combat Viewers. It contains the most popular eight articles from the Combat Diaries, including such classics as The New Cromwellians, The Great UFO/Retrieval Syndrome, and Events at Batley Boiler House. Here are not a few of the great thoughts of our time in one fast & easy free download. As can be seen from the above rehearsal, it promises to be a particularly good Winter Fire Festival. The Seething Elmon has promised to do the pagan decorations and our other girls are planning the equally pagan cooking. Elmon’s would-be partner, Seidlitz (see previous Combat Diary 14), would like to help, but he is banned from the House of Panzerben after the Old Fashioned British TV Holiday Package rendered himself and Elmon prostrate in the local casualty clearing station, see account below. As always, seeing the British trying to enjoy themselves is one of the great comic sights of world history. I look through the window now and see the results of a British attempt at celebration: the cast-out Seidlitz, leaning on a lamppost, his anorak pulled over his head, like Little Nell in a rainstorm. Al Catel has take over the UFO and Fortean section, since Mike (last seen in Diary 13) blew his top at the pagan funeral of Mr. Moon. As a new-born Christian, he is now leading an expedition to the Derbyshire Hills to make sure that the remain of M. Moon have a proper Christian burial. Apart from that, it has been a good month. We’ve had the usual average of three attempted break-ins per week, mostly from roving skeptical cliques, Stalinist UFO-haters, and the last fairy-eating Maoists of Brentford New Polytechnic University of Common Craftsmanship & Skills. But our security is now better than it ever was with the arrival of “biker” Sidney, now re-christened Samuel Johnson because of his strange preoccupation with that famous figure of English Literature. We have also two Taliban on the roof with high-powered binoculars, and night-patrols of unemployed anti-communists equipped with squirt-bottles of noxious vapour and a recognition list of known skeptical faces. Meantime those Leftish Lutherans who do not believe in Easter Bunnies or pagan funerals continue to try and smash our computer network, and unfortunately the need to stop hackers and viruses has taken Betty Baxter away from completion of Part 2 of her mighty work, The Great UFO Crash/Retrieval Syndrome. We hope to include this in the January 2004 Combat Diary. Unfortunately, due to limited bandwidth, we have been unable to bring you the latest episode of our official Fortean Times researchers Prod and Tonto, and F.T. Murk, their Brentford controller. This trio will appear again early in the new year. We have had many requests from many Viewers worldwide for printed copies of the Combat Diaries. We can provide these for £5 each (inc. p&p). That is the European single-copy rate. Other postal rates we are checking on. Each Diary consists of some 60 pages of high quality colour-laser prints on single-sided A4. This price is the cost price only, since often we are republishing other people’s work, and are not allowed as such to make a profit. Here is the Combat Diaries Xmas Box. Press here to download your present in a single file, which includes selections from previous Combat Diaries: |
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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
Happy Yuletide! Colin
Contents of Combat Diary 15:
Chapter 1: Memetics Part 2 Jack Hardy Chapter 2: Occult Nazis from Outer Space Part 2 Paul Armentano Chapter 3: The Doll Killer Patricia Farson Chapter 4: Eugenics and the Nazis –the California Connection Edwin Black Chapter 5: The Physics of High Strangeness Jacques F. Vallee and Eric W. Davis Chapter 6: The Pepsi Test Clive Thomson Chapter 7: Super Cosmos Jack Sarfatti
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Meet the Team of Panzerben:
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FORTWATCH
Dr. Patricia “Arson” Farson. A street magician, a magical vampire person, and UFO Contactee. She acquired her middle name in an incident that South Kensington remembers to this very day. Now lives in the House of Panzerben, visited by a stream of her many social workers and/or probation officers, and she (and we) make sure that they never forget a single visit. Still hard at work on her autobiography, Memoirs of a Fallen Programmer, a part of which, The Doll Killer, now appears in Combat Diary 15. Trendy. Upper-middle-class. Parents long in despair and hoping that the no one ever finds out that her mother’s married name was Cohen. Had great hopes after the much troubled public launch of their reluctant debutante daughter, but she proved to have brains, always an English upper-class nightmare. As a brainy person, she avoided the usual British fate of being locked up in the west wing like a misshapen dwarf. But I am sorry to say that Patricia Farson (our very own Jewish Princess) has not completed her promised exposure of the virtual take over of the Fortean Times by Magonia magazine. Also, the shredding of her piece by our lawyers caused some fine moments in the house of Panzerben not heard or seen since the last V1 landed in Paddington. Our full Crisis of Belief Tactical Support Team was summoned from urgent cases of skeptical hysteria. George Shenston and Mavis Powell held Patricia down whilst Jimmy Edwards (a qualified medical doctor – some times we do things legitimately, unlike funerals, but more on that subject those later) administered a strong sedative. To calm her down, and to show how much we appreciate her, I here include a piece from her as yet incomplete autobiography, Memoirs of a fallen Programmer, entitled The Doll Killer. Above is a happy picture of her in her usual buoyant state. Below is a picture of her just before she had to be sedated by our very own fallen medical practitioner who after suffering terrible sceptical doubts finished up on a camp bed in the House of Panzerben.
Patricia has received much praise, publicity, and not a little Ufological notoriety for her article Fortean Times and the New Cromwellians that appeared in Combat Diary 12. An expanded and much more detailed episode of this fascinating story will appear in the January issue of the The Alternative Fortean Times. In this long-awaited piece, she will, lawyers permitting, show in far greater detail the complete history of attempts by Magonian Skeptics at penetrating and finally taking over the Fortean Times. Meantime Combat Viewers will be intrigued I am sure with The Doll Killer, a piece from her autobiography, Memoirs of a Fallen Programmer. This novel is unique, quite different from the usual pastel-shade pre-electric British crap about Jack and Jill in Hampstead, or bleating knitting-pattern thoughts in Bloomsbury. Watch this space. It’s all true.
INVESTIGATIONS
Dr. Betty “Shackster” Baxter from Darkest Knightsbridge, on good repute said to be the greatest computer hacker since the great Fred Klaxon of Wakefield (RIP). Left her signatures at Sellafield, CERN, Microsoft, Los Alamos, and Bill Gates Personal Organizer. These days, after a month in the House of Panzerben, she now appears to be much more relaxed, and has come down to dinner several times. This sister still spends most of her contemplative life however her large custom-built Faraday cage on the third floor, part of which can be seen in the above picture. Betty is said to be Fifth on the CIA kill-on-sight list. IQ off the scale. Very posh. Pre-war drawling accent. Overbred, with good blood from somewhere. Double First in Greats. Turned down Christchurch History Fellowship. Fine bones. Manchester girl, of course. Great Grandmother Captain Mary (WAAF) was Ultra Liaison Officer with Fighter Command Link at Bletchley. Racial memory all over the place. Mother remembers Turing smiling at her in her pram. Professors and Fellows of All Souls right through the family. And of course, member of the SPR. Dreams about Churchill, Watson-Watt, the old Navy, and T.E. Lawrence weeping in the old Tank Corps sheds at Bovington. Guardian of British mysteries. What a tripper! Read about her latest Harry Potter style adventures in The Great UFO Crash/Retrieval Syndrome, in Combat Diary 14. Another episode coming up soon!
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DEFENCE AND SECURITY |
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Sidney in pensive mood |
Sidney on patrol |
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Sidney, unlike poor Mr. Moon (RIP) managed to avoid the NHSS experimental pound, when we found him the Last Chance Depot of the Camden Salvation Army. He was sound asleep on a pallias that had the name of a regiment last seen on the British Army List in 1904. The bedding straw was in a similar historical state. Strange to say, we found Sidney to be an expert on Dr. Samuel Johnson, whom he resembles somewhat. Astonished, we found him going through a sackful of notes he was compiling about a book about Boswell’s Diary for 1762! Thus does the observer become the observed. If Sidney is Johnson recreated, then goodness only knows if Shakespeare himself is a crane driver in Nottingham, and James Joyce is emptying dustbins in Norwich. If this is so, then perhaps, full of what Ionesco called nostalgia mysterioux, such folk stop what they are doing and wonder who once they were. Like Johnson, Sidney has a great problem with abstractions, and the romantic or mystical view of life. This is most strange, since he has complete recall of the day-to-day life of Boswell and Johnson. Of this, more later in the Combat Diaries of the Alternative Fortean Times. |
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Domestic
Head Cook, Manservant, and Chief Bottlewasher: The Seething Elmon |
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Before British Holiday |
After British Holiday |
Seidlitz (unchanged, as ever) |
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I tell this story again for new Combat Viewers. The Seething Elmon, our head cook and bottle-washer went on holiday with his partner, Seidlitz. Relatively speaking, this well-deserved rest didn’t go too badly as compared with other years. The pair got only one week in police custody out of the four-week TV Bingo-Fiesta holiday at Skegness Butlin’s camp, financed by their forged TV Jumbo Happiness Vouchers. The following week they spent in separate hospitals recovering from serious injuries suffered from their desperate affections for one another. Recovering, Elmon (with a leg in plaster) went on to win the TV Cilla Black Karaoeke Contest, and Seidlitz (on crutches) got the Dame Edna TV Crooning Award. Unfortunately, some very funny business on the Dodgem cars with young matelots in training got the pair promptly arrested again. They received less than nine charges of common indecency, some of legislation dating back to the time of the Black Death and the Civil War. The final week was spent in custody trying to organize the kind of lawyers who do not charge fees. After their Community Service, and Probation period, some say marriage is on the cards. We look forward to the Reception, if not the nuptials.
RETREAT, COUNSELLING AND CONFESSIONS
Another unique facility of the House of Panzerben.
All Pelican Rescue Duties have now been taken on by George Shenston, and his assistant, Mavis Powell, above. Poor Carol Silk (see Combat Diary 14), quite unable to take the endless despair of fallen skeptics who have had crises of belief, and she has made a sorrowful retreat to the nearest bistro. We do hope that this splendid pair will continue to run the Panzerben Rescue & Reform Scheme for UFO & Parnormal Unbelievers (K&C grant applied for) as well as take 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 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 combat-diaries@thewhyfiles.co.uk |
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