BIG BARRY’S BALLOONS: A SPACESHIP ODDITY

By Ted Colin
I recently received a call from a Big Barry who owns a toy factory over in Kalkaska County. He said that one night he threw an outdoor cookout party for his employees just behind the factory and according to Barry, several UFO‘s started to hover overhead. Barry said that all of his employees were so amazed at the hovering crafts that many of them dropped their plastic glasses of vodka laced fruit punch.

I was intrigued with what Barry had told me so I asked him if he still had any vodka laced fruit punch left. He said he had about ten gallons of it so I agreed to stake out his factory for an evening as long as I could have a gallon of fruit punch. Barry asked me “Are you going to use the fruit punch as bait to bring in the aliens?”

“Let’s just say that the fruit punch might make it easier for me to spot your UFO’s“, I replied.

Barry agreed to give me what I wanted so I showed up the next evening with my colleague Gerrard to see if we might just spot some UFO’s. Barry left a gallon of fruit punch on a picnic table just behind the main building. It was an old wood plank table set up evidently for the lunch breaks of the employees. Outdoor picnic table lunch facilities are common at Northern Michigan businesses. Barry not only left us the gallon of punch and some plastic cups to drink it with but, he also left us an old box full of various outdated snack packs that came from the vending machine. Barry had certainly gone all out to keep us happy. Gerrard and I each brought a sleeping bag since we were not intending to go anywhere especially if we had any fruit punch.

It was cloudy that evening so it got dark fairly early. Gerrard and I looked up at the gray darkening sky and saw several objects directly over the back parking lot of the factory. Gerrard and I squatted down behind the picnic table so as not to scare off the aliens. I started watching the aliens really close when I heard the constant crunching of corn chips by Gerrard. We had not been there more than twenty minutes and all the candy bars from the snack box were devoured by Gerrard. Now he was working on eating all the corn and potato chips. He was just smacking away while I was vigilantly watching the space ships hover over the yard. I figured it wouldn’t be long and all the snacks would be gone and I had not even eaten a bag of pretzels.

Finally, I had had enough of Gerrard. “Gerrard,” I said, “quit scarping down all the snack food and get your cell phone out. We need to get some pictures of these spaceships to prove that we didn’t just make this up.”

“I can’t take any pictures,” Gerrard replied.

“Why not?” I asked. “Didn’t you bring along your cell phone like I told you?”

“Oh I brought along my cell phone,” Gerrard assured me. “The only thing is the battery is dead so I can’t even tell people live what we’re doing on our Twitter account.”

“Dog gone it Gerrard. I spent all last night trying to figure out how to set up a Twitter account to compliment our blog. I did it just so we could be high tech tonight. Twitter is where it’s at now. Bloging is just so 2010. I was hoping pictures from your cell phone would compliment our tweet tonight and we’d be world famous with our proof of alien visitation. Now since you’ve messed everything up I guess there’s only one thing left for us to do. We’re going to have to capture one of those spacecraft and hold it until morning.”

I was really mad and it was a hot night and the heat made me feel even more intensely upset. I was still determined to prove that we had seen aliens so I stood up and moved around the picnic table and motioned for Gerrard to follow me. The closer we moved toward the initial siting the space ships seemed to appear. There must have been a dozen of them hovering over the ground at different altitudes. Some hovered over the barn while others hovered just a few feet above the earth. All of the spaceships seemed really small so I imagined that either the aliens were little teeny guys or perhaps the spaceships were just drones. In either case capturing just one of them would prove the existence of extraterrestrials once and for all.

As I said before it was really hot that night but, just as Gerrard and I approached the aliens a cool breeze came up which felt really good. Suddenly, the spacecrafts moved and tossed around.

“I’m getting kind of scared,” Gerrard whispered to me. “I’ve got to get a look at those things before I just go up there and grab one.” Gerrard pulled out a flashlight and aimed it directly at one of the spacecrafts. The light hit the nearest craft which was shaped like a heart. I believed that it must have been some sort of stealth design so that conventional radar and even a tachyon beam would not be able to detect it.

The craft itself was blood red in color with a curious message at the heart of it so to speak. It said, “BE MY VALENTINE”. Since we were no where near Valentines Day on the calendar I interpreted the message as one of friendship. Maybe the aliens thought that their message was a way to say “hello”. This gave me confidence that if we grabbed one of them they would not put up much of a fight since they might be thinking that Gerrard and I had peaceful intentions.

Gerrard suddenly flashed his light on another square shaped balloon This balloon was a steel blue in color with purple letters on it that said “HAPPY BIRTHDAY”. “Now how did they know that today is my birthday?” Gerrard gasped.

“I didn’t know it was your birthday Gerrard,” I said. “If I had known it was your birthday I wouldn’t have been so upset when you ate up all the free candy bars and didn’t leave any for me.”

“Well, the reason the battery on my cell phone is dead is because I took so many pictures at my birthday party earlier today. I took a picture of mom and then I took dozens of pictures of my new pet rat named Jimmy. He is really quite. I put a little paper birthday hat on him made out of the same construction paper as the hat that mom made for me. He was so adorable I couldn’t stop taking pictures of him even after he drew a lot of blood when he bit mom’s finger. She had to get some rabies and tetanus shots but she‘s o.k. now”.

Gerrard and I were almost up to one of the spaceships when suddenly a gust of wind came up and all the spaceships sailed off into the woods behind the factory and were gone from sight. We did not go after them because the forests in Michigan are so dangerous at night. Big Foots and other monsters are all skulking around in the forest and humans are a nice little bedtime snack for a Michigan forest monster.

Gerrard and I stayed up a while longer waiting to see if the spaceships might return but they never came back. Gerrard saved some pretzels for me so I had my dinner that night and between the two of us we polished off the gallon of fruit punch that Barry had left for our payment.

The next day I told Barry about what Gerrard and I had seen during the night. Barry was puzzled as to why space aliens were so interested in his factory. “After all,” he said “we just make balloons here for special occasions. We make massive amounts of balloons for birthdays or holidays like Valentines Day and then ship them off en-mass to retailers all around the country. Occasionally, we test blown up balloons out back to see how long they stay blown up. Sometimes they go way up height and out of sight but they always return to earth when the helium seeps out. I just don’t understand why aliens would take such and interest in our low tech business.”

Well, there you have it. This is a mystery definitely solved but, not proven. We know aliens hover over Barry’s balloon factory but no one knows why. Perhaps the next time Barry has some left over fruit punch we might go back and spend some more time investigating the UFO sittings at Big Barry’s balloon factory.

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THE SKEGEMOG LAKE MONSTER

HUNTING THE SKEGEMOG LAKE MONSTER
By Tim Collin

Skegemog Lake is located in Northern Michigan and is visible from highway U.S. 72. Much of the lake is surrounded by a protect protected natural habitat, hiking area which is famous for the abundance of Michigan rattlesnakes. Rattlesnakes do not usually bother people but, they do not like to be stepped on. Someone once told me that the venom of the Michigan Rattlesnake is fifty times more powerful than most other rattlesnakes so, it must really hurt if you get bit.

A few days ago I read on the Internet that the rattlesnakes in Skegemog Lake have been hard to find lately. In addition, fishing has also been really poor there recently. When I talked about this at the bar yesterday a man from Midland Michigan said that the reason the fish and snakes are disappearing is because of the giant snapping turtles that live in the lake. One in particular is a monster over 20 feet long and is known by locals as “Old Skeggy”.I asked the man from Midland Michigan how he knew so much about the problem in Skegemog Lake. He said that he was a turtleolgist (someone who studies turtles). He introduced himself as Bugzy and said he’d be willing to mount an expedition to find Old Skeggy if I would put up the $15.00 to rent a canoe. I agreed to his terms and the next morning we were standing on the shore of Lake Skegemog with our aluminum canoe. I had my brother Mike accompany us because if we found Old Skeggy we were going to try to put a large fish net over it. I figured we could use an extra hand to haul in a giant snapping turtle.

As we neared the center of the lake we noticed lightning off in the distance. The clouds were really black and the storm seemed to be moving in our direction. My brother Mike was concerned that we might get hit because we were in an aluminum canoe. However, Bugzy said that the aluminum would conduct the lightning bolts away from our body and we were much safer than if we were in a fiberglass canoe. Besides, the fiberglass canoes were an extra $5.00 to rent for the day.

Mike also wondered why we did not have a more substantial boat to go after such a large monster. Bugzy pointed out that a canoe is more maneuverable than a large boar and we could get right up near shore if we had to. Besides, if a canoe is flipped over it is easy to flip it right side up. A larger boat would be nearly impossible to flip quickly and with rattlesnakes and giant turtles in the water, you want to get back in the boat as fast as possible if it flips. Bugzy further stated that he knew what he was doing because he was a scientist with a background in turtleology. With such credentials how could anyone argue with Bugzy?

Just as the black thunderheads started to roll in and rain began to sprinkle down, some large, massive saucer shaped object soared past us at no more than three feet away. The thing must have been 15 feet long. When the object got about twenty feet away, a head popped up and turned an eye back at us then, the head went back under the waves. The waves were getting bigger as the wind increased. The sky had turned totally black and the rain was wiping down on us as we sat in the middle Skegmog Lake.

Lightning bolts came down like spider legs all along the shore. My Brother Mikes’ hair became really kinky like he just had one of grandma’s permanents. Then, suddenly, the entire canoe was raised out of the water and we found ourselves traveling on top of the giant snapping turtle. He swam toward the shoreline at the speed of a motor boat. Mike and I just sat still hoping the thing was not going to eat us once we were closer to shore. Bugzy was busy pulling up the fish net we had laying in the canoe. I figured our turtleologist must have a plan to save us from certain death.

When our canoe was just about 50 feet from shore Old Skeggy sank down like a submarine and our canoe went riding off into shallow water. Mike and I jumped out of the canoe and ran for our lives until we reached shore. We turned around to see Bugzy with his net, trying to ensnare Old Skeggy. Bugzy managed to get the net over Old Skeggy but the turtle used his beak to slice through the net and swam off to deeper water. Bugzy walked slowly up to the shore with his head held low. He was so dejected that Old Skeggy had gotten away when we were so close to capturing him. Just as Bugzy stepped on shore the canoe was hit by several bolts of lightning at once and exploded. The orange glowing metal pieces feel back into the lake and sizzled as they sank to the bottom.

Mike was the first to speak and said that he thought Old Skeggy had saved our lives. Bugzy did not say another word until we had a couple of beers at the bar. Then he told us that he was going to give up turtleology and become a truck driver. Bugzy said that he had been a truck driver until Tuesday. That was the day he decided he would try being a turtleologist.

The only thing good about this adventure for me is that I did not end up paying a fine or having to do community service which, seems to be my usual reward for being curious about the out of doors and life in general. I did have to pay $300 to the canoe rental business for failing to take better care of the canoe.

We did not get bit by any rattlesnakes but, there is a giant snapping turtle in Skegemog Lake. I do not think he was trying to hurt us and in fact, he may have saved us. I also learned that turtleologist don’t know anything about lightning strikes. I leaned that just because someone is a genius in one scientific field it does not mean they know anything about any of the other sciences.

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EXPERT SAYS PETOSKEY STONES ARE ALIEN BRAIN CELLS THAT DESTROYED THE DINOSAURS

Ted Colin

Junior Editor/Contributor

a humor News Online Publications

What do we really know about the Petoskey Stone? We know it is only found in a very specific region on the planet Earth. That region is Northern Lake Michigan extending up to Lake Superior. Several sites on the internet explain that the petoskey stone is a fossilized coral from the Devonian Era which would make the stone approximately 350 million years old. We have found someone with a very different opinion.

In an old gravel pit about ten miles west of Traverse City, there is a Petoskey stone dig site managed by Professor I. M. Alyar. Professor Alyar teaches Paleontology, Astrophysics, Alien Psychology and, Human Proctology at the Bare Truth Online Institute of Education and Adult Photo Journalism.

We caught up with Professor Alyar at the dig site to ask him about the theory he was advocating regarding the origin of the Petoskey Stone. The Professor had previously contacted us and said he would pay us $50.00 to publish a story about his “Origin of the Petoskey Stone” theory. After some intense negotiations, the Professor also agreed to pay for our gas. The following is an outline of the theory as he explains it:

“The Petoskey Stone came to my attention as I noticed that people were making a lot of money picking up these stones and selling them on EBay and to tourists. I remembered that my uncle I. Ben Alyar owned this old gravel pit where I picked up petoskey stones as an under graduate student. It then occurred to me that I could get a government grant that would pay me a salary to do research on the petoskey stone for a couple of years. So last year I began digging up petoskey stones for research and the extra stones I sell for money (cash only, no receipt if you want any).

Well, last week I received a letter from the government wanting to know why I haven’t published any papers on my findings. The letter went on to say that if I were fraudulently obtaining grant money that I could be prosecuted if I did not return the money with interest. I like most people in Michigan have a penchant for Black Jack so; I have no money to give back and no published paper.

Then, suddenly it hit me. As I was in the bar located out on the highway, I suddenly realized that the petoskey stone seemed to look a lot like a piece of gray brain matter. But, not just any gray matter. Animal gray matter does not have those eyes. Then, I realized that those were not eyes but, they were individual cells. These were cells to the brain of some incredible creature. Brain cells of incredible size that must have belonged to a massive brain. This brain had died 350 million years ago and had been fossilized over time. It all made sense. Over eons of years, glaciers broke up the fossil and scattered brain cells all across Northern Michigan.

But, I asked myself, where does this giant brain come from? There is no evidence in the fossil records to indicate this creature ever existed. Finally, I concluded that this creature was not of this world. It was in fact a creature from outer space that most likely died upon impact with our planet over 350 million years ago.

The fact that the creature had or was a giant brain means it must have been physic. This makes sense because many physics use this stone for healing or to go into trances to see the future. I should charge more money for the stones I sell. Perhaps a medical research facility will be built in my name to study the medical uses of the Petoskey Stone.”

Because the Professor kept rambling on, I shut off my recorder. We of course believe everything he postulated. True to our word, we are publishing his theories now. A couple of days ago the Professor was arrested. This is too bad because we were thinking of making him our official scientific advisor. Yesterday I received a call from the Professor asking if I would use the $50.00 he gave me to help bail him out of jail. I told him that unfortunately, I was a problem gambler and lost the money playing foosball.

ODE TO THE PETOSKEY STONE
By I. M. Alyar
Oh vain,
Petoskey stone,
Are you an alien brain,
Or seaweed bone,

Why do you lay,
And splash on the beach?
Have you something to say?
Have you something to teach?

Maybe your looks,
Can make me some pay,
I'll polish you up,
To sell on eBay.

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