Speaker 1: Monster House Presents.
Speaker 2: It's actually quite unlike anything we've ever seen before.
Speaker 1: A giant, hairy creature. Park eighte part in Luckness, a
Speaker 1: twenty four mile long bottomless lake in the Highlands of Scotland.
Speaker 2: It's a creature known as the Luckness Monster. Monster Talk.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Monster Talk, the science show about monsters. I'm
Speaker 1: Blake Smith.
Speaker 3: And I'm Karen Hey.
Speaker 1: They're Monster Talkers. This is Blake Smith reporting live from
Speaker 1: Cryptic Con twenty twenty four. What follows is a discussion
Speaker 1: that Karen and I had last night about the events
Speaker 1: of the first day of Cryptic Con. I would not
Speaker 1: be here were it not for the general support of
Speaker 1: our listeners, so thank you so much for making this
Speaker 1: episode possible. My apologies for the audio quality of these
Speaker 1: in caps. This is not my normal recording equipment and
Speaker 1: I need to clearly invest in a travel kit for
Speaker 1: doing this kind of stuff on the road. Most well,
Speaker 1: thank you for meeting with me on such short notice.
Speaker 1: I know this wasn't exactly how things were planned for
Speaker 1: this weekend, but this is Hey.
Speaker 3: We fly by the seat of our pants.
Speaker 1: Lucky to get off the ground, lucky to get I'm.
Speaker 2: Really excited that you're at crypto Con and I want
Speaker 2: to hear all about bitcoin and a theory.
Speaker 1: Oh, it's so cool, it's so cool. That's extraordinarily funny. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's cryptid Con. Yeah. I got onto some ban lists
Speaker 1: on Blue Sky, which I've moved over to Blue Sky.
Speaker 1: I'm enjoying it there. But somebody, yeah, well you actually
Speaker 1: brought that to my attention that someone had put me
Speaker 1: on a band list because of Yeah, yeah, exactly, crypto
Speaker 1: cryptid exactly.
Speaker 3: Well, so easy to confuse the two.
Speaker 1: I think. What did I say back is that there's
Speaker 1: bullshit and then there's bullshit, right.
Speaker 3: Distinction.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so yeah, you are in Kentucky.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Juli Ryan, you know what. Okay, first of all,
Speaker 1: let me say I wouldn't be here if it hadn't
Speaker 1: been for the fans coming together, because literally the day
Speaker 1: before I was about to leave my van, water pump
Speaker 1: failed and we just, yeah, absolute disaster. People came together
Speaker 1: and helped us out, and so I was able to
Speaker 1: salvage the trip, which I was delighted by. For the patrons,
Speaker 1: I gave little video and audio postcards along the way.
Speaker 1: I did make it up to Kelly Hopkinsville successfully, you're
Speaker 1: more about that later.
Speaker 3: I guess, well, this is a very important business.
Speaker 1: It is.
Speaker 3: I mean, I mean, you need to report to.
Speaker 1: Us from me, I need to report. But also it
Speaker 1: was like my wife was so upset that I wasn't
Speaker 1: going because she's like and I thought.
Speaker 3: Well that alone was worth the trip.
Speaker 1: It was suspicious, but she really she knew how much
Speaker 1: I wanted to go. She really did not want me
Speaker 1: moping around the house all week and complaining that I
Speaker 1: wasn't there. So I appreciate it so much from everybody,
Speaker 1: so thank you.
Speaker 3: We appreciate our listeners so much.
Speaker 1: So much, so much, especially, I mean, we appreciate all
Speaker 1: of you, but your patrons really really helped us out
Speaker 1: and you keep her bills paid and we are extraordinarily grateful.
Speaker 1: And if you're not a patron, you suck. No, not really, no,
Speaker 1: But we appreciate all our listeners, you know, but if
Speaker 1: every little bit helps, so you know, if you can't
Speaker 1: be a patren, we appreciate it a lot. But here
Speaker 1: I am, I'm in Cryptid Central, I'm in Cryptic Con
Speaker 1: and Lexi, Kentucky, and I thought I would report back
Speaker 1: on the day's events because I basically spend all day
Speaker 1: listening to lectures, which was great.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I've just got a couple of questions up front.
Speaker 2: How long has it been around for?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 1: I know, I was at the first one, which I
Speaker 1: think was twenty seventeen maybe maybe okay years now, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: several years. Of course they had to shut down for
Speaker 1: COVID like everything.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, yeah, but yeah, there.
Speaker 1: Were some surprises here. This was really I mean it's
Speaker 1: first of all, you know, if you like monsters, cryptic
Speaker 1: comes are really great convention if you need to get
Speaker 1: your branding updated, because holy cal they've got some great
Speaker 1: vendors here with just some tremendous items posters, t shirts, buttons.
Speaker 1: If you love cryptids, they've got you covered, I mean,
Speaker 1: and some of them are extraordinary. There's a Loveland Frog
Speaker 1: artists down here who's like made a like a poster
Speaker 1: for the lovel of Frog and it's so accurate to
Speaker 1: the original, yet artistically more thatch than the original. So
Speaker 1: the original Littland Frog was very lopsided and weird and
Speaker 1: had a magic wand and yeah it's a very strange story.
Speaker 1: But he clearly has read his material as well as
Speaker 1: being a skilled artist, so I fantastic. Yeah, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: have to figure out how to get some of that stuff.
Speaker 1: That guy's name is Jeff Collins with a K Star
Speaker 1: Cruiser Studios. No, he doesn't give me anything for that,
Speaker 1: but I just have to mention how freaking amazing that
Speaker 1: stuff was.
Speaker 2: So yeah, yeah, I've seen some videos on YouTube. It
Speaker 2: seems like there's a lot of cool merch there for
Speaker 2: any Cryptid fans.
Speaker 1: Now, when they did this years ago, like when they
Speaker 1: first started, they had kind of like a split track,
Speaker 1: so you kind of had to pick between speakers. This year,
Speaker 1: this hotel doesn't really have a setup for that, so
Speaker 1: it's all one main track. They have seating for about
Speaker 1: four hundred and fifty people. It's a little more than
Speaker 1: that because there's some seats in the back that're just
Speaker 1: kind of loosey goosey.
Speaker 2: But I have to ask, is this conference for everyone
Speaker 2: or is it mostly for believers?
Speaker 3: Their mix of skeptics and believers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good question. I would say it's very
Speaker 1: much geared towards people who watch paranormal and Cryptid TV.
Speaker 1: It's put together by TV ghost Hunters, and there are
Speaker 1: ghost hunters here and there's some UFO people here, and
Speaker 1: we'll get to that. There's some surprising people. I sort
Speaker 1: of the headliner doesn't really have much to do with
Speaker 1: cryptids at all, but he was certainly a presence here.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I'm looking forward to hearing about that. Yeah,
Speaker 3: so where do we begin, Well, let's start with the.
Speaker 1: First talk was by Charlie Raymond, who has been on
Speaker 1: TV before. He is the head of the Kentucky Bigfoot
Speaker 1: Research Organization, which sounds similar to the Bigfoot Field Research Organization,
Speaker 1: and apparently he works with them. I don't know how
Speaker 1: much he works with him. He told me or he
Speaker 1: told me he told everyone because it was giving a lecture.
Speaker 1: He has about seven hundred cases that he has. I
Speaker 1: don't know if investigated is the right word. Interviewed the people,
Speaker 1: he's interviewed the witnesses and collected data about that. But
Speaker 1: that's a private database. And you know, I think one
Speaker 1: of the problems with these sort of fringe ideas is
Speaker 1: people hoard their data and so you don't know if
Speaker 1: are you repeating investigations, are you making important insights? You know?
Speaker 1: Could someone else have something to add, you know?
Speaker 3: So that makes me think of that.
Speaker 2: Gabriel amph you know, the exorcist in Rome, and he
Speaker 2: claimed that he'd done something like one hundred thousand exorcisms,
Speaker 2: but some of them were exercising the public if there
Speaker 2: was a big crowd of people. So yeah, it sounds
Speaker 2: like a bit of fudging maybe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, or at least you know, in some sense, a
Speaker 1: lot of cryptosology people are not doing science, but they're
Speaker 1: emulating it, you.
Speaker 3: Know what their version, their brains, right.
Speaker 1: But as someone who loves cryptozoology and loves monsters, what
Speaker 1: I wish is there was more of a scientific base,
Speaker 1: like some baseline training. All these people going out in
Speaker 1: the woods could be doing citizens science. You know, bird
Speaker 1: watchers collect data and share it, amateur astronomers. The Bigfoot
Speaker 1: world does not have to be locked up in just
Speaker 1: it's just stories. It didn't have to be that way,
Speaker 1: it just is, and I wish that would change.
Speaker 3: Well, I want to ask you to just explain a
Speaker 3: phrase to when you texted me earlier this morning. You
Speaker 3: said it's a pelts and.
Speaker 2: Pause crowd, and I'm wondering exactly what does that mean
Speaker 2: for our listeners.
Speaker 1: Well, and this is very on point for his talk.
Speaker 1: So pelts and pause or is basically the idea that
Speaker 1: whatever Bigfoot is, our cryptids are that they're real, physical,
Speaker 1: natural animals, just mysterious and hidden, but they're real, they're normal,
Speaker 1: they're biological, they have DNA, et cetera.
Speaker 3: So legendary creature is that kind of.
Speaker 1: Thing, right, right? Right? I mean there was a table
Speaker 1: here for the ho Dag because they're putting together a
Speaker 1: Hodag festival, but nobody believes there's literally a Hodag. It's
Speaker 1: very tongue in cheek. It always has been, it was,
Speaker 1: it was, yes, much more, can't we have? I don't
Speaker 1: think we've ever done a pure episode on this, but
Speaker 1: this whole the whole idea of like the lumberjack monsters,
Speaker 1: like the the Colorado was it the sidewrock Slider, the
Speaker 1: one oh that I h yeah, that's just stolen from
Speaker 1: that's funny. But there's a bunch of those, you know,
Speaker 1: there's there's there's so many of those, like they're just
Speaker 1: campfire stories for lumberjacks. Yeah, we love them, we do,
Speaker 1: uh you know, I I love basically all monsters. But
Speaker 1: but but the Pelts and Paul's crowd really wanted to
Speaker 1: be biological. But Charlie, when he started his talk before
Speaker 1: he ever got into talking about, you know, the data
Speaker 1: he's collected and the expeditions he's been on. He asked
Speaker 1: the audience for what did they think, you know, and yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I didn't do a headcount, but I did some eyeballing.
Speaker 3: So it looked like so some eye rolling.
Speaker 1: Well, so let's say there, I believe there were about
Speaker 1: four hundred and fifty seats on the floor and then
Speaker 1: it was about eighty percent full at that first talk.
Speaker 1: And when he asked, first of all, he said, you know,
Speaker 1: do you think Bigfoot might be paranormal? That got about
Speaker 1: five percent of the audience to raise their hands. When
Speaker 1: he said flesh and blood, he got about twenty percent.
Speaker 1: When he said a combo, that number dropped. It looked
Speaker 1: maybe like fifteen percent. He asked if people thought it
Speaker 1: might be aliens? A few more than more than five.
Speaker 2: Georgio put his hand on he was back in the.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he was back there selling autographs or whatever. But
Speaker 1: then he said, to think it might be a government experiment,
Speaker 1: and one person raised their hand, you know, or a
Speaker 1: government cover up. You know. Also you know what that was,
Speaker 1: you it was. It's funny he said that because like
Speaker 1: one person raised their hand, and maybe what he should
Speaker 1: have done is asked to survey again after he gave
Speaker 1: his talk, because he did tie into that whole missing
Speaker 1: four one one stuff and how the national parks have
Speaker 1: people missing and maybe maybe they know something, you know,
Speaker 1: that kind of thing. So he was leaning into that
Speaker 1: towards the end. But he said he had six hundred
Speaker 1: and eighty eight documented reports and then he's got I
Speaker 1: guess twenty two that are super secret that people don't
Speaker 1: want to be, you know, revealed. So since nobody can
Speaker 1: see these reports at all, it feels like they're all hidden.
Speaker 1: But whatever, does.
Speaker 3: He plan to share them at any stage or not?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'm actually planning to maybe talk to
Speaker 1: him and to talk to Cliff Barrickman tomorrow if I
Speaker 1: get a chance. Cliff. When I met Cliff at twenty
Speaker 1: nineteen at this convention, and he was willing to come
Speaker 1: on to Monster Talk, but then something happened like it's
Speaker 1: when I can't remember what it was, but it really
Speaker 1: distracted me and I lost track of things. I can't
Speaker 1: don't remember what it was. Anyway, whatever that was, it's
Speaker 1: over now, and I I need to talk to Cliff
Speaker 1: because he was one of the talks, So we'll get
Speaker 1: to him in a minute. But I really like him
Speaker 1: and enjoy chatting with him, so I'd love to have
Speaker 1: him on only he wanted to talk about possible in
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. He wanted to talk about possible human ancestors
Speaker 1: that might still be relic populations that could account for
Speaker 1: Bigfoot stories. But what I really want to talk to
Speaker 1: it is interesting. I am grossly unqualified to talk about
Speaker 1: human like the sort of that sort of anthropological view
Speaker 1: of ancient humans. But what I am interested in talking
Speaker 1: about he might be interested in talking about is And
Speaker 1: I have to ask, is this exact thing we're talking about,
Speaker 1: which is the split between the Pelts and Paul flesh
Speaker 1: and blood people and the paranormal people. Because there's so
Speaker 1: much paranormal stuff here, you know, and if you I
Speaker 1: feel like the Pelts and Pause people feel like that's
Speaker 1: not being a serious investigator. If you're looking for portal
Speaker 1: Bigfoot or ultra dimensional Bigfoot or demonic Bigfoot or angelic Bigfoot,
Speaker 1: that those things aren't science. I'm here quote those aren't scientific.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I could see there being some rivalry and
Speaker 2: a real split between those two groups.
Speaker 1: Exactly. I think the most interesting thing was as subdued
Speaker 1: as Charlie was. He kept talking about, you know, you
Speaker 1: don't get guaranteed you'll have an experience, but then he
Speaker 1: would say things like when you're on one of these
Speaker 1: adventures and then like a big male bigfoot bluff charge
Speaker 1: of you. You know, it changes your life, you know.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, wait a minute.
Speaker 3: You know, Okay, you just said the.
Speaker 1: Forest was safe, but also you're being bluff charged by
Speaker 1: giant male big feet. So yeah, I don't know mix
Speaker 1: signals MC signals.
Speaker 3: Well did he talk about evidence that he had.
Speaker 1: He did, and he showed some video. His evidence was
Speaker 1: primarily audio. He got into the Sierra Sounds and talked
Speaker 1: about nice he had a uh he I guess one
Speaker 1: of the interesting things was he had recording here in
Speaker 1: Kentucky recent that was a very close sound structure map
Speaker 1: to the original Sierra Sounds whooping sounds. And he showed
Speaker 1: a video where he compared a human whooping into a
Speaker 1: microphone to what they got in those recordings. And so
Speaker 1: I haven't had a chance to sort of like dive
Speaker 1: in on that at all or see if that's stuff
Speaker 1: that we could look at because it's very visual, even
Speaker 1: though it's an audio presentation.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's sort of stuff that interest me.
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, no, no, of course. Yeah. And Ron
Speaker 1: Mooreheads still alive and the Sierra Sounds are copyrighted, so
Speaker 1: I've always been hesitant to play them on the show.
Speaker 1: I know a lot of book bigfoot people do, but
Speaker 1: they're not in the public domain. This is, you know, so,
Speaker 1: and I don't know how lightgious mister moorehead is, but
Speaker 1: I'd love to talk about that at least, you know,
Speaker 1: under exactly if we're adding commentary and analysis, I'm sure
Speaker 1: it's fine, but yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: Some days.
Speaker 1: Oh I think at the end of his talk, he said,
Speaker 1: just kind of in passing, it's like, you know, and
Speaker 1: one of the most startling stories I've heard was about
Speaker 1: the Fort Knox Bigfoot massacre. In my eyes, you know
Speaker 1: what it's like, Yeah, he said, I guess an old
Speaker 1: soldier from Fort Knox gave a deathbed confession that the
Speaker 1: army had killed or Bigfoot but let a young one
Speaker 1: get away. And I was like, yeah, I would love
Speaker 1: to hear more about that story. But yeah, like all
Speaker 1: deathbed confessions, this one is or maybe not all over
Speaker 1: like this, but this one is a deathbed confession, unattributed
Speaker 1: to any particular person, so certainly newsed to me.
Speaker 2: Yes, it'll be a hallucination or something. I don't know,
Speaker 2: you gotta wonder, but yeah, like to hear more about
Speaker 2: that too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but if he was, you know, dipping into the paranormal.
Speaker 1: The next group was bathing in it so or eleven
Speaker 1: forty five talk was from a YouTube channel called Hellbent Holler,
Speaker 1: which is the husband and wife team of Jesse and
Speaker 1: Joe Doyle.
Speaker 3: And I must admit I have not heard of them before.
Speaker 1: I hadn't either, No, no, no, this was the first
Speaker 1: I'd heard of them. They seem, you know, the name
Speaker 1: of their group is Hellbent Holler. I can't help but
Speaker 1: feel like they're kind of doing a sort of more
Speaker 1: cryptid version of the hellier stuff.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, that kind of was in the back
Speaker 2: of mind.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so, I don't know. I mean, they very much
Speaker 1: kept talking about their experiences being bordering on They kept
Speaker 1: bruning into the occult signs of people performing rituals in
Speaker 1: the woods of North Georgia and in the land between
Speaker 1: the Lakes. The land between the Lakes is a park
Speaker 1: area here in Kentucky between two bodies of waters is
Speaker 1: like a I think they called it the longest inland
Speaker 1: isthmuth in the United States. I don't know, but it's
Speaker 1: people go camping there and stuff. But people have been
Speaker 1: reporting a lot of weird things there, and so when
Speaker 1: they go out and do their videos, they're finding things
Speaker 1: like the blair Witch style little hanging stuff from trees.
Speaker 1: They did a lot of stuff with brown mountain lights.
Speaker 1: What they showed us some video that was really interesting,
Speaker 1: but it looked more like a UFO than anything I've
Speaker 1: ever seen. The brown mountain lights.
Speaker 3: Described as so, why is it bigfoot?
Speaker 2: Then it's involving all this paranormal activity.
Speaker 3: What makes it bigfoot?
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, No, they weren't saying it's all bigfoot. But
Speaker 1: they basically do cryptids, creepy, the occult, anything that's kind
Speaker 1: of weird or dark or mysterious. But uh, I noticed gear,
Speaker 1: tactical gear, and uh they both carry. There's they've got
Speaker 1: a bunch of videos with them firing guns and shooting
Speaker 1: machine guns and stuff, and and uh, there's one video
Speaker 1: they were heard a noise and Joe pulled his pistol
Speaker 1: out was pointing his flashlight as pistol in the dark,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, I I didn't I don't know how
Speaker 1: I feel about that. Not safe. I don't want to
Speaker 1: go to Bigfoot somebody's you know, packing heat because if
Speaker 1: tensions get high, Uh, I feel.
Speaker 3: Like I have a very yeah with this crowd.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Yeah. But on the other hand, they
Speaker 1: look like the kind of people who could sell black
Speaker 1: rifle coffee. I mean, you know what I mean, like
Speaker 1: they they they I don't know, I don't know. They
Speaker 1: seem nice enough, but it's super divorced from critical thinking,
Speaker 1: is I guess, kind of way of putting it. Reported
Speaker 1: a lot of tree structures. They made a special note
Speaker 1: that people had put a circle of quartz stone around
Speaker 1: a witch tree. Uh, and they were hearing humming sounds.
Speaker 1: So I mean they're all over the board with what
Speaker 1: they're into.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeahs pretty mundane summertime.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3: So the things that we've talked about, like the tree structures.
Speaker 1: Yes, oh yeah, that's so right. And I thought that
Speaker 1: was kind of funny because several people that seemed to
Speaker 1: be a topic of contentionent here. Some people are like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's uh, you don't need to have a bigfoot to
Speaker 1: get those. That's just happened, And there's other people like
Speaker 1: that's clearly the work of an intelligent creature building something
Speaker 1: like what are they building? Yeah? Yeah, but the big
Speaker 1: you know, the big speaker, the big speaker comes in
Speaker 1: at one like a rock star, really really really you know.
Speaker 1: And I say that, but like everybody had introductory videos
Speaker 1: where they played rock and roll music and showed little
Speaker 1: clips of them running around in night vision.
Speaker 2: I'm not even joking, Like, so we're talking about of
Speaker 2: course Georgio.
Speaker 1: Georgio Suculo's now you may I you know, he didn't.
Speaker 1: I was kind of disappointed. I was excited to see
Speaker 1: him in real life, just to see how tall he is.
Speaker 1: Is he really as orange as he looks on the internet?
Speaker 1: And the answer is no. His hair is absolutely just
Speaker 1: as big, but his skin is not nearly his orange.
Speaker 1: So yeah, okay.
Speaker 3: Interesting.
Speaker 1: He was a very passion speaker.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, but I mean that is one thing I
Speaker 2: like about him. He is I mean, he says a
Speaker 2: lot of ridiculous things, but his passion for the topic
Speaker 2: is very really rubs.
Speaker 1: Off and yeah it's infectious as.
Speaker 3: Long as you can.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is as long as you can sit down
Speaker 2: with some popcorn and treat it for what it is
Speaker 2: and not believe in it.
Speaker 3: I think he's good fun.
Speaker 1: Yes, there's more like ancient failures podcasters what they kept
Speaker 1: talking about it being a show to this design. So
Speaker 1: you could be making dinner and walk through the living
Speaker 1: room and go, oh, that's interesting and walk back to
Speaker 1: the kitchen.
Speaker 2: That's right, something for the dinner party. But so you
Speaker 2: said that he did it. It was a kind of a
Speaker 2: Q and a say.
Speaker 1: That was what I was disappointed by. It was absolutely
Speaker 1: an Ama asked me anything, and everybody wanted to ask
Speaker 1: about the congressional hearings on UFOs, the cover up when
Speaker 1: this disclosure coming, Like I am to be blunt, i
Speaker 1: am not a cryptic con for UFOs. I'm a crypto
Speaker 1: con for cryptids. So I got a little bored of that.
Speaker 2: So yeah, and I guess he is just a kind
Speaker 2: of figurehead for that. But I thought, maybe he seems
Speaker 2: to tie in his beleefs with just about anything anything
Speaker 2: any the whole.
Speaker 3: Series, So I thought, oh, he's going to have some
Speaker 3: links to it.
Speaker 1: Did have a few. I mean he talked about the
Speaker 1: idea that maybe Bigfoot was the real and natural progression
Speaker 1: of what humanity would have been had it not been
Speaker 1: for alien intervention. So that's there we go. Yeah, there
Speaker 1: you go. Yeah, if it hadn't been for those aliens,
Speaker 1: we'd all be out naked and having a good time
Speaker 1: in the woods. And you still can. But it's a
Speaker 1: lot colder without that fur indeed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, well I think that would have been interesting
Speaker 3: to see. Anyway, He's just got such a huge following.
Speaker 1: He uh. One of my favorite questions that somebody asked him.
Speaker 1: I tried to scribble it down, but it was like,
Speaker 1: I don't understand how they could post these amazing videos
Speaker 1: like the go Fast video, and then these government people
Speaker 1: will just come in and they'll try to use trigonometry
Speaker 1: and physics to explain the whole thing away.
Speaker 2: Good learn shorthand yeah yeah, good stuff.
Speaker 1: Using that trigonometry of physics. It's a conspiracy. I'm wondering
Speaker 1: ti the terrorist group algebra.
Speaker 3: The base.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, but these videos that these talks and interviews,
Speaker 2: will they be publicly available?
Speaker 1: Oh I don't think no, no, no.
Speaker 3: That's okay.
Speaker 2: So just at the comet. Well, that's a shame in
Speaker 2: a sense that all of these things. It's great that
Speaker 2: you're reporting on them because we won't get to see them.
Speaker 1: So I wish he had talked about cryptos. That would
Speaker 1: have been better, but you know, it was what it was.
Speaker 3: It would be more on point.
Speaker 1: But yeah, then hell a little for food. And then
Speaker 1: Cliff Barrickman came up and he did great. I really
Speaker 1: liked his talk. He's a very reasonable guy. I mean,
Speaker 1: I again, he very much believes in Bigfoot, but it
Speaker 1: is no trouble at all to talk to him. He
Speaker 1: has lots and lots of data. I'm going to say
Speaker 1: that I don't want to knock his stuff. You know,
Speaker 1: he's got footprints and handprints and all kinds of things,
Speaker 1: and he really cares about fearing information and like I,
Speaker 1: you know, I think we have very civilly agreed to disagree.
Speaker 1: And I really, I really hope he'll come on the
Speaker 1: show and talk about some of the stuff because he's
Speaker 1: a really interesting guy.
Speaker 3: We've had guests like that before on the show, so
Speaker 3: we don't shy away from golf. Do you believe in
Speaker 3: these things?
Speaker 4: Are?
Speaker 3: I think it's certainly just all part of the fabric
Speaker 3: of our show. It is, and people.
Speaker 1: Like this he is he has made. I guess since
Speaker 1: we talk to twenty nineteen, he has built a museum,
Speaker 1: the North American Bigfoot Center, and put a lot of it. Uh,
Speaker 1: that's a really great question. I think it's at North
Speaker 1: American Bigfoot Center dot com according to my notes, but
Speaker 1: I don't remember what to say, the Pacific Northwest, but
Speaker 1: I don't remember which state.
Speaker 3: Okay, it's all online then, or.
Speaker 1: It's some physical No, No, it's a physical place.
Speaker 3: Okay, okay, let me see.
Speaker 1: I'm looking it up. It's boring Oregon, so I don't
Speaker 1: That does not mean that the museum is boring. It's
Speaker 1: just it's in boring Oregon. So I got a friend
Speaker 1: who lives in Oregon. I'll have to see if I
Speaker 1: get her to go take some pictures for me. That'd
Speaker 1: be cool.
Speaker 3: Added to the bucket list.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but anyway, he gave a He talked about his
Speaker 1: museum has a big sasquatch mascot wearing sort of a
Speaker 1: flannel shirt. He said, he's sorry that it's kind of campy,
Speaker 1: but it's very recognizable. But I guess they got to
Speaker 1: show off at a big I'm gonna mess up. I
Speaker 1: don't know I'm just gonna say a basketball team sports event,
Speaker 1: because I recognize that the sport was basketball, but I
Speaker 1: do not know what the team was, and I know
Speaker 1: he said it, but I've forgotten. But also he kept
Speaker 1: saying how he didn't do sports, but he was excited
Speaker 1: to be able to be a part of this, and
Speaker 1: he complained that, you know, he plays Dungeons and dragons,
Speaker 1: is he's into Bigfoot, and people call him a nerd.
Speaker 1: But then if you talk to a sports person for
Speaker 1: just a few minutes, you realize they're nerds too. They're
Speaker 1: all about stats and stuff. It's like, yeah, okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: we're just different kind of Just because you have stats
Speaker 1: athletics people, does not make you athletic.
Speaker 2: That's my quote, not yes, indeed, Oh yeah. We'll have
Speaker 2: to bring him on the show at some point when
Speaker 2: he's available.
Speaker 1: And doc who was after that, Maria Mayer and Russ Accord,
Speaker 1: and they were giving a very funny talk. They are
Speaker 1: from Expedition Bigfoot. I'm gonna have to get here's the
Speaker 1: I don't watch Expedition Bigfoot. I collect it with the
Speaker 1: intent to watch it, so I really need to give
Speaker 1: it a watch. Her background is actually she was a
Speaker 1: Miami Dolphins cheerleader and then became an anthropologist and then
Speaker 1: became a TV personality. So she seems to have a
Speaker 1: strong career. Yeah, oh, very interesting. And she's absolutely got
Speaker 1: a strong stage presence and it is a good communicator.
Speaker 1: I don't know much about Russ. They were giving some
Speaker 1: background for him too. He's ex military. I mean they're both,
Speaker 1: you know, physically attractive TV people. But she seemed pretty sharp.
Speaker 1: That doesn't mean that what they're doing on the show
Speaker 1: is sharp, so I can't really endorse that, and I
Speaker 1: don't you know, Yeah.
Speaker 2: I admit it's another thing I haven't watched. I mean,
Speaker 2: there's just so much content out there nowadays. It's really
Speaker 2: hard to keep up with all of it.
Speaker 1: There really is. There is a lot. Sorry, I'm drinking
Speaker 1: some up water here because I am dehydrated. Anyway, So
Speaker 1: Maria and Russ we're giving a very funny talk. But again,
Speaker 1: I felt like I don't know much about the show.
Speaker 1: They were mostly talking about how they got into the
Speaker 1: show and the show itself. But I, you know, that's
Speaker 1: I need to actually watch a few episodes. But she
Speaker 1: because she's an anthropologist, My first thought was, oh, she
Speaker 1: might be, you know, giving some good signs of information.
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's real. You know though, because
Speaker 1: so many of these TV shows, it doesn't really matter
Speaker 1: what your qualifications are. The editors tell the story.
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, we know that. But yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean you make me curious about checking it out.
Speaker 1: She's trading on her anthropology background. I just don't know
Speaker 1: if when you watch the show you get any of that.
Speaker 1: That's what I'd like to find out. So yeah, but that.
Speaker 3: Brings us a minor.
Speaker 1: Well, it brings us to a very it's a very
Speaker 1: nice transition into the final guest for today, which was
Speaker 1: Renee Holland from Finding Bigfoot, the skeptic of the team.
Speaker 1: And you know, they used to when she would disagree
Speaker 1: with them, they would call it Renee saying, which I
Speaker 1: thought is extremely funny. But you know, she has not
Speaker 1: been at Bigfoot events for a long time.
Speaker 3: And so a reason for that.
Speaker 1: Yes, And it was actually well, her whole talk. I
Speaker 1: took a bunch of notes. Her whole talk was about
Speaker 1: four concepts that she thought were really important if you
Speaker 1: want to stay in Bigfoot. Bigfooting, which is a sense
Speaker 1: of belonging, a strong sense of curiosity, lots of patience,
Speaker 1: and persistence, and she said that you know, those are
Speaker 1: values that she holds deer, but she also really believes
Speaker 1: in the scientific method and won't accept evidence that other
Speaker 1: people will because it doesn't hold up to the scientific method.
Speaker 1: And she gave some examples about like in the bigfoot community,
Speaker 1: how they get all excited about DNA studies, and then
Speaker 1: you know, there was the Melbourne catch which turned out
Speaker 1: to be a complete fiasco, and there's Brian Syke's study
Speaker 1: which turned out to be funded you know, by the
Speaker 1: people putting together documentary, not like really approached from a
Speaker 1: cold scientific perspective. Yeah, So her point, I think was,
Speaker 1: you know, if you and she kept using Carl Sagan quotes,
Speaker 1: which I loved, which is basically, if you don't engage
Speaker 1: in skepticism, then you're not equipped to differentiate, you know,
Speaker 1: a fact from the most ridiculous lie. You know, you
Speaker 1: just don't have the tools for it.
Speaker 3: Sure, And how did that go down? How was that received?
Speaker 1: Okay, so I took some photos of the room because
Speaker 1: but it was the last talk of the day, so
Speaker 1: the seating was like half empty, and then a few
Speaker 1: people left after she started talking. But I thought it
Speaker 1: was a really good talk. Now, she started by saying
Speaker 1: she was super tired and hadn't gotten much sleep. She
Speaker 1: had a few trouble with the slide show, but once
Speaker 1: she got rolling, she was giving a really strong message
Speaker 1: about how Bigfoot can be used as a tool to
Speaker 1: teach scientific curiosity, and that the community should embrace scientific
Speaker 1: methodologies and scientific thinking and how they approach the problem.
Speaker 3: Right, Kindred Spirits totally.
Speaker 1: Felt like that. Totally felt like that. And she also
Speaker 1: talked about herself as being like the Scully but she
Speaker 1: has three molders to contend with, which was extremely funny.
Speaker 1: But yeah, it was a good talk, you know. And
Speaker 1: after it was over. Oh, and she also spent a
Speaker 1: lot of time talking about proper use of environmental DNA,
Speaker 1: the history of environmental DNA, how there are projects out
Speaker 1: there where people could contribute, that it's not that hard
Speaker 1: or expensive, and you know, the lack of basic you know,
Speaker 1: scientific literacy and methodology makes it hard to make use
Speaker 1: of any of the stuff people do collect. Right. Oh, yes,
Speaker 1: so it felt real good. But she also had gotten
Speaker 1: and this is my word, not hers, but basically burned
Speaker 1: out by the Bigfoot community. There's the way I felt
Speaker 1: she was describing it, And so I think she basically
Speaker 1: disappeared from the scene for quite a while, only coming
Speaker 1: back to like any kind of events for the first
Speaker 1: time in twenty twenty one, and it's been very She
Speaker 1: doesn't do podcasts, she doesn't do anything, but she has
Speaker 1: started to kind of re embrace the community, and I
Speaker 1: really commend her for coming back. If it's that much
Speaker 1: pressure and it's that hard, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I think just in our experience, that's what
Speaker 2: we've kind of come across when we've been interviewed for
Speaker 2: TV or interviewed for podcasts. I think that you do
Speaker 2: get that sense of burnout pretty quickly when you're saying
Speaker 2: things that people don't want to hear.
Speaker 1: Yeah. She pointed out that of all the Bigfoot shows,
Speaker 1: she did a really cool thing where she took a
Speaker 1: real info graphic science brochure that's designed to teach people
Speaker 1: how to be citizen scientists as well watchers, and she
Speaker 1: said this was a very effective campaign. I tried to
Speaker 1: do the same thing with Bigfoot. So she basically made
Speaker 1: the same infographic using Bigfoot to talk about what you
Speaker 1: can do and how you can be a better bigfooter
Speaker 1: and be more scientific, which was good. But one of
Speaker 1: the things in the corner was don't get all your
Speaker 1: information from Bigfoot television. And she made the point that
Speaker 1: Finding Bigfoot is the only Bigfoot show that she's aware of.
Speaker 1: Where it was in the contract that the producers could
Speaker 1: not fake evidence they could, they weren't allowed to add
Speaker 1: anything or sweeten it or you know, do anything to
Speaker 1: make it fake. You know, I don't know how you
Speaker 1: police that because they've got the editing tools.
Speaker 3: But yeah, we know a lot about Yeah, but at.
Speaker 1: Least they tried, you know. I mean, it may be
Speaker 1: in the contract. That doesn't mean it didn't have but
Speaker 1: at least they didn't care enough to try, you know,
Speaker 1: so it matters.
Speaker 2: Depressing state of affairs though that's really a clause to
Speaker 2: about that. I mean, you just I think that a
Speaker 2: lot of most viewers would just expect that this is
Speaker 2: all on the up and up. Oh so I didn't think, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I've got to really pay attention to those disclaimers, you know,
Speaker 2: about entertainment purposes only.
Speaker 1: I have a good college educated friend who still thinks
Speaker 1: that the Ghost Centers TV show with the plumbers was
Speaker 1: doing science.
Speaker 3: Oh, blind spots.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they were not.
Speaker 3: Never did. Yeah, well, I think they started off a
Speaker 3: little bit more skeptical.
Speaker 1: But yeah, well, I mean, I just I don't want
Speaker 1: to get into it. I do, obviously want to get
Speaker 1: to we've been doing it in two thousand and another day.
Speaker 4: Yeah, oh boy, Well that sounds to me like it
Speaker 4: would have been one of the more interesting talks for you,
Speaker 4: would have been for me to And it's a shame
Speaker 4: that it was, maybe, as you said, being the end
Speaker 4: of the day as well, people were kind of drifting
Speaker 4: off to go and get there to knock at their
Speaker 4: mint julips, and it was.
Speaker 3: Just a little quiet.
Speaker 2: But I just wonder how many people in that community
Speaker 2: really want to hear that.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know. I think a lot
Speaker 1: of people are here to have fun, you know, just
Speaker 1: you know, just to hear fun, scary stories, be told
Speaker 1: that the woods are spooky. You know.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of that that I can appreciate too,
Speaker 3: me too.
Speaker 1: But there's a whole lot of haunted Appalachia kind of
Speaker 1: creeping in here. I heard spooky Appalachia, haunted Appalachia, cursed Appalachia.
Speaker 1: I heard a lot about the hillfolk and what is
Speaker 1: getting what's happening out there? And it's weird to me
Speaker 1: because like this is not like the manly Wade Wellman
Speaker 1: fiction stories where you've got conjuring people. You know. Well,
Speaker 1: I guess maybe it is a little though I like,
Speaker 1: I don't hear any split between like white folk magic
Speaker 1: and I don't mean like white people, but I mean
Speaker 1: folk magic versus satanic ritual because some when they go
Speaker 1: on these trips and there's finding occult stuff, it's classic
Speaker 1: satanic panic stuff. It's not it's not herbal remedies and
Speaker 1: the long Lost Friend or whatever. It's just something else.
Speaker 1: It's so one of the stories they told was they
Speaker 1: told a story about some people who came up on
Speaker 1: a ritual and there was a child in the middle
Speaker 1: of a circle and hooded figures wearing cloaks were doing
Speaker 1: something and they tried to intervene, but they got chased
Speaker 1: off by the cultists. And I'm like, what what, like,
Speaker 1: what did you call the police? Did you do anything?
Speaker 1: What are you talking about? That's you know, So there's
Speaker 1: a whole lot of folklorish kind of stuff going on here,
Speaker 1: which can be good fun or it can kick off
Speaker 1: a cultural oppression of people who were different, so you
Speaker 1: got to kind of watch out.
Speaker 2: So yeah, absolutely, yeah, I think it's good that you
Speaker 2: kind of are there to just observe everything and be
Speaker 2: able to write about it and talk about it.
Speaker 3: I don't know how well it would go down if
Speaker 3: you were too. I don't know if you've been engaging
Speaker 3: much with other I am quietly.
Speaker 1: I decided to go incognito this year, so I'm just
Speaker 1: quietly asking questions. I'm not I will know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, big pair of glasses and.
Speaker 1: If I had a wig at all, that would be
Speaker 1: a good disguise, that would be Yeah, I'm going as
Speaker 1: this is a great disguise. I'm going to that guy
Speaker 1: with a goatee, right, that's me. I've got I blend,
Speaker 1: I assure you. So I'm not even that fat anymore.
Speaker 1: I cas I shouldn't even say that, but yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I just white guy with a go tea is a
Speaker 1: great costume here. It works out real well.
Speaker 3: So yeah, fit in.
Speaker 1: Well that's all I have to report so far from cryptocon.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, I mean we'll we'll have to pick things
Speaker 2: up and find out a bit more about the day
Speaker 2: two to the events, but it sounds pretty interesting. I
Speaker 2: wonder if you might encounter any monster.
Speaker 3: All listeners too, we.
Speaker 1: Have in the past. I haven't seen any here. I've
Speaker 1: definitely run into it. I didn't get a chance to
Speaker 1: really promote that I was going to be here in time,
Speaker 1: I think. But and also previously I was giving talks,
Speaker 1: and this year I didn't even try to. I didn't
Speaker 1: know I was going to be coming till the very late.
Speaker 1: And then once I got it, you know that it
Speaker 1: was happening that it almost didn't have It's just been
Speaker 1: a little I've been playing it quiet and just absorbing
Speaker 1: everything I can because it's just it was just not
Speaker 1: a year for self promotion. It was a year to
Speaker 1: learn things. So that's all right, fair.
Speaker 3: Enough, good to sometimes just listen and pay attention. Well,
Speaker 3: enjoy the rest of the conference, and I look forward
Speaker 3: to hearing more about what transplirees tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, Yeah, it should be a good day. I'm excited
Speaker 1: about heading back home. Last thing of the day is
Speaker 1: a Bigfoot town hall, which is kind of like a
Speaker 1: prayer meeting for Bigfoot. But I really want to get home. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So basically it's so I know that's not your background,
Speaker 1: but you know, I grew up in a very fundamentalist church.
Speaker 1: So you know, there's Sunday morning service, Sunday evening service,
Speaker 1: but Wednesday night's prayer meeting, and in prayer meeting, people
Speaker 1: will get up and give testimony about all the ways
Speaker 1: the Lord has been in their life, you know, like
Speaker 1: what things have happened if they pray and a thing came,
Speaker 1: you know, it's a it's a reinforcement way to talk
Speaker 1: about all the way the Lord's been helping you. But
Speaker 1: in the Bigfoot world, these town halls to me, and
Speaker 1: they seem to sort of be the same thing. It's
Speaker 1: people get up to tell their personal story, which is
Speaker 1: most of Bigfoot data is stories. It's it's a it's
Speaker 1: a very much a story kind of field. What's a
Speaker 1: Bigfoot town hall? They used to do these on the
Speaker 1: Finding Bigfoot show and now it's like a pretty common
Speaker 1: thing at these kind of cryptid conventions to.
Speaker 3: Actually, Okay, I wasn't aware, y yeah.
Speaker 1: And I wish I could stay, but I really I
Speaker 1: won't be able to stay for that because I really
Speaker 1: need to get hold. Yeah it's a five and a
Speaker 1: half hour drive, so.
Speaker 3: But I do see the parallels with religion that's.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, very very well. I think there are
Speaker 1: probably religious study people out there who were studying this
Speaker 1: stuff as religion, you know, I know the UFO side
Speaker 1: certainly has it. I would be shocked if the Bigfoot side. Well,
Speaker 1: even when I went to the conference with Joe Letcock
Speaker 1: and Natasha Michael's the the whole like the questionnaire, they
Speaker 1: can't be asking you, I would say it's big for
Speaker 1: a religion, and there was like, how is it not
Speaker 1: a religion? And I'm like, well, wait a minute, what's
Speaker 1: a religion? You know, It's like it's like, but the
Speaker 1: religious well, religious studies and cultural studies are both well
Speaker 1: equipped to sort of categorize, dissect, and better understand this
Speaker 1: stuff than you can just from the inside, right. I
Speaker 1: mean they sort of do a meta analysis, which is
Speaker 1: very interesting. Now, some people might say that sort of
Speaker 1: SAPs the joy, but it also reveals things about how
Speaker 1: we think and how culture progresses, and that doesn't mean
Speaker 1: gets better, just means moves on down the line. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Oh no. I remember my old professor doing research into
Speaker 3: humor and to laughter, and some of it wasn't really
Speaker 3: funny at all.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, it turns out jokes are best when alive.
Speaker 1: When you deconstruct them, they're just dead. Well, thank you
Speaker 1: very much, and again thanks to the listeners who made
Speaker 1: this possible. I've been having a wonderful time and I
Speaker 1: hope that the content that I sent you guys was enjoyed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I want to check that out too.
Speaker 1: Well.
Speaker 3: Thank you for reporting on site.
Speaker 1: You are welcome. Have a great night.
Speaker 3: Yeah you too.
Speaker 1: Monster You've been listening to Monster Doc, the science show
Speaker 1: about monsters. I'm Blake Smith and I'm Karen Stolsner. Thanks
Speaker 1: for tuning into another Monster Talk. Sorry for the audio
Speaker 1: quality of these endcaps. I definitely need to work on
Speaker 1: my travel gear because this isn't as good as I'd like.
Speaker 1: It ain't great, just grating. Monster Talk theme music is
Speaker 1: by Pete Stealing Monkeys. With five and a half hour
Speaker 1: drive ahead of me, I can only think keep on trucking.
Speaker 1: This has been a Monster House presentation.