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Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the best of Coast to Coast podcast,

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Speaker 1: Coast Insider to start listening. Now here's a highlight from

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Speaker 1: Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio. Joe Nichol has been

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Speaker 1: called the modern Sherlock Holmes, the real life Scully from

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Speaker 1: X Files. He's spent four decades as an investigator of historical, paranormal,

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Speaker 1: forensic mysteries, myths hoax. In contrast to mystery mungers on

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Speaker 1: the one hand and so called debunkers on the other,

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Speaker 1: Joe believes that the mystery should actually be investigated with

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Speaker 1: a view towards solving them, and he's very careful when

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Speaker 1: he does that. He has been a guest on our

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Speaker 1: Beyond Belief television show, and of course He's been on

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Speaker 1: coast to coast with us a lot. A couple of

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Speaker 1: his books out there, Adventures in Paranormal Investigation and the

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Speaker 1: Science of Ghosts, Searching for the Spirits of the Dead. Joe,

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Speaker 1: welcome back. How was a pleasure talking with you? Same here, George.

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Speaker 1: Enjoyed meeting you in Colorado and in the pages of

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Speaker 1: the New York Time that's right around. We sure do.

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Speaker 1: And what's new? What have you been up to? Well,

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Speaker 1: just lots of things. I've been spending something I mentioned

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Speaker 1: to you in Colorado, and maybe the reason for being

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Speaker 1: on tonight. I've been working for about much of the

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Speaker 1: last decade on the question of Bigfoot, trying to I've

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Speaker 1: spent a lot of time going to you know, see

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Speaker 1: this this Gunk Apes layer in Florida, and the Ruby

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Speaker 1: Creek Incident Layer in British Columbia and other places, trying

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Speaker 1: to figure out what it is that people have seen

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Speaker 1: when they've described an upright standing, hairy man like beast

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Speaker 1: which science says isn't there. And this is this is

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Speaker 1: the you know, we've talked about this before. This is

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Speaker 1: sort of the story of my life is on one end,

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Speaker 1: I work for a science organization and science is very

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Speaker 1: skeptical and very critical of many of these paranormal topics.

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Speaker 1: At the same time, I go into people's homes where

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Speaker 1: they've seen a lake monster or some they've seen something

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Speaker 1: they have and I'm convinced. I've talked to many of

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Speaker 1: these people. And that's that's why you mentioned debunkers. I'm

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Speaker 1: really down on my own colleagues who take that stance,

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Speaker 1: who often have not been out anywhere and hear about

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Speaker 1: somebody who's seen, say, Bigfoot, and they're they're tapping their

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Speaker 1: their head, or they're making a gesture of drinking and

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Speaker 1: sort of implying that people are drunk or crazy or

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Speaker 1: stupid or something because they've seen something that isn't there.

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Speaker 1: And I'm just not inclined at all to take that stance.

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Speaker 1: I of course have seen people lying and hoaxing and

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Speaker 1: so forth. I've I've cut several ghosts, red and it.

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Speaker 1: But I've also been in the homes and out with

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Speaker 1: people who have, in my estimation, clearly seen something that

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Speaker 1: looked like what we call bigfoot that they can't explain.

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Speaker 1: They can't explain it all, can they just right? But

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Speaker 1: what's interesting is to is to try to take people

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Speaker 1: at their word and then allow for the fact that

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Speaker 1: that's an eyewitness account, and no matter how honest and sincere,

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Speaker 1: and let me say sober and intelligence, these people are

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Speaker 1: by in March. What could they have seen that looks

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Speaker 1: pretty much like they're describing. And I have to say

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Speaker 1: that I, out of much of this work, over much

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Speaker 1: of the past decade, I have coined the term the

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Speaker 1: big footbear, the big Foot bear, and we're going to

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Speaker 1: have you explained that. But you do not this, and

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Speaker 1: this is what I admire about you. You don't go

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Speaker 1: into a project to debunk it. You want to know

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Speaker 1: what it is exactly, because I think I think the

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Speaker 1: person who goes into something too debunk it and who

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Speaker 1: calls him self a debunker, meaning I'm a debunker before

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Speaker 1: I get there, is just the flip side of the

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Speaker 1: true believer. They both have their minds made up in

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Speaker 1: advance of the evidence. And what I'm trying to do

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Speaker 1: is say, Okay, I'm a skeptic. That is, I doubt

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Speaker 1: that Bigfoot exists. I doubt that ghosts exists. But I

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Speaker 1: put that aside because I really when I get to

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Speaker 1: the door of the haunted house, I really want to

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Speaker 1: know what actually is going on, and that is not

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Speaker 1: helped by having an attitude that knows what it is

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Speaker 1: before you've heard the evidence exactly, and being a skeptic,

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Speaker 1: I think is healthy exactly if you're not a skeptic.

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Speaker 1: If you're not, if you don't have critical thinking skills

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Speaker 1: so that you can prioritize between something that this sounds

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Speaker 1: credible but could be something mistaken. This sounds really far fetched.

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Speaker 1: This as all the symptoms of a hoax. If you

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Speaker 1: can't do some of that, you're really not equipped to

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Speaker 1: be assessing this myriad mishmash of stuff that comes out

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Speaker 1: in the paranormal realm, which is just all over the

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Speaker 1: place as everything from you know, bizarre made up stories

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Speaker 1: and lucinogenic experiences to people who have really seen pretty

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Speaker 1: much what they described. Have you been in a situation, Joe,

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Speaker 1: where when you leave you really don't have an answer,

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Speaker 1: you don't know what it is. I guess the short

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Speaker 1: answer to that is not really. But I do have

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Speaker 1: to say I'm not sort of an all purposed guy

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Speaker 1: who can just show up and in five minutes I

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Speaker 1: know everything that's to be known. And there are paranormal

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Speaker 1: cases that I've looked over and thought, yeah, I don't know.

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Speaker 1: I don't know what that's really about. Because if you

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Speaker 1: weren't there, if you don't have an opportunity to be

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Speaker 1: there and see a phenomenon, and you're not, you don't

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Speaker 1: have access to the actual hard evidence. Really you're at

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Speaker 1: a disadvantage. You know, I've worked, I've worked with the

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Speaker 1: police departments and investigated homicides, which I always say, if

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Speaker 1: I come back in another life, I think I'll be

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Speaker 1: a homicide detective. Also, you do believe in the other lives,

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Speaker 1: But we can all get into that too. We'll get

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Speaker 1: into we can all hope. But I found that if

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Speaker 1: if if the police department takes you in and once

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Speaker 1: the help of someone like me who can think outside

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Speaker 1: the box and who's creative and who will come up

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Speaker 1: with the strategies and so forth, if you have access

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Speaker 1: to the evidence room, you have you have the pistol,

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Speaker 1: and you know in your hand, if you can take

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Speaker 1: evidence to a blood pattern analyst. If you can do

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Speaker 1: those things, you're your chances of solving a case are

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Speaker 1: much much much higher than if you're, say a private investigator.

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Speaker 1: And I have been, you know, I was a private

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Speaker 1: detect both a couple of years. Yeah. If you're a

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Speaker 1: private detective and you're trying to investigate a case on

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Speaker 1: behalf of a family and the police are not cooperating

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Speaker 1: with you, and they're not telling you what they've got

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Speaker 1: and showing you what they've got, you're at a serious disadvantage.

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Speaker 1: And some of that applies to the paranormal. If if

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Speaker 1: you have I would just say this. I know it's

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Speaker 1: long and rambley, Julian, you're on for two hours time, Okay,

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Speaker 1: I'll ramble some more. If if you're trying to solve

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Speaker 1: a case, um, you're you're at a disadvantage if you

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Speaker 1: don't have access to the evidence, and you really need

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Speaker 1: to be willing and prepared to say that case is

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Speaker 1: not very investigatable, as opposed to Yeah, I think it

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Speaker 1: was a hoax because I don't. I don't have a clue.

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Speaker 1: I've seen skeptics do that. There was a you're familiar

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Speaker 1: with the flat Woods Monster? Oh yeah, absolutely, a very

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Speaker 1: famous case. And I was able to go to flat

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Speaker 1: Woods and meet elderly folk who could remember this this case,

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Speaker 1: and I later hadn't in a encounter with a writer

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Speaker 1: who was putting together a book, and he he had

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Speaker 1: gotten someone who said that, would that be Frank Festino? No, No,

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Speaker 1: it wasn't Frank. This was this was a guy compiling

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Speaker 1: a actually compiling an encyclopedia of UFO stuff. And he

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Speaker 1: was getting guest authors to do pieces. And I was

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Speaker 1: doing pieces, and I said, what about Flatwoods? And he's

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Speaker 1: he said, well, he's got someone doing that, said the

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Speaker 1: guy says, it's a hoax. And I said, listen to me,

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Speaker 1: listen to me. If you believe anything I ever I

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Speaker 1: ever tell you, you you believe that was not a hoax.

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Speaker 1: I have been to Flatwoods. I've talked to people. I

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Speaker 1: talked to the guy who drove the pickup truck after

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Speaker 1: the boys had seen the monster, and he assured me

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Speaker 1: those boys were scared to death. They were not hoaxing.

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Speaker 1: They hadn't, you know, made up a story. They were

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Speaker 1: scared to death. In fact, the lemon boy was actually

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Speaker 1: throwing up. He was that scared. That's a sure sign

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Speaker 1: of hysteria. Yeah, absolutely, and we know that the the

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Speaker 1: You know, I always look for corroborative evidence, evidence that

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Speaker 1: will piece the pieces that reinforce each other and help

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Speaker 1: you build something that's the stronger than any one piece.

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Speaker 1: And I knew that what those boys and missus May

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Speaker 1: had seen that early evening in Flatwoods had that they

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Speaker 1: had seen a meteor. It was seen over three states,

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Speaker 1: and I know for she know, and others want to

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Speaker 1: argue about that and being deep, denile and so forth,

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Speaker 1: but it's just a fact that that that was in

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Speaker 1: the sky and they saw a meteor. Now they thought

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Speaker 1: it landed right over just right over the you know,

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Speaker 1: on that hill, And it's a common illusion. That's the

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Speaker 1: way meteor disappear. They look like they're very close and

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Speaker 1: they're awesome, and they just landed right over there. They're

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Speaker 1: way out and they generally burn up. That's right. And

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Speaker 1: so I knew that they had seen something, and that's

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Speaker 1: therefore not likely that when they go up in the

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Speaker 1: area and they see this tall creature with shining eyes,

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Speaker 1: and Missus May would forever recall it's having terrible claws

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Speaker 1: and coming at them with a high pitched hissing sound

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Speaker 1: and so forth, had a kind of a heart shaped face.

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Speaker 1: I was pretty sure that I knew what they had

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Speaker 1: had seen, that they had seen a barnel which looked

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Speaker 1: tall because it was perched on a limb, and all

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Speaker 1: the other elements of their description are just absolutely accurate

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Speaker 1: for a barnel. And that's that case helped me really

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Speaker 1: understand how you know, their description isn't so far off

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Speaker 1: from what what they were actually seeing. And the skeptic

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Speaker 1: who was trying to debunk the case saying it was

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Speaker 1: a hoax, you see, he had he said, oh, there's

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Speaker 1: no there's no eight foot monster, and there's no monster

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Speaker 1: that does this, and no monster came to earth in

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Speaker 1: a flying saucer. This is all a bunch of blarney,

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Speaker 1: and those boys made that story up. This is a hoax.

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Speaker 1: Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at

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Speaker 1: one am Eastern, and go to Coast to Coast am

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Speaker 1: dot com for more