…they were watching a Dickensian paranormal epic unfold.
Ferabo or Leguay appeared on the JPK forum scene a little over two months after the initial post. He knew latin and would captivate the other posters with his well…latin. Apparently knowing latin is as good as a mensa membership in the internet world, so no one questioned Leguay’s intentions or his actual existence for that matter.
Before I let my entire train of thought derail I have to inject an observation. For those of you that have seen the movie Good Will Hunting, I think you’ll know where I’m coming from. When Will (Matt Damon) is involved in a conversation with Robin Williams’ character over the strength of his intellect, Will’s Achilles heel is revealed: although he is learned, it is a book smart based intelligence that has rarely seen the outside of a library or bookstore. There was something about Ferabo’s posts that rang of this exchange and it stuck with me the entire time. For those less cinematically versed, let’s imagine Homer claiming he was Ulysses and writing under the pseudonym Achilles…which now brings us back full circle.
So Ferabo, battle hardened scholar and armchair adventurer, played an interesting and integral role as our protagonist. I say interesting because I felt the “development” of the character was crucial to the stories ongoing draw. Ferabo was initially played as a skeptic. Sure, his belief in JPK and his book were real and unwavering, BUT, he questioned the validity of the statements and overall ideas of the author. This is a very important facet for a character, especially if you’ve just paid your 199.95 for Joseph Campbell’s Build- A- Hero course. Taking the focus off of the debate of the actual crux of the story and placing it on other details gives the reader a choice that is immediate and yet imperceptive. To follow the story and its new offshoot, you are conceding to the story’s foundation. It’s a great device that leaves the starting gate so far in it’s wake that the principles of the story itself are no longer questioned; midgets, upright reptiles, die-hard Latinists all inclusive.
So we have a hero, a supporting cast and a goal (Childe Rolande’s quest for the ever elusive Dark Tower), but where is our opposition ahhh….the plot develops at the same time as what some might call an “alternate reality game” construct starts to weave itself into the narrative. The opposition becomes the very skepticism that was so craftily avoided through the lynchpin role of Ferabo. To now question the very essence of the plot is to remove the momentum of new insights and debates that drives the engaging heart of the story itself; and engaging is exactly what it had become. By now we had our gnomes, upright lizards ,our bumbling, yet masterminding professor (sorry kids, no Flubber), a repentant gnome murdering biker (yepper) and a leather-bound book that also served as a passport to Middle Earth…but, all tired kitchen sink jokes aside, we seem to be missing something: a vast conspiracy that extends to the ends of the earth and just possibly…one with implications so vast that it can shatter the very core of the guardians of our future…topless dancers!!!
(continued in part 4)
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Friday, January 23, 2009
ParaWeek in Review
1-23-2009
1-23-2009
What an amazing show we had last night. Michelle Dresbold was able to give a pretty good profile of me just based on a paragraph that I had written and my signature. What an amazing woman, and a cutie too. For those of you that missed it, go to our past shows section and download it, you won't be disappointed.
In the news this week from our friends at www.anomalist.com there is a video that CNN captured before the inaguration of a UFO flying behind the Washington Monument. It's a pretty cool video, it can be found at disclose.tv. Also, Loren Coleman has discovered hobbits and Jesus and Mary decided to make yet another appearnce... this time in a Lava Lamp.
Tune in next Thursday when we have animal psychic Charles Peden and he will talk about animal depression, how animals think, and his special that will be on the Travel Channel next friday. See ya then!
Mark
Friday, January 16, 2009
ParaWeek in Review
01-16-2009
This week has turned out pretty good for us, we got some press on Anomalist with Ash's John Palifox Key story and we had Jesse Marcel Jr on the show last night to talk about the Roswell crash and his fathers experience in the military prior to the wreckage. We also had a couple of more auditions and lined up a couple more so that process is still going on in case any of you are interested.
Also in the news this week we have had NASA admit that there is some form of life existing on Mars, Obama is set to be briefed on the existence of UFO's and Extraterrestrial life, there were "V" shaped objects flying over Chicago, and to top it all off, MosterQuest is about to go on the first Yeti expedition of the year. Just two weeks into the New Year and it's already shaping up to be an exciting one.
And to end the weekly blog this week I want to give a huge thank you to Jesse Marcel Jr. for coming on the show. Also, raise your glasses for Khan and Number 6, better known as Ricardo Montalbon and Patrick McGoohan, you'll both be missed. Cheers!
Mark
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
The John Palifox Key Mystery/Hoax Part 2
A central figure emerged throughout most of the posts on about.com that went by the handle FERABO. This personality was unassuming at first and like most message posters went on at great lengths about how his opinions were nothing short of god’s law and should be taken as such. If there is one thing the internet has taught me is that there is a virtual smorgasboard of undiscovered geniuses out there that can literally change our lives if only we listen to them unquestioningly. Ferabo was no exception: a smart guy who wanted everyone to know it.
The about.com forum posts that went well into the thousands surrounding the subject detailed one woman’s account while driving on a business trip that took her directly into the “JPK Zone”. According to her story, while driving she was suddenly thrust into another reality where she witnessed small lizard-like and gnome-like beings carrying or “farming” these weird fruits with sharp geometric structures or possibly large D20 D&D dice, which would explain a lot. These misplaced LARPers were aware of her presence but didn’t seem to be entirely impressed with it, going about their business. Fortunately for her and their roll of increased strength and indifference to interdimensional traveling salesmen, she popped back into her own dimension. Distraught over her little blip into Oz, the forum poster went on to ask for anyone who had similar accounts or any advice to her her a holla. Enter John Palifox Key, Proofs of My Return and Ferabo..
ApacheUnger’s (the experiencer’s monicker) original post was simply her cry for help over her episode in rural Michigan: a harrowing tale of midgets and strange fruit north of the Motor City; the stuff most harrowing tales are made of. The book however changes all of that when it is introduced adding yet another layer to the story and injecting the first dose of “pre-existing mythology”. Now we have an anchor. This anchor not only dropped with a resounding thud in the forefront of the casual forum poster’s imagination, it carried them down into the very murky depths of obsession.
But, in true Highlander fashion, “Kurgan!!!”…er….”there can be only one!!!” and Ferabo stepped up to the plate. Ferabo, who would later become known as Joel or Joey painted himself a patriot and veteran that had a wealth of experience traveling the world on Uncle Sam’s dime. He talked of foreign conflicts and American history with a grizzled zeal and confidence that gave his every post an air of legitimacy, albeit tinged with arrogance. The persona of Leguay grew and soon he became the archetypal hero of the about.com forum, taking a personal quest to investigate the mystery himself. Now mind you, Leguay had a cast of supporting characters: the distraught accidental daytripper taking her place now sidestage as well as others, all questing for the ultimate truth to the JPK enigma. It was involving and the posts were frequent enough that the casual reader felt that they were watching a Dickensian paranormal epic unfold... (continued in part 3)
The about.com forum posts that went well into the thousands surrounding the subject detailed one woman’s account while driving on a business trip that took her directly into the “JPK Zone”. According to her story, while driving she was suddenly thrust into another reality where she witnessed small lizard-like and gnome-like beings carrying or “farming” these weird fruits with sharp geometric structures or possibly large D20 D&D dice, which would explain a lot. These misplaced LARPers were aware of her presence but didn’t seem to be entirely impressed with it, going about their business. Fortunately for her and their roll of increased strength and indifference to interdimensional traveling salesmen, she popped back into her own dimension. Distraught over her little blip into Oz, the forum poster went on to ask for anyone who had similar accounts or any advice to her her a holla. Enter John Palifox Key, Proofs of My Return and Ferabo..
ApacheUnger’s (the experiencer’s monicker) original post was simply her cry for help over her episode in rural Michigan: a harrowing tale of midgets and strange fruit north of the Motor City; the stuff most harrowing tales are made of. The book however changes all of that when it is introduced adding yet another layer to the story and injecting the first dose of “pre-existing mythology”. Now we have an anchor. This anchor not only dropped with a resounding thud in the forefront of the casual forum poster’s imagination, it carried them down into the very murky depths of obsession.
But, in true Highlander fashion, “Kurgan!!!”…er….”there can be only one!!!” and Ferabo stepped up to the plate. Ferabo, who would later become known as Joel or Joey painted himself a patriot and veteran that had a wealth of experience traveling the world on Uncle Sam’s dime. He talked of foreign conflicts and American history with a grizzled zeal and confidence that gave his every post an air of legitimacy, albeit tinged with arrogance. The persona of Leguay grew and soon he became the archetypal hero of the about.com forum, taking a personal quest to investigate the mystery himself. Now mind you, Leguay had a cast of supporting characters: the distraught accidental daytripper taking her place now sidestage as well as others, all questing for the ultimate truth to the JPK enigma. It was involving and the posts were frequent enough that the casual reader felt that they were watching a Dickensian paranormal epic unfold... (continued in part 3)
Monday, January 12, 2009
The John Palifox Key Mystery/Hoax Part 1
The John Palifox Key Mystery/Hoax
I have been known to take my interests and curiosities to the extreme. This is not something that I feel deserves reproach or praise. It’s just how my brain does business. Those same business practices started a two year odyssey of stupidity/revelation revolving around a little known internet hoax/game that went by the name of John Palifox Key.
At the time I first heard of Key and the mysterious tome he had aledgedly written while teaching at Emory University, I was working data entry for a small German camera manufacturer. The job was an exercise in repetition and although the menial, thought robbing clicks of my tasks drained me of most thought and ambition, the work load was ebb and flow and I was afforded time to randomly search the internet. A good deal of this was spent meandering lazily through stock photo sites as I was going to school for design at the time. NOTE: I was actually going to school for animation, but seeing as I am now a designer by necessity saying that I went for design lessens the blow a little. This usually resulted in me putting in softcore porn phrases and ogling the models on any number of stock photography sites….all in the name of art, you have to understand.
When I wasn’t concealing my little searches for “muscular female calves” I was also visiting paranormal forum sites…because we all know that softcore fetish porn and alien abduction accounts go together like pb&j. What I found, besides the fact that 3 out of 4 fashion photographers prefer ball gags to good lighting, was an interesting thread concerning a man named John Palifox Key. The Key immediately stuck out as an allusion to the actual work of the man himself and you’ll see why.
Key, for all of his lack of googleness, was pretty popular in small circles for penning a book entitled Proofs of My Return. The book supposedly served as an autobiographical account of Key’s journeys into parallel dimensions, his return and details of “portal” areas where the die-hard interdimensional daytripper could jump ship and live amongst the denizens of the Secondary Alternate realm; aforementioned inhabitants being gnomelike creatures that instantly sparked my interest. I am known to be a little of a Tolkien nerd, so talk of dwarves always sets my nerd phaser to stunned. So stunned I was to learn that a few of these portals were within map’s reach right here in the continental United States. Stunned further was I to learn that I was spending hours of my day researching this. (mind you that data entry is so mind numbingly boring that I would’ve joined Amway or the Jehova’s Witnesses for a brief reprieve) I chose however to scour the message boards for anything that I could find to bring this mystery a little closer to closed for myself.
A central figure emerged… (continued in part 2)
Ash
The Parafactor
I have been known to take my interests and curiosities to the extreme. This is not something that I feel deserves reproach or praise. It’s just how my brain does business. Those same business practices started a two year odyssey of stupidity/revelation revolving around a little known internet hoax/game that went by the name of John Palifox Key.
At the time I first heard of Key and the mysterious tome he had aledgedly written while teaching at Emory University, I was working data entry for a small German camera manufacturer. The job was an exercise in repetition and although the menial, thought robbing clicks of my tasks drained me of most thought and ambition, the work load was ebb and flow and I was afforded time to randomly search the internet. A good deal of this was spent meandering lazily through stock photo sites as I was going to school for design at the time. NOTE: I was actually going to school for animation, but seeing as I am now a designer by necessity saying that I went for design lessens the blow a little. This usually resulted in me putting in softcore porn phrases and ogling the models on any number of stock photography sites….all in the name of art, you have to understand.
When I wasn’t concealing my little searches for “muscular female calves” I was also visiting paranormal forum sites…because we all know that softcore fetish porn and alien abduction accounts go together like pb&j. What I found, besides the fact that 3 out of 4 fashion photographers prefer ball gags to good lighting, was an interesting thread concerning a man named John Palifox Key. The Key immediately stuck out as an allusion to the actual work of the man himself and you’ll see why.
Key, for all of his lack of googleness, was pretty popular in small circles for penning a book entitled Proofs of My Return. The book supposedly served as an autobiographical account of Key’s journeys into parallel dimensions, his return and details of “portal” areas where the die-hard interdimensional daytripper could jump ship and live amongst the denizens of the Secondary Alternate realm; aforementioned inhabitants being gnomelike creatures that instantly sparked my interest. I am known to be a little of a Tolkien nerd, so talk of dwarves always sets my nerd phaser to stunned. So stunned I was to learn that a few of these portals were within map’s reach right here in the continental United States. Stunned further was I to learn that I was spending hours of my day researching this. (mind you that data entry is so mind numbingly boring that I would’ve joined Amway or the Jehova’s Witnesses for a brief reprieve) I chose however to scour the message boards for anything that I could find to bring this mystery a little closer to closed for myself.
A central figure emerged… (continued in part 2)
Ash
The Parafactor
Friday, January 9, 2009
The ParaWeek in Review
1/09/2009
It's been busy here at The ParaFactor studios, auditions, auditions, auditions! We've been looking for someone to fill the 3rd mic spot since the beginning of the year. We're about to finish up the first round of auditions, but if you're in the north Jersey area and want to take a crack at it, use the contact us section of the site and shoot us an e-mail letting us know you're interested.
We had a great show last night with Steven Lachance and I highly recommend everyone goes out and gets his book "The Uninvited" and download the episode once we get it up and just listen to it over and over and over again until our show next week with Jesse Marcel Jr. Speaking of next weeks show, if you want to be prepared for that, get off yer ass and pick up his book The Roswell Legacy!
Finally, we're hoping to get Michelle Dresbold, author of "Sex, Lies, and Handwriting" on the show for the 22nd, she was supposed to be on at the beginning of December to do a handwriting analysis on me, so I'm hoping that we will be able to get that done then. This is just an example of the splendid programming that we have lined up for you. Keep listening for more details and watch this space for all of your ParaFactor news!
Mark
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Launching in 5...4...3...2...
Launching in 5...4...3...2...
Ready for liftoff. So it goes when we begin again. As much as I loved the name and the show of The Paranomalists, things were happening that were forcing a change. Anything ranging from people having priorities over the show to the name, as catchy as it is, not being as user friendly as it could be. Just as death metal logos that are so intricate that they are illegible; our name was sort of a sour point as far as people finding us. I loved the name, but Paranomalists is not something that just rolls across the keyboard, it's not something that one is used to saying, and it's not a common term in the dictionary... or in the dictionary at all for that matter. Our numbers were there for downloads on other sites, but I think if people were looking to find our show online and more about our show, it was a little difficult. It also didn't help that there was another show that used the more user-friendly term The Parano
r
malists. So what do you do?
Ash and I decided to take a look over the situation. We took inventory of what we had and what we have coming up, decided to close the door on The Paranomalists, streamline our production, start holding auditions for 3rd mic, and start The Parafactor running at full speed at the beginning of the year (also it was nice to get a small break from the show to be with our friends and family over the holidays). Luckily we won't have the growing pains that we did with The Paranomalists because we have all of the equipment already, we have the know-how to keep things running smoothly, and we have the connections that we need for what we do. We are listening to older shows and finding what we did that worked and what didn't work and how we can make things even better than it already was.
The Name Game
The hardest part of the whole process so far has been coming up with a name. Do we keep "Para" at the beginning of it, or can we come up with something that covers what we do without that. Then you have to take into consideration about how things look when written and how they sound. For instance, Paraspies sounds cool, like paranormal spies, but how easy would it be to look at it and see par-aspies... ass pies?!? Exactly. ParaPhiles sounded really cool until we decided it would make us seem like we wanted to molest underage ghosts, and ParaSyndicate sounds great, but it's just too long to put on a hat or bumper sticker. We also briefly looked at Para-Guys until we realized that sounded like a homo-erotic porn. Finally after a week and half of thinking of different things and calling each other at all times of the night, we settled on The ParaFactor. Now for the next step that killed a lot of names that we came up with prior... is the URL available. After doing some checking, we discovered that
, www.parafactorradio.com, and
were all available. We wanted
, but that is taken. The site that has it looks as if it hasn't been updated in quite some time. I sent an e-mail to the address on the site to try to bargain with him for the URL and offered assistance with coming up with another name and an interview on our show, but he declined. Hopefully one day he will change his mind but until then the offer still stands. So that has been our last few weeks. Check back next week for more news and updates about The ParaFactor!
Mark
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