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Every week it's something. This week, it's an aching lower back. But I am not going to dwell on that, because otherwise it's been a pretty good day here on planet binnall. Spring is on the way and with it comes baseball season. Daylight savings time kicks in earlier than ever before. And we've managed to live through another week, so we have that to be happy about too. Aching lower back be damned !
This week, we look back at a tepid week on Coast to Coast AM that included the return of Hoagland and a great Nick Pope interview. We look ahead to Ian Punnett interviewing Harry Shearer and other highlights of the upcoming week on Coast. We'll preview the first of a two part interview with Mac Tonnies on BoA : Audio. Viral Esoterica rears its forgotten head in the mail bag, we remember Noory's interview with the sultry Amanda Swisten in the history segment, and, of course, we have some Hot Newz for you, this time featuring Ian Punnett turned professional wrestler.
You take the good, you take the bad, you take them both and there you have the binnall report. This one's for Tootie.
The Week That Was
Just when I was ready to start pasting his picture on milk cartons, C2C's esoteric laureate and science advisor Richard C. Hoagland finally resurfaced on the program last Friday, after being gone almost a month. And this was clear cut evidence that "less is more" when it comes to Hoagland, as it was like reuniting with an old friend. Instead of cringing when I saw him on the schedule, I was excited for a change. I don't even remember what he said, just that it was Hoagland and he was ranting and it was awesome. Now watch him appear another eight times this month. Standard Friday into Saturday Open Lines followed.
Noteworthy, as well, was that in the first hour, Ian Punnett popped in to respond to Red Elk. Apparently Red Elk called out Punnett during his appearance on C2C last Tuesday and Ian was chagrined about the whole thing. Something tells me this will be just the catalyst for Red to make an exception to his "retirement" and return for Ian's show.
Saturday on "Ian", IP had David Hawkins on the show to talk about 911 as insurance fraud conspiracy. I didn't catch this one, but Lesley did, so we'll excerpt from her excellent C2C Rewind and get the scoop : "Ian got all conspiratorial on us! Forensic economist David Hawkins was his guest, along with a pilot from a major airlines, Field McConnell (I didn't catch if that was his real name or an alias).
I have listened to a lot of 911 related guests and I thought this show was one of the best I have heard. While I didn't agree with Hawkins that 911 was contrived as nothing more than an insurance scam, it wouldn't surprise me that those people were also in on it to get their slice of the 911 pie. Hawkins had a lot of really interesting information even if you don't entirely believe his conclusions. Ian asked great questions too Saturday night on C2C proper, Art Bell continued his UFO theme from the last few weeks, this time with Nick Pope. Just outstanding stuff on this one, including some great discussion on some kind of UK remote viewing study that I'd never heard and some fascinating material on the UK UFO scene, one of the more informative segments on C2C that I've heard in quite some time. I love when Art interviews someone like Nick Pope, because his questions always dance right up against the edge of whatever state secrets Pope has but can't reveal. Very strong episode.
Sunday night, Amelia Kinkade was Art's guest and the topic was psychic animal communication. As expected, this one sounded awful on paper but turned out to be pretty damn good. Instead of going into it skeptical, you could tell Art was buying this one, based on his close relationship with his cats. Speaking of which, the cats factored into the episode quite a bit, which was an interesting look behind the curtain at Bell's world.
Kinkade was entertaining and her material was surprisingly solid. She did annoy me once when she called human beings "human monkeys" and went off on a rant about humans that made me think she was lobbying to give cats the right to vote or something. Geez, Amelia, they don't even have thumbs.
I missed James McCanney on Monday night with The Noor. There was no buzz on this one @ theusofe, so I can't even tell you if it was any good. He was talking about encryption codes and internet stuffs.
Tuesday, George invoked "Operation Floating Noory" to move guest John Robbins up an hour earlier, probably because his topic, health matters, sounded like a channel changer. Due to OFN, I ended up catching Robbins and stuck with it for a few hours, despite not enjoying it all that much. There were some gems hidden throughout, including the strange side story of Robbins rejecting the Robbins family fortune and was sounded like a strained relationship with his dad. Of course, Noory used this as the ideal opportunity to embarass his son, telling us all that he had high blood pressure. Sigh, poor son of Noory. Bland episode, as expected.
Wednesday, Michael Horn was the guest, sharing with us the magical story of Billy Meier. Been there, done that, still not interested. I skipped it and went to bed thinking about Lost.
Thursday wrapped up the formal week on Coast with Jeffrey Long talking about OBEs. I listened to a lot of this, but it ended up turning into background noise more than a riveting interview. That's probably more my fault than Long's as he usually turns in some quality stuff and I was kind of burned out by the end of the week, in general.
I did catch the first hour and Noory had a rare "Noory Pop Culture Hat Trick", mentioning "Contact", "Abyss", and "What Dreams May Come" all within a 10 minute span. Noory must have had his mind on Friday, where he has the day off, and what movie he'll be watching. I have a sinking suspicion it will be "Under Siege 2".
In summation, it was kind of a "meh" week. Held up by the big weekend, with Nick Pope, cat psychic lady, and the always dependable Ian Punnett's "Ian". The weekday guests weren't anything thrilling, as evidenced by my lack of recaps for most of them, I simply didn't care enough to listen to most of them and by the time I did, it was Thursday and I was too tired and busy. You win some, you lose some, but this week was more like a "push".
The Week That Is
Noory is off tonight, on his way to induct Art Bell into some radio hall of fame. In his stead, we'll get a rebroadcast of the quite good 1.23.2006 Skeptic's Cage episode, featuring Dr. Michael Shermer versus Gary Schwartz, Russell Targ and Dean Radin, in a gauntlet style, hour-by-hour series of showdowns. In the first hour, the Noory - Kasem summit will be rebroadcast again, despite happening less than a month ago. Sheesh.
Here's my recap of the Skeptic's Cage from last year's Coastie Contenders :: "It started out with a veritable draw with Gary Schwartz, who was far too apologetic. Then, Shermer was bigfooted by Russel Targ, who barely let him say anything other than, "Okay, find Osama Bin Laden" (which turned out to be Shermer's only argument after the halfway point of the show). And, it ended with Dean Radin just pummeling an exhausted Shermer, who kept asking for proof of Bin Laden's whereabouts from the Princeton Eggs (yes, he was that clueless). Fun episode."
Sure to be consuming a case of Red Bull, Ian Punnett settles in for another 8 Hours of Ian on Saturday. For starters, he'll have Charles Pellegrino to talk about forensic archaeology on "Ian". Pellegrino is the Quincy of antiquities (feel free to use that line, Ian) so I expect it should be pretty interesting. There's lots of cool ancient stuff that is buried or purportedly buried, so this should be a solid episode.
Hours four through eight for Ian will be on C2C proper and the guest will be comedic genius Harry Shearer, of "Spinal Tap" and "Simpsons" fame. This has to be the best on-paper episode of the week as I'm looking forward to it almost as much as the Dan Aykroyd appearance from last Summer. And, unlike Aykroyd, Shearer will be on for the full three hour interview. I expect greatness here, an easy Coastie contender.
On Sunday, The Noor steps into the hosting chair as Art Bell is off accepting some kind of award. Noory will have David Talbott and Wallace Thornhill on to talk about Velikovsky. Could be good, could be bad, we'll see. Also, Noory said he'll play Art Bell's acceptance speech during the first hour, which should be cool.
Radical Islam is the topic, once again, on Monday as Noory welcomes Chris Panos to the show. Sigh. We just had an excellent radical Islam guest a few weeks back on "Ian", so the Noor will have to deliver here, lest he be outperformed by IP. I suspect that this will be good to great, depending on Panos's level of charisma and material. Expect high levels of righteous indignation from Noory, which is always good for a few laughs.
Tuesday sees Geoffrey Simmons as the guest, with the topic being evolution. Simmons seems to be anti-evolution and he bases this on technology somehow. This has all the makings of a snoozer, but it could turn out better than expected.
Wednesday, the guest will be William Warwick and he'll be discussing the Phoenix Lights and the Norfolk Incident, amongst other notable UFO cases. I'm unfamiliar with Warwick, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. Should be interesting.
Thursday, Noory has Paul Eno on the show to talk about his theories on ghosts and the paranormal. Eno is a philosopher, so I'm sure he'll try and say something profound about all of this. For some reason, I suspect that this is the dark horse episode of the week and could turn out to be very good.
As a whole, aside from the Harry Shearer episode on Saturday, this looks like a pretty humdrum week for Coast. Nothing really looking all that strong, so I expect a couple of surprises, at least, and a couple of dogs in the bunch.
BoA : Audio, Season Two
This week : Mac Tonnies (Part 1 of 2)
Esoteric pundit Mac Tonnies comes to BoA : Audio for a marathon conversation. In this first installment, we'll be discussing Mac's book "After the Martian Apocalypse". Mac tells us how he got interested in the esoteric, how his Mars work came about, his thoughts on the Martian anomalies (including in-depth discussion on "The Face") and the purported NASA conspiracy to cover it all up. We'll also smash the 4th wall and talk about the evolution of the Mars anomaly community, including Mars Face guru Richard C. Hoagland. Plus, of course, tons more.
His website is posthumanblues.blogspot.com
You can hear an MP3 preview of our Mac's appearance on BoA : Audio on MP3 * Just right click and then "save target as". Or you can listen to it in Streaming Audio.
Next Week : Mac Tonnies (Part 2 of 2)
Our conversation continues with esoteric pundit Mac Tonnies, in this special extended edition of BoA : Audio that will run close to two hours or so. First, we'll spend about an hour digging into Mac's "cryptoterrestrial hypothesis", which has sparked considerable debate and thought throughout esoterica in the last year. We will go in-depth on the CT, leaving nearly no stone unturned and barely a question unasked. It's a must-hear episode, taking you to the bleeding edge of esoterica.
In the second hour, or so, of our conversation, we'll have a big picture discussion on Ufology, including its lack of young people, its evolution on the Internet, disclosure and other hot button topics. We'll also find out about Mac's work with the Society for Planetary SETI Research and his as-yet-unfinished novel "Women and Children First". Plus, as always, tons more.
His website is posthumanblues.blogspot.com
binnall report mailbag
Tim,
What happened to Viral Esoterica ?
Randy in Ft.Wayne, Indiana Good question, Randy. Viral Esoterica started out as a good idea, in theory, but sort of fell by the wayside as things got busy @ BoA in the middle of last year. While finding esoteric video online @ youtube and such is kind of easy, it's finding quality stuff that is hard. I'm mostly talking about short clipped stuff and not full documentaries, which seem to be online in abundance nowadays.
I'm sure if time allows for it, we'll bring back VE at some point in the future, but for right now, you'll have think of it as BoA's version of "TV's Bloopers and Practical Jokes" ... a special occasion type thing, not a full time series.
Question ? Comment ? Gripe ? Query ? Love Letter ? Write to tbinnall@hotmail.com and we'll sort it all out.
This Week in C2C History
3.9.2005 : Noory welcomed writer and erstwhile actress Amanda Swisten in the first hour. We were able to deduce much of what The Noor is like in LA, as he claimed that the vivacious Swisten was one of the first people he met in LA ! Noory, you stud.
Did you think I'd leave out that creepy little moment at the end of the first hour ? Shame on you. First of all, Noory and Swisten claimed that she played a maid in American Wedding. This is akin to a stripper claiming she is a dancer, as, ironically enough, in American Wedding, Swisten actually played a stripper whose gimmick was that she was a maid. Anyone with any sense who'd seen American Wedding knew that and had probably seen Swisten topless.
Secondly, the little exchange between her and Noory, followed by her doing her little "French maid" voice left me feeling the need to shower. Rent a room, you two. Note that Swisten called Noory "sweetie" when she left the show. I'm not sure if that is "LA speak" or if I smell a love connection. Also note that Noory said he heard about Swisten's serial killer fetish via one of her friends, meaning that Noory probably hangs out with hot models / actresses. The private life of George Noory gets more sultry by the day. My hat is off to you, sir. 3.9.1999 : Referenced by Hoagland this past Friday night, eight years ago yesterday saw Hoagland about to undergo open heart surgery, Art Bell trying to muster the collective power of the C2C audience, and a life hanging in the balance. Esoteric radio at its finest.
"Art gives us an update on the condition of Richard Hoagland. Angioplasty was not successful and Richard will be undergoing open heart surgery. Art is going to break one of his rules by asking the audience to participate in a seventh grand experiment at 4:00 am in the west or 7:00 am in the east. Richard's significant other told Art that Richard had a prophetic dream and awoke with chest pain and they called 911. On the way to the hospital he actually had the heart attack." (artbell.com cd rom)
End Notes
Like sand in an hourglass, another week goes by here in the binnall report. Thanks for coming along for the ride.
Plugs : Tomorrow @ binnallofamerica.com, the internet will be on fire as esoteric pundit Mac Tonnies comes to BoA : Audio in the first of a two part installment. Discussion on Mars will ensue. Sunday, Lesley's C2C Rewind @ the Debris Field. Monday, R.Lee's Trickster's Realm. Tuesday, Lesley's C2C Rewind. Wednesday, Khyron's K-Files. Thursday, Hot Newz. And, Friday, we rock it out one more time in the binnall report.
binnallofamerica.com ... esoterica's creepy neighbor.
On that note, we'll bid farewell for now. Have an excellent weekend and a stress free week. Until we meet again, this is binnall ... signing off.