Freedom is found In knowledge sought Connections imagined – New dawning era of thought Yet none speaks wisely Who claim to know all Pushing forth their opinions As to not seem so small Compensation calculation For indiscretions of past Look instead to the future Nothing Can Last
11 December 2020
There’s a light in the forest Beyond the break in the trees Where water flows gently Among the rustle of leaves. Pardon the intrusion Where humans should not be I’ll return to the shadows– Darkened path no one sees
9 December 2020
I hold space in the darkness Where someday I pray There will be light
8 December 2020
“Dans Macabre–” you say With a permanent pearly grin “It takes your breath away.” As your long limbs sway Stripped of their flesh Now immortal as stone With your clattering bones: Restless soul with no home.
Thank you for taking the time to read my poetry today! These originally appeared on my Twitteraccount.
Newspaper clipping from the Billings Gazette, October 10, 1975
**Content Warning: This post discusses the killing and mutilation of animals by unknown perpetrator(s) over the past 50+ years in the United States. As a non-beef eater myself, reader discretion is advised**
While the world is caught up with everything that is 2020 (do you have your apocalypse bingo card yet?) I’d like to visit an ongoing state and national news story that captured my attention when I first moved to Montana in 2013. In October, 2019, new developments arose. I think it’s time to share this news with readers for the purpose of distraction. So, I’ll compile some basic information here. While I have some thoughts on what the possible explanations could be, I will save those for the end.
Cow Mutilations
From the GIPHY keyboard
On October 2, 2019 the Billings Gazette reported a new report of 5 dead cattle being found in Salem, Oregon. While tragic, the random death of cattle in the Pacific Northwest would not turn heads under normal circumstances. These were not normal circumstances. Instead, this was the newest report in an ongoing series of documented cow mutilations throughout the Midwest and Pacific Northwest, with the majority of documented cases in Montana, dating back to the 1970s.
According to the original newspaper clipping from the Billings Gazette on October 10, 1975 (shown above) about 175 reports of mutilations were gathered from Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Nevada, Utah, and Idaho in addition to Montana at that time. At that time, given the cost of the equipment necessary to cause the types of mutilations and damages found, the issue stumped authorities, leading to the concern of a cult traveling throughout the country traveling “by helicopter”. Reasonably so, this was thought to be ridiculous.
There is a Wikipedia page on Cattle Mutilation as a general concept, but it is important to note that this page includes international and domestic horse, goat, and other unidentified livestock incidents. These non-bovine and international incidents have mutilation patterns not matching those specifically found in the mutilated cattle of the Midwest and Pacific Northwest. That said, they may still be worth discussing for contrasting purposes.
The Investigation
From the GIPHY keyboard
The common pattern with these mutilations is that the sex organs and tongues are removed with all blood drained from the corpse. An investigative report mentioned in a 2001 article in the New York Times mentioned that a group that researches these incidents, The National Institute for Discovery Science, did find one interesting variation in a case in Utah where there was a hole in the head of one of the cattle with both BHT and Formaldehyde present, indicating that an embalming/preservation process took place. This group is/was funded by Robert Bigelow – a man that became obsessed with aliens and the Skinwalker Ranch – a place so notorious even the History Channel has added it to their questionable line up.
As their website is now defunct and it is hard to find information on anything other than his alien focused ventures, I am not going to spend much time focusing on this aspect for now.
Another common element between all of these cases? They remain unsolved. To give readers an idea of how extensive and compelling these reports are, there is an open case file with the Federal Bureau of Investigation regarding the recurring ritualistic serial mutilation of cattle. At this time, the FBI only investigates mutilations that occur on tribal land and all have been closed unsolved according to the Billings Gazette.
Private and public reward monies for information regarding cattle mutilations continue to accumulate, including a $25,000 reward for the recent mutilation in Oregon.
My Interest And Thoughts On These Events
From the GIPHY keyboard
Shortly before moving to Montana, on March 1, 2013, a rancher found more mutilated cows approximately 5 miles outside of Browning. Given how current it was in the news, this provided the opportunity for me to learn more about these incidents and start compiling information on this truly bizarre fascination.
Spoiler Alert: I don’t think this has anything to do with aliens. While I do not dismiss the possibility of life in this universe more intelligent than humans, I don’t think it is coming to Earth and messing with our cows.
I have 7 years of research and thoughts on these events and there are a few options regarding what I can do with this information. The option currently in the lead:
Start An Investigative Podcast/YouTube Series With A Funny Name
I would present each individual documented event in chronological order, the information available that I’ve been able to gather, any additional leads people are able to provide, and similarities between the events that I’ve been able to observe. This would then include leads from listeners that have been followed up on in later episodes.
The reasoning behind presenting the same information in two formats is because I want to be inclusive of non-auditory individuals, and those needing closed captioning and/or lip reading to assist with auditory processing. For more information on auditory processing disorders you can visit that website or read the Wikipedia page here.
Possible Explanations
From the GIPHY keyboard – credit to Trey Parker and Matt Stone
The big rule here driving my investigation: It’s Not Aliens. The perpetrators could be many things, but the response of “aliens” has become the standard cop-out. There is a lot of additional evidence, even from those that do believe aliens visit earth, to suggest these mutilations are not being performed by aliens.
I mentioned before that I have thoughts on alternative explanations. I don’t think these cases are going to be a “one explanation fits all” kind of thing. These potential explanations include: insurance fraud, publicity, public diversion from other questionable activities, ritualistic or cult activity, and intimidation. That said, I absolutely expect that there are potential explanations that I have not yet thought of. Who knows – maybe I will be proven wrong and there are aliens. I have to be open to that possibility, no matter how skeptical I am and how little I think it makes sense.
TL;DR
If you are interested in this kind of investigative podcast about the unsolved mysterious cow mutilations that have been ongoing throughout the United States for at least the past 50 years, please like this post and/or comment your suggestion for title of the series, what excites you the most, or if you have any thoughts you would like to contribute. If you think a friend would like to listen to this podcast or would have anything to contribute, please share this.
I’m excited to have as much input as possible in this 100% bizarre side project, even if you disagree with me and want to tell me you think I’m wrong; even if you insist that it’s aliens.
If this gains enough interest (100 likes) I will launch the first episode of the podcast.
Until then, I will continue to focus my efforts on reviews, my book becoming available for pre-order later this summer, “A Hundred Different Skies”, and my short story collection coming out early next year.
As always, thank you for reading. Without you, this post would have been meaningless electrons sent out into the void.
I posted this on twitter last night after the briefing.
Remember how we were projected to have 2.5 Million cases? We have reduced the projected number of infected Americans by 1.5 Million to only 1 Million. 1 Million is not great, but that’s a big change. That is called flattening the curve and everyone should be thinking that is really amazing (I know I am). They did not mention the number in the briefing (frustratingly). But forecasting has gotten a bad rep in the past.
For those who are math nerds – that’s a linear fit to 1,000,000 (switch from exponential), which some dude in the early 20th century proposed was when the growth in the number of reported influenza cases was hitting it’s predictable rounded peak forecasted the maximum cumulative cases (the limit). I’ve been trying to go through my notes to remember more about how this all works because I don’t remember the name of who came up with all of this and I’m trying to find the paper. I will update this and replace this rambling text when I do.
Recovery in the US
Recovery is not a guarantee that you will not get SARS-CoV-2 again. There are recorded cases of reinfection internationally. We do not have enough data to know if this is reactivation of latent virus or if this is true reinfection. That said, we are finally looking for asymptomatic, both recovered and not, individuals.
A vaccine would be able to address this by using adjuvants designed to induce helper T cell immunity in addition to antibody based immunity. Vaccines take time. Realistically a good vaccine will be on the market in March 2021 at the absolute earliest. Anything before that and I will be floored if it has sufficient efficacy to help.
At each of these state clusters there is at least one urban center that has the dominant reservoir population. Once movement between urban centers (New York -> Chicago -> Houston -> Miami -> Atlanta -> Boston -> Dallas -> L.A. -> San Francisco -> Chicago -> Orlando -> Pittsburgh -> (etc. etc. etc.)) stops then there will no longer be additions of infected individuals into the populations. This is why non-essential planes need to be grounded.
I live in Montana. I am so blessed. I want to make it clear that we still need to behave. It only takes 1 person to infect 10.
My family and people I love live in Washington, Idaho, Oregon, Montana, California, Texas, Alabama, Louisiana, Florida, Virginia, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Arizona and Maine. I’m terrified for everyone.
We’re going to gradually come to a new normal. Ask me questions and I’ll eventually address them in updates on these original posts.
As a change of pace, I’m going to stop writing about the coronavirus for a while unless there’s something people specifically think of graphs or other things that would be useful questions to be answered in something new instead of an update. I still have a backlog of a couple posts that will still get done though.
I will be starting to write short stories and weird little memoir style posts so people can enjoy my writing separate from the reviews.
Thank you for reading. Without you this is a shout into the void.
