» Tales of the Unexplained

I've had several strange encounters
I'm not saying there's not a reasonable explanation for these things, but they were very creepy when I experienced them and I still don't know what could have caused them.

First, I was about 10 when my Grandad died, in my house as it happens. Died right in the chair opposite me, which obviously hit me quite hard. But anyway.

A week or two later, we were all sitting in the same room he died (the living room) watching TV. Now, it was quite late so there were no windows open, the front door was locked for the night and there was no capacity for a gust to blow through the house.

While we were all sitting there, the living room door blew wide open. I have no idea what could have caused it, but for a long time afterwards I thought it was my Grandad's soul leaving the house. Logic dictates that there must be a reasonable explanation for it, but to this day I don't know how it could have happened.

Second, this only happened a few months ago. If you live in London you may have seen it too, but it was eerie nonetheless.

It was New Years Eve, and me and the girlfriend couldn't be arsed to go to the Thames for the fireworks so we just stayed in for once. So, come midnight we rushed outside to watch any fireworks that people might have been setting off.

A few minutes passed, and we were happily watching the fireworks above us. But then, we saw a flaming ball in the sky. I immediately dismissed it as a firework, but after 30 seconds of it just floating there in the sky I began to think maybe it wasn't a firework.

It was quite far away, but it was still a reasonable size, and would have been many times bigger than a normal firework. It was bathed in flames, and was slowly travelling across the nightsky.

Even if it was a balloon or something that someone had set off from the ground, it would have either burnt out or disintegrated and fallen to the ground by now. This was about 3 minutes after seeing it.

No, instead it was still hanging there in the sky. Then, it started moving across the sky; quite fast really. For a brief second, I thought it was a meteorite. However, after going one way, it began to go back on itself.

It was at this point that I grabbed a pair of binoculars to get a closer look. Upon closer inspection, it was definitely quite large; and a reasonable distance away. I couldn't see any details, apart from a big ball of flames. I could also make out smoke floating up from it, however it was not a plume of black smoke; rather just light smoke from intense heat. Like the smoke you get when you overheat a cooking pan. (Bad analogy, I know)

Anyway, after about 5 minutes of this ball travelling around the sky, it began to travel away from us in the opposite direction until we couldn't see it anymore. However, mere seconds after the first one disappeared, a second one appeared in the same spot where the first one appeared. (I hope you're following this)

This second flaming ball hung in the air as well, and didn't travel around the sky as much as the previous one. This happened for about 2 minutes, after which time the first ball actually came back. What scared me is that the two flaming balls actually then travelled towards each other. Eventually, they both came to the same spot, and then travelled back in the opposite direction of us.

We waited around for about half an hour talking about it, and seeing if anymore would appear; but none did. We saw those flaming balls from about midnight until half 12, and I still have no idea what they could have been.
(Thu 3rd Jul 2008, 10:39, More)

» Hypocrisy

People who answer QOTW are idiots

(Fri 20th Feb 2009, 9:46, More)

» Cringe!

You couldn't make it up
As coincidences go, I have experienced quite a few. However, this is the single most cringe-worthy coincidence I've ever experienced.

Me and my mates (16-ish at the time) were on our way to Thorpe Park for much frivolity and fun. We had no car so we had to get the train from New Malden to Staines. The train we got to Staines had individual compartments like ye olde trains, so we spied a near empty carriage, save for one inconspicious man, and bundled in.

We reverted to the normal teenage boy talk of football, video games and hot chicks you saw on the TV last night when the topic of conversation turned to my computer after seeing an ad in a newspaper. I'd recently been having trouble with it, unsurprisingly because it was bought from Tiny.

If you don't know, Tiny are (were) a computer company that went bust due to the tremendously bad quality of their computers.

Cue us slagging off Tiny, mostly me though because I had first-hand experience of how bad my computer was.

The man in the corner then piped up and said to our astonishment: "I used to be a managing director of Tiny." We couldn't believe the huge coincidence, and I felt myself go bright red. We'd just slagged off a company in front of one of the most important people in the company. The carriage went quiet for a moment, until the man said:

"Yeah I resigned before I was pushed. The computers are a pile of shit". Or something to that likeness.
We then spent the rest of the train journey slagging off Tiny, with the help of the former MD.

As unlikely as this story sounds, it is absolutely true. Not the most cringeworthy as some of the entries so far, but almost certainly one of the biggest coincidences.
(Wed 3rd Dec 2008, 14:55, More)

» Accidental animal cruelty

Splatted Hamster
When I was about 7 or 8, I went throught the phase of wanting a cute, cuddly hamster as a pet. He had the imaginative name of 'Hammy'. Now, Hammy was a golden hamster, and could be quite vicious at times.
This made my young self quite nervous around him after the first week or so, after being bitten several times.
As we all know, hamsters like to take a stroll in plastic balls; which we have all longed for at some point.

Anyway, he was having the time of his life in the living room, as good ol' Mum was cleaning his cage. I used to like gently pushing the ball as a way of playing with him without getting bitten. I didn't push him hard, just a gentle nudge now and again, and he used to run back towards me; so I assumed he liked it.

I picked him up at one point, as we have a step down into the kitchen, and I didn't want him to go down it and hurt himself.
Plastic balls have small holes and lines to stop the hamster suffocating obviously, and as I had the ball in my hands, I felt something sharp on my finger. Having been attacked by Hammy before, I instinctively proceeded to throw the ball up into the air thinking I'd been bitten. The ball then crashed down onto the floor, splitting in two.

So, I saved him from falling down one step, instead accidentally making him plummet from about 5 feet up. The ball had split apart, and both pieces laid either side of him, he was spread-eagled on the floor motionless. I panicked and picked him up. As I held him in my hands, I didn't notice any blood on my finger. I then realised the sharp thing must have been his claws.

He recovered after about 10 minutes, with no ill-effects of his short-lived freefall. He died about 6 months later from an unrelated disease :(

RIP Hammy
(Fri 7th Dec 2007, 17:38, More)

» Cheating cheaty cheats

Teacher/Student Cheat Shocker
My english language a-level teacher was an absolute legend, not only because she'd cancel lessons because she "couldn't be bothered to teach us today", but she came into her own when it came to coursework. After learning absolutely nothing for the year we had her, next came the possible minefield of A2 coursework.
Cue the whole class handing in questionable first drafts, only for her to say that she would write extra things for us that we could add to our work. She also constantly marked our work so that we got the best marks. I also borrowed majorly from my media studies coursework forthis, as I basically did the same subject for both courseworks.
I absolutely bricked it when my coursework was chosen for moderating by the exam board. I got off scott-free though, as did the rest of the class, as most of us got A's for the coursework! :D......cheating bitch
(Fri 18th Nov 2005, 12:16, More)