Well here we are again with another round up of all that's happening in the world of UFOs and the Paranormal, (well almost!)  It's been a busy time of late but I wouldn't have it any other way.  OK so without any further ado, let's take a look at what's been going on shall we.

Judy and I attended (along with our friend Matthew Williams) the Fortean Times Unconvention on the 6^th and 7^th of April.  And I must say I thoroughly enjoyed myself.  There were a whole range of different speakers, namely, Jon Ronson, Jim Moseley from the States, author Colin Wilson, Mike Jay, Doug Skinner, Richard Freeman, Doc Shiels (more of him later !) Phil Walton, Colin Bennet, Andy Roberts and Dave Clarke, Peter Brooksmith, Graham Hancock, Paul Devereux, Lionel Fanthorpe and many more.  They also showed an American documentary on the Mothman, which was absolutely fascinating.  The venue, the Commonwealth Institute in London was buzzing with large crowds and the many paranormal stalls were doing much business.  It would be too much to go into here in regards to all the talks I heard, suffice it to say Graham Hancock put in a great performance with a talk on lost civilisations which are now underwater, Peter Brooksmith gave us an interesting talk on the Betty and Barney Hill case having a dig at American researchers which was uncalled for !!.  Paul Devereux was excellent.  For me though, the lecture, if we can call it that !!!!!!! by Doc Shiels just had to be seen to be believed.  I have heard so much about this man that he turns up drunk for each lecture he gives and rambles on and on about next to nothing, I just had to see him more so because he took a classic photo of "Nessie" some years ago.  Anyway, Judy and I went in and true to form he was well plastered.  The slide machine wouldn't work and he treated the audience to an impromptu comedy routine, which had me almost on the floor.  Making shapes with his hand against the white screen etc, well I guess you get the picture.

He rambled on and his jokes got tiresome, so much so that Judy walked out,  I stayed the course however and learned nothing.  At question time, I asked him about his calling up "Nessie" from the depths, how did he do it etc.  He rambled on about something or other which I couldn't make out but he clearly didn't want to give me a proper answer, (if he had one!)  Judy and I attended the after dinner buffet for the speakers in a nearby pub where we had a rare old time with Jon Downes, Dave Clarke and Andy Roberts to name but a few.  The whole weekend was great.  Judy was asked to go on the panel at the end of the weekend and was fantastic and she lucidly explained her views about UFOs.  The panel was called the death of UFOlogy which many felt was way over the top.  I grabbed the mike in the audience and asked the panel why it was so selectively sceptical!!  8 people were on the panel and there was only one 'believer' or shall I say open-minded person, and that was Colin Bennett.  I said this was ridiculous and it should have been 4 sceptics and 4 open-minded people.  The panel just laughed this off with Judy telling me that she would see to me later!!!!   When the question and answer session finished with the panel of experts, one young woman came up to me and shook my hand and said that she was glad that I pointed out to the panel how biased it was (and kept shaking my hand saying that she was sure I was speaking for many other people in the audience).  Mind you, when I relayed my point in the audience, one chap sitting behind me told me that I was at the wrong conference, that if I was a believer I should have gone to the Birdsall's UFO Conference!!   

There were a lot of sceptics at the Unconvention, or should I say people with closed minds,