The Glenndale Seven

The Glenndale Seven thought they planned the perfect crime. They would break into the gold vault at Fort Knox using techniques a court injunction has barred me from describing on a post card, leave with seven hundred gold bars, and lay low at a local church while waiting for a fence to restamp the gold and sell it to buyers waiting in Eastern Europe and Central and South America. One member of the Glenndale seven was a federal agent who used his understanding of FBI investigation procedure to avoid detection, and another member served as custodian for the Greater Life Baptist Church of Glenndale which gave him both 24/7 access to the large building and an thorough understanding of which rooms were never visited, and thus ideal for gold storage. Their plan would have worked flawlessly, but for one thing. God took none too kindly at being made an accomplice in this daring crime. Of course, the age of miracles had long since past, and God, being older and more mature, decided the somewhat subtle approach would be best. He waited patiently for a detective with a fondness for Irish folklore to pass the church, and He set a rainbow in place above the building, knowing the detective would remember that the gold is found at the end of the rainbow.

- Originally mailed to W. Murphree in Rosenburg, Texas

Dapper Plastic Aliens

People often look at the symbols older cultures created, or the works of art that can only be seen from the sky and they assume that long ago, extra-terrestrials came to earth to give us a scientific jump start. Of course, it is easy to look at symbols from another culture and make inferences about their meanings because we have no associations of our own to muddy up the process. This is why many of of the same people who point out the extra-terrestrial influences on the past completely overlook the signs that aliens still guide our scientific development. For instance, the Chinese are aware that without alien intervention, we never would have developed plastics. International relations being what they are, however, they cannot risk their position by making such a “ridiculous” claim. Instead, they create symbols much as the people of old did, imprinting upon containers from their takeout restaurants the following image. Most mistake it for a brand or something that simply means plastic. Only the few removed from their own personal experiences with Chinese takeout see it for what it truly is: a starman in a nice suit, surrounding himself with plastic. Theorists still debate, however, whether he is wearing a tie or has a fu manchu mustache.

- Originally mailed to B. Bowser of Brandon, MS