UFOs – Go Retire Psychiatrist

Groundhog Day Finally Explained

Well, by now everybody has heard the official news about what Punxsutawney Phil saw this morning since it’s Groundhog Day. On the other hand, the unofficial news is this: for some reason he saw extraterrestrials instead of his shadow. I know about it only because a drunken official calling me from the Pentagon spilled the beans to me and abruptly hung up just before he passed out.

Apparently, they were looking for a decent rib joint, which they’re always on the lookout for after traveling halfway across the galaxy.

You have to question the ETs preference for using so much fuel and creating missing time and hallucinations for thousands of people gathered for this time-honored and totally bogus event which the editors of The Old Farmer’s Almanac repeatedly try to debunk in a futile attempt to educate us about the seasons.

What almost nobody knows is that recently declassified government documents obtained by Brer Rabbit has led to the discovery of yet another conspiracy to hoodwink the American people about the ETs preoccupation with finding the best BBQ rib joint in the galaxy, which is genetically linked to their inability to distinguish humans from woodland creatures whose only real purpose in life is to dig holes in the ground so they can secretly write books circulated only amongst groundhogs about how silly it is for humans to call them ridiculous names like “whistle pigs.”

The truth is groundhogs know perfectly well how the seasons change and it has nothing to do with them—it’s all about the tooth fairy. But…ETs can’t handle the truth, as Col. Jessup has repeatedly pointed out in countless memes and gifs over the years.

We can only hope this deplorable state of affairs will be rectified when scientists eventually back engineer and reverse the polarities of the device (which is, trust me, stored in a cardboard box in a garage in Area 51) ETs use to hypnotize the criminals amongst their own kind into endlessly flying around in their souped up Tic-Tac UFOs in the absolutely pointless search for the perfect rib joint—all because the ET leaders can’t come up with a better solution to close the gaps in their worthless criminal justice system.

I hope I have made all this clear. Happy Groundhog Day!

The Extraterrestrial and Mutilated Soybean Hybridization Program in Iowa

After watching a number of TV shows about extraterrestrials (ETs), I had this vivid dream about ETs invading Iowa.

Apparently, I had somehow driven out on some highway that was not clearly marked, maybe Highway 20 which the National Weather Service always mentions as a sort of boundary line between a howling, disastrous tornadimohurricannibalistic storm and utter tranquility a few miles north of us.

I got out of the car and noticed up in the sky a gigantimonguous craft shaped like a triquetra. It was eerily silent as it passed just inches above my head and it glowed multiple colors like the NBC peacock.

Suddenly, 3 beings who resembled the 3 stooges (except their heads were tiny) floated out of the craft and took me hostage. They kept arguing amongst themselves about how they were going to exsanguinate me and then fuse me with a soybean plant they had previously mutilated. Apparently, they had tipped a few cows in the process and slipped in the pasture, falling into an area full of cow pies.

I told them they smelled bad and suggested they try Mando, the deodorant that is nothing like the scented stuff which, if you apply it, is exactly like turning up your car radio when the engine rattles—hey, it just masks the problem.

I guess that hurt their feelings and they told me they were going to stick some kind of implant in my nose so they could track me because they could hear my nose whistle and find me anywhere. I told them I’m allergic to ET implants and I would just sneeze it out. I had them there.

Then they tried to communicate with me telepathically but I knew how to counter that trick. I just thought really hard about good barbecued ribs, which made them hungry. They asked me where they could find a decent rib joint and I told them how to get to Jimmy Jack’s Rib Shack in Iowa City.

So we head on over there and I help them order. They weren’t sure what to drink, so I suggested water because I saw this trick in the movie, Signs. It didn’t work as I expected and they just acted like they were drunk.

Then, of all things, they wanted to go to Area 51, and we just zipped over there. On the way, they picked up Bob Lazar who drew pictures of them. He asked me why they had barbecue sauce all over their faces and I just told him they had bad manners.

Finally, I woke up and I swear I’m going to limit how much kale I eat next time.

Upcoming Svengoolie Movie: “Flight 7500”!

The upcoming Svengoolie movie this coming Saturday is “Flight 7500.” It reminds me of one of our vacation trips when Sena asked for an extra bag of peanuts from the attendant, who promised she would return with another bag—and never did. Sena’s never forgotten that.

I think that’s kind of how things go on airplanes. I’m not big on airline food and not keen on flying at all. I remember sitting next to an elderly guy (Har! Look who’s talking!) who was probably more nervous about flying than I was (as if that were possible).

As we were taking off, he pressed a little button on his hand or his wrist (can’t remember exactly) that was attached to a wristband. I remember thinking it might have had something to do with acupressure points. I looked this up today and it turns out that there’s a point called Union Valley and it’s in the webbing between your thumb and index finger. Or maybe it was the Inner Frontier Gate point, which is about 3 finger widths below your wrist. I know it wasn’t the Shoulder Well point because that can induce labor. I’m pretty sure he wasn’t pregnant.

Anyway, this movie looks like it could make you nervous. It was released in 2014, which is pretty unusual for Svengoolie. On the other hand, it’ll be the Sven Squad that’ll be in charge of it because Svengoolie is taking the night off. I gather he’ll be doing that once a month now. The Sven Squad members are Nostalgiaferatoo, Imp (Ignatius Malvolio Prankenstein who calls Svengoolie his uncle), and Gwengoolie. They usually do the 2^nd film of a double feature—which I can’t stay awake for.

I think Nostalgiaferatoo and Imp will play rock, paper, scissors more than 30,000 times to see who does most of the talking about the movie.

Anyway, the gist of the plot is that passengers start to feel a little queasy after their in-flight meal of beef jerky and turnip pastries and start hallucinating little monsters out on the wings which they keep telling the pilot about who is a little too busy to pay much attention because he’s distracted by the half-dozen or so UFOs zipping around just outside the front window which dodge the windshield wipers so fast it reminds him of the Men in Black movie in which Nick can’t clean off the bug parts of the big dragonfly that hits his window, so he has to take a break and orders his copilot to run back into the cabin and slap some of the passengers who are playing around with a Ouija Board and dousing rods, conjuring up demons who are demanding macaroni and cheese with Pepto-Bismol sauce, cheating at dominoes, and wondering when William Shatner is going to sign up for a sequel to the Twilight Zone smash hit, “And Don’t Call Me Shirley,” featuring a dozen or so nuns who are slapping the hysterical passengers who are unable to open the restroom door because Bigfoot is having THE USUAL PROBLEM of constipation from too much beef jerky…OK, I guess that’s not exactly how the movie goes, but I’m close!

Florida Man News!

We saw the news story about the Florida Man who recently got busted by the cops in Ormond, Florida after he stole a BMW and when he was stopped for going 130 mph (about 5 mph over the local speed limit), he thanked the police for saving him from the extraterrestrials who evidently had teleported him into the BMW. Well, that explains everything!

This is just further evidence on top of what has already been thoroughly documented by Dave Barry in his 2016 documentary book, “Best State Ever; A Florida Man Defends His Homeland.”

Did you hear about the blackout in Florida?

People were stuck on the escalators for 4 hours.

I used to have a ton of Dave Barry books. I got hooked on his humor shortly after I graduated from Iowa State University back in the 1980s. I was in a post graduate program in Medical Technology in a Des Moines hospital and back then you could always find a newspaper on some tables in the cafeteria.

Over the years, I lost many of his books during moves. Sena would ask me something like “Do you really still want all these Dave Barry books?” I knew better than to say “These are very important examples of timeless prose exemplifying humor literature that will be excavated in the distant future by archaeologists who will preserve them in hermetically sealed glass bookcases so people can admire the covers.”

I just threw them out. Please don’t tell Dave.

Anyway, I have managed to preserve a photo of Florida Woman, taken in Miami many years ago. Let this be a lesson to you: never call your wife “Florida Woman” unless you want to live the rest of your life in a refrigerator packing box—although you can use duct tape to seal off those cracks to keep the wind and snow out.

Did you know there’s a song titled “Florida Man”? Believe it or not I heard it a couple of years ago on the Big Mo Blues Show on KCCK radio. It’s by Selwyn Birchwood who is from—that’s right, Tampa, Florida. The song was released by—you guessed it, Alligator Records.

And here’s Iowa Man:

Jim with 48 inch pusher plow shovel and new coveralls

Men in Black 5 a Thing Now?

I just saw something on the web which look like Men in Black 5 could be for real. Supposedly, maybe, I dunno—but I hope so.

It may be more than a rumor, but there are doubts about whether Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones will reprise their roles as Agents K & J respectively. Sony Pictures may or may not be confirming this depending on what article you read. Maybe somebody is drafting a script but I’m not sure.

I can’t confirm whether Frank the talking pug will be in it, but I doubt it because I think he passed away. Agent K will get around pretty well in a plutonium powered mobility scooter and Agent J will take Serutan (remember, that’s Natures spelled backward!) just before pressing the little red button.

Serleena will not stick her 3-foot-long green tongue into Agent K’s ear. I can never stand to watch that part.

Yours truly might be involved—but I really can’t say at this time because I’m still negotiating my contract.

Thank you for your time.

Thanksgiving Day 2025 Tabloid News!

Today is the day for the 2025 Thanksgiving Day Tabloid News and you better believe this paper’s got issues. Eat turkey, watch football, take a nap from all that turkey.

This post’s title was inspired by (what else?) lines from the first Men in Black movie:

Agent K: [at newsstand] We’ll check the hot sheets.

Agent J: *These* are the hot sheets?

Agent K: Best investigative reporting on the planet. Read the New York Times if you want, they get lucky sometimes.

Agent J: I cannot believe you’re looking for tips in the supermarket tabloids.

Agent K: [front-age article about farmer’s stolen skin] Not looking for. Found.

Anyway, today is a special day because we’re waiting for some new items: a premium Cribbage Wars board from Ebonwood with resin inlays. We’re also waiting for extra pegs. These acrylic and brass pegs just shipped from the United Kingdom, which doesn’t charge tariffs. Michaud Toys makes a game board they call Cribbage Rumble (actually the same game as Cribbage Wars), but they’re currently not shipping to the U.S. because of the tariff situation.

We’re still playing Cribbage Wars on our economical little board with tiny peg holes. We’re finding out we like it so much we’d prefer a larger board so we can at least see what we’re pegging without a magnifying glass.

Sena still wins most of the games. I’m working on my strategy.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Protecting the Universe from the Scum of the Earth

The title of this post might sound familiar to those who have seen the movie Men in Black way too many times, like me. There’s a trailer poster from the 1997 MIB movie showing Agents J and K holding huge space guns and the title is “Protecting the Earth from the Scum of the Universe.”

There are reasons to invert the title; all you have to do is read the news headlines. And one of them is on a story posted in the Guardian entitled ‘Bored aliens’: has intelligent life stopped bothering trying to contact Earth?

Whoa! When exactly did they start?

In a nutshell, the author is citing an astrophysicist’s notion that we should consider embracing a novel idea called “radical mundanity” which in this context says that maybe extraterrestrials are not much smarter than earthlings. That could be one explanation why nobody has seen what the majority of humans would call clear and convincing evidence that advanced civilizations exist out in the galaxy.

I guess “clear and convincing evidence” means ETs should be walking up to us and asking for directions to the nearest good rib joint.

I guess terms like “radical mundanity” and “radical empathy” are in vogue because radical rationalization is an old earthling habit that fathered both.

In fact, common sense suggests that something like radical practicality might explain one pretty funny quote from MIB. It’s the one in which Agent K is demonstrating the universal translator to the soon to be Agent J and confides that earthlings are not supposed to have it, and then goes on to explain why:

“Human thought is so primitive it’s looked upon as an infectious disease in some of the better galaxies. That kind of makes you proud, doesn’t it?”

Interesting why Agent K says that the low opinion some ETs have of humans is something to be proud of. Maybe that because of radical admiration, which is what we often have for slick villains clever enough to steal something like the universal translator—since radical criminality is so rampant everywhere on earth.

That would pretty much be the end of this line of thought (if I had any sense). But if you reason that most ETs would be leery of earthlings, why would so many of them travel to this planet? Part of the answer (of course) is in MIB. It’s Agent K’s explanation for why so many of them do.

Agent K: “Back in the mid-1950s the government started a little, underfunded agency with the simple and laughable purpose of establishing contact with a race not of this planet… They were a group of intergalactic refugees wanting to use the earth as an apolitical zone for…creatures without a planet. Did you ever see the movie Casablanca?”

“Today there are approximately 1500 aliens living and working Manhattan and most of them are decent enough; they’re just trying to make a living.”

OK, that’s only part of the story, maybe mostly the radical empathy part. Getting back to radical mundanity, which is how we got started on this crooked tale, where does this put earthlings and ETs? Maybe we’re headed toward realizing that every bright dot in the sky is not evidence for visitors from somewhere out in the galaxy or beyond. Maybe trying to get to Mars is not such a hot idea. Maybe we can try to get along with each other on earth without waiting for ETs to stop us from slaughtering each other. I don’t know as much about this approach as I should, but I think it’s called radical acceptance.

Will There Be a Men in Black 5 or Not?

As a big fan of the Men in Black (MIB) movies, my burning question is: Will there be an MIB 5 or not?

Probably not in my lifetime, which is sad. I’m not really as big a fan of any other films, despite what you might think of my Svengoolie movie reviews—which are always tongue in cheek.

I didn’t see the first MIB film when it came out in 1997 because I was too busy starting my career as a psychiatrist. It’s my favorite, but I can’t remember the first time I saw it. I’ve always thought the chemistry between Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones was priceless. One of my favorite quotes from that was:

Edwards: Why the big secret? People are smart. They can handle it. (this relates to why the subject of extraterrestrials on the planet is kept a big secret).

Kay: A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it. Fifteen hundred years ago everybody knew the Earth was the center of the universe. Five hundred years ago, everybody knew the Earth was flat, and fifteen minutes ago, you knew that humans were alone on this planet. Imagine what you’ll know tomorrow.

I Iiked the first sequel, MIB II (2002), although not as much as the first movie. And I just found out what Frank the pug meant by his question to Agent J about missing Laura. I always thought I heard Frank ask him: “What? Still sit and shiver?” That doesn’t make sense, of course. What Frank actually asked is “What? Still in shiva?” I finally just looked up the word “shiva.” Turns out it’s a Jewish term, loosely translated meaning a period of mourning, in this context of losing his girl.

I thought the third sequel, MIB 3 (2012) was really funny (all of them are funny). I always thought this one about time travel and getting trapped in the year 1969 was on target, partly because it was historically accurate. I lived through that era. Somehow, being able to laugh about it might be healing, in a way.

Jeffrey Price: Do not lose that time device or you will be stuck in 1969! It wasn’t the best time for your people. I’m just saying; it’s like a lot cooler now.

Agent J: How will I know if it works?

Jeffrey Price: You’ll either know…or you won’t.

I never watch MIB International (2019). Nothing against the actors; it just doesn’t do for me what Agents J and K do.

Anyhow, I doubt there’s ever going to be an MIB 5. I just wish the cable networks had not recently stopped showing reruns of the movies. Now it looks like the only way to see them is to subscribe to a streaming service, which is way too expensive just to feed nostalgia. I checked the Internet Archive. Comments on the videos mention their low quality. I know they’re available on DVD, but we don’t have a player anymore. I know I could play them on my computer, but I’m too lazy to sit at my desk. It’s just not the same as watching them while sitting in the living room in a really comfortable chair.

I’ve seen them so many times, I’ve practically memorized them anyway.

Upcoming Svengoolie Show Movie “Tarantula”!

Svengoolie Intro: “Calling all stations, clear the air lanes, clear all air lanes for the big broadcast!”

This Saturday’s Svengoolie movie will be “Tarantula,” about a giant tarantula in the Arizona desert who developed a huge brain and invented a brand new barbecue-flavored meatballs dish made out of humans and marketed to extraterrestrials who are pretty hungry after traveling from a far-away galaxy and abducting thousands of people who are just looking for a fun new ride on a spaceship and the giant tarantulas have 8 arms and are trying to learn how to juggle 32 persons because it’s well known that people can learn how to juggle 8 items and they have only two hands and—OK, so that’s not quite the story line but fun to think about.

Spotting Venus in the Eastern Sky

I was watching a television show last night about UFOs and had to chuckle about some of the segments in which there was a lot of speculation about underground and underwater bases where extraterrestrials typically are thought to hide from us while they work on whatever it is they work on.

There was the usual discussion of the Chicago O’Hare airport UFO sighting in 2006 which, according to the official FAA explanation was a weather phenomenon known as a “punch hole” cloud. Of course, true believers don’t believe that.

The show also rehashed the remote viewing theme in which somebody describes and draws pictures of things which are said to be seen remotely, often of extraterrestrials and humans working together on antique cars.

Remote viewer: I see many objects lining the walls of a hollowed-out mountain in Wyoming.

Observer: What are the objects?

Remote viewer: They are…socket wrenches. Billions and billions of socket wrenches.

Observer: Zzzzzzzz.

I thought about that show as I was walking out to the mailbox pod early this morning. I saw a very a bright object in the eastern sky. It didn’t move. It wasn’t disk-shaped and it didn’t look like an orb. It didn’t abduct me. It looked like a star, which I decided it was. I looked around the internet and it was most likely Venus, sometimes called the morning star (it also can be known as the evening star).

That reminded me of an X-File episode in which Jesse Ventura, a former Minnesota governor (1999-2003), had a role. The episode was “Jose Chung’s from Outer Space” and it’s one of my favorites. Ventura played a man in black.

I’m not saying Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs) don’t exist and I don’t know why we need to call them Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) nowadays. I’m just saying that the morning star is a beautiful thing.