CELESTIAL NEWSAGENT

During our annual TOMTIT seance meeting on Halloween, we achieved contact with the spirit of P. Parsons, a deceased newsagent and tobacconist. He spoke to us of his celestial newsagents shop, and the many publications he sold to the dead.

One thriving magazine he mentioned was 'TOMTIT Computer', and after a great deal of screaming, he began to send us pages from a 1984 edition via a circle of printers we'd arranged within a chalk pentagram. Sadly, Unmann-Wittering aggressively broke wind before page 2 arrived, and disrupted the proceedings. Contact with Parsons was halted as a result. 

Here is a scan of the spectral printout, which has been examined by a cross section of respected ghost hunters and paranormal experts, all of whom expressed a desire that we don't waste their time any further.

What fools these mortals be !

FLASH FORWARD

‘The Man Who Fell To Earth’ is a favourite film of ours, and one of the scenes that is permanently glued to the inside of our skulls is when Thomas Jerome Newton (the cadaverous but quite brilliant David Bowie) is travelling through the American mid-west in the back of a limousine and looks out of the window to see that, somehow, the car has been spotted by a group of settlers from a hundred years previously. 

There is no explanation for this unsettling, green tinged time warp, and it passes almost instantaneously - as it reaches a certain point the limo disappears in a ball of blue light, then the gawping settlers do the same - presumably leaving an empty landscape. 

The interesting thing is not that Newton can see the settlers (he’s an alien, he has special powers), but that they can see him – and they, understandably, are pretty freaked out. So who is haunting who? Is this how ghosts happen: momentary temporal shifts from the past or future that leave indelible marks on the landscape? 

The idea of a ‘backwards haunting’ is an interesting one, i.e. the spectres are from the future rather than the past. In Nigel Kneale’s 1963 teleplay ‘The Road’, inhabitants of an 18th century village are disturbed by paranormal noises and visions they can’t understand, but we can recognise as psychic reverberations from the aftermath of a nuclear war that won't happen for another two hundred years. You’ll have to take our word for it on that one, though, as the BBC wiped it after transmission.

THE CROCODILE OF SCIENCE

 

This cover features a rendition of the terrifying sonic apparition from the future that spontaneously appeared out of the musical equipment at the first ever Depeche Mode rehearsal in January,1980.

The Basildon boys immediately made a deal with the ghostly sound reptile and, within a few months, were on Top Of The Pops. The Electric Crocodile's side of the bargain is still yet to be fulfilled thirty four years on, but it is believed to entail the total destruction of the world and everyone on it. Except Depeche Mode*.

* Vince Clarke excluded. 

NEW FOLKLORE

One of the most wonderful things about this awful country is how it's always 1641^* somewhere, even if its just in our heads. In the town or city it is difficult to walk around and not feel the weight of our long history; in the country it is virtually impossible.

We're not talking about simply putting a floppy hat on, by the way, or knitting your own underpants and only eating Sugar Beet. As above, it is perfectly possible to channel the past without pretence or pose, and to actually add something to the sum, not just simply plunder the accumulated parts.

Oh, and who knew that the analogue synth would become as much a folk instrument as a dulcimer or a harmonium? 

* i.e. Pre-Civil War. But any date from 10,000 BC up until tea time yesterday would be equally valid.  

INNER BEAUTY

Note zip and belt buckle.

A selection of x-rays taken after a BARIUM MEAL. The meal itself is slightly radioactive, which bothers people, although the same people usually think the x-ray process is pretty routine, despite it often being more dangerous. Why do you think the radiologist hides to take the photograph? 

For us, it seems to prove that people will quite happily suffer on the outside (tattoos spring to mind, not to mention tanning booths and those big lug hole ring things), but can be very picky indeed about what they put in their mouth if it isn't marketed properly. 

One suggestion would be a Barium Happy Meal, same chalky, glowing, horrible tasting sulphate but with a tie-in toy from a blockbuster film. People would make themselves poorly just to collect the set. 

There's something eerie about these pictures, as if the stomach were haunted. We're reminded of the crazy fake ectoplasm mediums used to pretend to produce until 'Ghostbusters' came along and raised the bar (note to Editor: check chronology; note to Selves: get Editor). 

Outrageously, these were once used as promotional items, with the fluffy stuff cited as visual proof of contact with the beyond. People were funny in the olden days. Now they're just tosspots.