On 5th March, Jonathan and Corinna Downes, the Director and Administrator of the Centre for Fortean Zoology [CFZ] the world's largest mystery animal research organisation, fly to Texas. Together with their friends and colleagues Richie and Naomi West who very generously financed the expedition, they will spend two weeks continuing the research into the Texas blue dogs, first carried out by Jonathan Downes in November 2004..

Monday 15 March 2010

Dodgy music and sunken rooms

We (Jon, Richie, Naomi and I) have just returned from a two-day visit to Dallas, and it is time to do some catching up with emails and blogs.

Jon had a gig booked for the Dallas branch of MUFON where we met Richard Freeman's doppleganger and Naomi took secret photos of The X-Files' 'The Smoking Man's' doppleganger, after which we visited Nick and Dana Redfern and spent the night at their lovely house. Jon and Nick spent a few hours reminiscing on the good ol’ days whilst Nick entertained us with some rather dodgy music from his collection of The Ramones, Sham 69, Sex Pistols and Motley Crue. Now, I must add here that Richie was quite impressed with Sid Vicious’s rendition of My Way, but Jon and I cringed when Motley Crue blasted from the speakers in the sitting room. In the end it was down to Dana and me to demand that our other halves put a stop to the offending musical interlude and I must admit, we both shouted STOP THAT ROW with excellent finesse and - what's more - with great success.

When we first arrived at their house Nick and Dana warned us to watch for the small step that led to the sitting room. No problem – it was but a small descent. However… it did ensnare one of us in its lurking grip. Me to be precise. Yes the good ol’ gal here ended up on the floor after niftily performing some kind of peculiar triple salco to avoid a shelf of ornaments that seemed to loom towards her as she fell into the chasm that was the sitting room. However, it has been reported that she performed her magnificent entry with a certain aplomb and ended up lying on the carpet whilst laughing uncontrollably at her extreme cleverness.

This morning Nick and Dana took us to White Rock Lake (which soon became White Lock Cake and White Lock Rake when I tried to record a piece for On the Track) and then it was off to Dallas to visit the site of the famous event of November 1963 – the assassination of President J.F. Kennedy. It is one of those events in history where people tell you that they can remember where they were when the news reached them. I was only 7 at the time so I am afraid I am not one of those people but have seen clips of it many times in TV programmes and of course re-enactments of it in films. There were quite a few people visiting, and a continual stream of people running across the road when the lights were red to have their picture taken on the ‘x’ that marks the spot. I declined to run the gauntlet of traffic, as did Jon.

It was great to see Dana and Nick again - they are lovely people.

Photo credit: CFZ top photographer of the year: Mr Richard West, Texas

Tomorrow it is off on the road again on our continued blue dog investigations.

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