White noise

 For a long time it has been accepted that the use of white noise is helpful in the communication of the afterlife. I'm not a scientist so I don't know how this works, but it's a theory that is so popular it has spawned several movies.

I recently posted a little story about white noise on my Facebook page and was surprised when several people responded and said that they had also heard music, chattering, and unexplained noises in their home when they had their air conditioner or other white noise maker running.

Is there something to this?

Maybe.

We have a very large dehumidifier in our basement. It's noisy. over the course of the past few weeks I have been shocked to hear what sounds like talking and music coming from the room that the unit is in. In fact, I've walked down the basement steps several times and heard voices speaking so loudly that I have assumed that one of my kids was up. Nope. Nothing there.

Others have talked about hearing low, mournful music. They've mentioned the sounds of violins and a melody so sad that they've been brought to tears. Someone told me that the voices have been so loud that they've almost been able to pick up parts of the conversation.

One thing is clear: the noises can't be heard in any other room in the house.





Rebecca Patrick-Howard is the author of HAUNTED ESTILL COUNTY, published by Mistletoe Press, 2013.

The Wolfman of Wolfe County

So Destination America has a show on right now called "Mountain Monsters" which is really just another way of exploiting the Appalachian region and finding the craziest people to represent us. (Naturally, people love this kind of thing.)

Recently, there was a show that aired called the "Wolfman of Wolfe County."

Now, being from Wolfe County, Kentucky I was intrigued about this episode. After all, I had spent my childhood there and still return at least once every year and have strong ties to the area. In all of these 33 years, however, not once have I ever heard of the supposed "wolfman."

According to the show, the wolfman stands on his hind legs and looks like a wolf. Yep, that's it. He's a monster who terrorizes people and animals and has been wrecking havoc for as long as anyone (at least the actors they brought in for the show) remembers.

Sticking to the format that most of these shows have, a trap was set for the wolfman and he was almost captured on camera before he stealthily got away. Aw, so close!

The fact that he was roaming the hills of Hazel Green, the town where I am from, yet nobody I know from there had ever heard from him was more than questionable. The fact that nobody knew the "locals" in the production was even more questionable. (Hazel Green has one gas station. A thriving metropolis it is not...) The fact that these "locals" referred to the a hollow as a "hollow" kind of sealed the deal for me. Clearly, this episode was completely, and not even cleverly, staged.

There are strange things in the mountains of Wolfe County. There are ghosts and spirits and black panthers and, hey, maybe even a few demons. Lots of things to talk about and speculate about without having to actually make anything up.

Oh well. At least they weren't trying to find Bigfoot. (That was in neighboring Lee County and they did that last year.)