The Thing in the Road.

Seeking a solution to the aforementioned supernatural/paranormal tomfoolery/high-jinx that is afoot in my town and spreading throughout the country at large, I have found myself consulting the work of Lady Gregory. In her attempt to assemble an archive of Irish folk beliefs, Lady Gregory spent a large part of the early 20th century travelling the hills of Sligo collecting tales of Fortean phenomena said to have been experienced by the various bog men she found there. It was amongst the folk wisdoms of these first hand accounts that I hoped to find some remedy to our current economic/occult predicament.

Gregory records an odd event that took place late one February night on a muddy road that ran raggedly from the foot of Ben Bulben. The tale of The Thing in the Road became one of the most celebrated paranormal incidents of its time and is even said to have once been referred to by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle himself, during a drunken tirade launched at his wife.

Anyway, without further ado, I will reproduce the accounts, as recorded by Lady Gregory, of the people who were actually there on the night. If you catch sight of anything that may be of assistance amongst the insanity of the garbled rustic parlance below please let me know.

The Thing in the Road: testimonies by boggers of a fiend that they happened upon whilst drunkenly travelling a pitch dark path at four o'clock in the morning (possibly after taking mushies).

Husband: 'There was something in the road that night. You could tell it was there because it wasn't somewhere else. It had a shape but it wasn't like a shape and it rolled forward like a duck doesn't or a goose either for that matter. It was as big as it was small and twice that size again. It wasn't comely, you wouldn't go toward it.'

Wife of Husband: 'I saw it also. At first I thought it was a cow but it wasn't. It was nothing like a cow and there was no reason to think it was a cow at all. It wasn't a cow or anything like that. It wasn't a horse either. I thought it was a cow and it could've been I suppose but for the fact that it wasn't.'

Brother of Wife of Husband: 'It was fierce. It looked fierce and it smelled it also. There was a stench of fierceness in the road and that is all I will say on the matter.'

Wife of Brother of Wife of Husband: 'My heart was above me at the sight of it. My heart was above me and to either side of me and behind and below me and there before me at the sight of it on the road.'

Father of Wife of Brother of Wife of Husband: 'I'll neither confirm nor deny that I saw it but see it I did and it wasn't there at all.'

Brother of Father of Wife of Brother of Wife of Husband: 'I thought it was something the faery ride upon. It had no hooves. It let a tremendous belch. It called me a gee-bag.'

Random Bogger: It was faery but not good faery, not comely, you would be reluctant to make its acquaintance. There was badness to it. You should never cross a faery's path. Never close a gate upon a faery or speak badly of one's footwear. It called us gee-bags. I didn't like it at all. It might have been a protestant. You know, the grass is so thick there you could grease your boots with it.'

The End.

I'm not sure if reading endless streams of this Lady Gregory stuff is helping. Beyond my window I can hear the pitiful wails of a nation being poisoned, paralysed and slowly eaten alive by the hideous scuttling mega-spider that is Nyx. There must be something that can be done, something, . . .going forward.