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Hey Dees,

Well, that was fun! I just watched the Terzake show and thought it was quite cool. I tried keeping some notes, let’s see if I can decypher my scribbles. For my own comfort I’ll just list my observations:

• Two new terms: agroglyph, another word for crop circles (which seems to be a mostly French term, I learned from a Google search), and the more than fantastic name Cereal Killer :-D.
• People dressed in Napoleon style are by no means credible. Never.
• The thought that crop circles are negatives of the thoughts of people living in a fifth or sixth dimension (I was very curious about your reaction to this Dees!!).
• Crop circles mostly appear near historic monuments. I was thinking, if I wanted ‘facilitate’ the creation of urban myths around something I had made, I would definitely choose such spots on purpose too.
• Crop circles are visited by over 5000 people. There must be a business model to that!
• Just a quote: “Amongst experts, this circle is described as “real”.”. I liked the subtle skeptic tone here…
• I noticed that the Wallonian researcher who took some stalks for further analyses in the lab only took them from within the crop circle, not from outside. So no control sample. They did not find anything out of the ordinary, but I think they should have compared the sample from the circle to a true control sample anyway. Maybe they did not show this in the video, I don’t know.
• Apparently, many of the videos showing balls of light creating a crop circle are hoaxes. I thought so.
• Another really nice quote (I’d like to refer back to my business model note): “Crop circles are big business in new age circles.”.
• OK. Janet Ossebaard. Even you did not really appreciate the arguments she discusses in her book to ‘prove’ that crop circles are not man made, did you? She totally did not convince me. I am just repeating her here: “You ask such difficult questions!”. Really. I did like the fact that the reporter thought of her ideas as an ‘ambitious hypothesis”.
• Should we attend the annual Crop Circle symposium in Glastonbury? Bookings can be made from February onwards. I might want to spend some money on that! Entertainment guaranteed I guess. Going just one day isn’t that expensive, 40 Pounds.
• Then we had firm believer and conspiracy theorist Andy Thomas (a quick search led me to this website). He claimed that crop circles are not explicable in normal terms. I am completely not convinced of that! So far, the explanations that I have seen for the creation of crop circles by humans is quite convincing. Do you think he would even take the evidence disproving his theories seriously?
• John Lundberg, the guy behind circlemakers.org mentioned a movie he was making about crop circles with some Japanese people. Note to self: check this out!! I also loved Lundbergs customer list, including Microsoft, Nike, the BBC…
• Some things that were frequently said about creating a crop circle: “it is simple”, “it is quick”, “he just makes crop circles for fun”.
• I really liked the interview with crop circle maker ‘Cereal Killer’. Especially the part about why he never exposed himself as the maker of some famous crop circles (because then myths and urban legends rise, people try to explain what happend, which is quite fun. Also, when everyone would know a crop circle was man made, the crop circle itself (which very often is a beautiful piece of landscape art) would get far less attention. It probably all boils down to acknowledgement. In an anonymous way.) This guy was quite concerned about the take up of crop circles by sects and religious groups though, which might also be an interesting issue to explore further (another note to self).
• Apparently, making a crop circle isn’t that difficult, as long as you prepare it well and make sure your planning and organisation are in order. I can do that! I think.
• Do you think someone ever made a calculation of the loss of income for farmers because of crop circles?

It is time I started doing some real research myself again, but ah, time…. You know the feeling! I’ll try to remember I ask for Eise’s library card next time I see him (I’m more of a single girl these days!!). Buying crop circle books is just one step too far for me… :-S

Cheers!

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