#j.w. ocker

"Put aside cryptozoology for a moment, and let's talk UFOs. You've decided that those strange lights in the sky are not secret military aircraft, swamp gas, or misinterpretations of natural astral phenomena. You're firmly in the camp 'advanced extraterrestrial craft.' I'm going to ask you to rethink that position once again: what if those saucer-shaped lights in the night sky are actually giant flying clams?"

"The skunk ape's name comes, unfortunately, from its smell. All the worst smells have been used to describe its stench: wet dog, rotten eggs, excrement, even decaying corpses. Maybe the smell is inherent and serves a biological purpose, or maybe it has something to do with Florida's baking heat and the fetidness of the sticky swamplands that the creature calls home. Meanwhile, its bigfoot cousins in the Pacific Northwest tromp through pine-scented forests refreshed by annual snowfalls."

"But cryptids exist in yet another way beyond stories and monuments. Many who love cryptids love them more as symbols of the natural world than as secrets of it. Cryptids are hopeful concepts: hope that the world is still a diverse place full of discovery. Hope that humankind hasn't zoned every square inch of the planet for McDonald's franchises. Hope that we haven't grown bored with our mother planet, that she still harbors wonders for us. Cryptids exist: as stories, as monuments, as symbols. Maybe even as more than that. But those three ways already make them as much a part of this planet as any officially acknowledged creature in a zoology textbook. Now, let's go party with some monsters. Because we're going to find them—guaranteed."

"You're out in the forest looking for bigfoot, hooting out your best bigfoot call, attempting to lure it with Milky Way bars (they like sweets). Instead of a giant hairy beast, though, a flying saucer appears in front of you. Are you disappointed? Of course not. Because cryptozoology and ufology go together like nougat and caramel."

"You hear a rumble on the mountain above you; feel a vibration that shakes the ground. You quickly make peace with your fate as you turn, expecting your final earthly sight to be an ominous cloud of crushing rock and soil racing down the mountain, both your killer and your gravedigger. Instead you see something else sliding down the mountain. It looks like a... whale? You still die, though. Just confused. And you're eaten instead of crushed: by a slide-rock bolter."

I'm in my Book reading era to cope with some grief, ive read alot just in this one month