Every now and again, I try to step back a little from the whole enigma caused by UFOs to get a better overall look at things. The old cliché of making sure you don't miss the forest by looking too closely at the trees applies to ufological items as well as anything else. One of the best ways I have of doing this is by checking the UFO UpDates List and reading a number of the posts pertaining to completely different items.

The only problem with all of this is that I have yet to do this and not have it hurt my brain. The more I discover and learn about, the less I seem to know and I'm no further ahead today than I was many years ago. Matter of fact, I think I might even be more confused than I was back when I got interested in UFOs and the phenomena that surrounds them.

On the UFO Updates List the past couple of days there have been posts pertaining to the ongoing saga of the STS-48 Timestamp, The Cydonia region on Mars and Artificial Intelligence, FOTOCAT, (A UFO research group and publication) showing some reasonable explanations for some UFO sightings and a post by the UFO Watchdog talking about Linda Moulton Howe speaking at an upcoming conference about "The Roswell Fragment"

All of this gave me food for thought and I thought I would share a little of this with you. So, going down the little list.....

First, the STS-48 Timestamp anomaly. A little while back one of the posts from NASA's spokespuppy James Oberg posed a question. He asks, "Why would NASA go to all the effort to change the timestamp and video record?" My question to that is that is EXACTLY the question, why would NASA go to all that trouble to hide something that they bluntly state is not there?

To the next item - The Cydonia region and Artificial Intelligence, I happen to believe that we know less about Mars than we think we know and that when we eventually get a manned mission to Mars we are in for some major surprises that nobody is capable of predicting.

The post regarding FOTOCAT was one of the more intriguing posts to the UpDates List this week because it contains a link to the FOTOCAT homepage and a translation from Spanish to English talking about how some UFO sightings have been explained as being nothing more than some mis-identified Missile shots from U.S. Submarines. The reason that one intrigued me so much is that I do not believe that every single sighting and report of a UFO is something not of this Earth. Matter of fact, I believe that MOST reported UFO sightings are normal everyday items in our atmosphere and people simply make mistakes in not being able to identify what they saw. However, I do not believe that all reported UFOs are normal everyday things because there are too many questions that people are avoiding and too many things that some pretty powerful people and organizations are trying to cover up.

The final item on my UFO UpDates list is the report of Linda Moulton Howe speaking at an upcoming conference about the supposed Roswell fragment and this one disturbs me a little. Linda is a magnificent speaker and has presented some pretty powerful information in the past about things of an UFOlogical nature, but... very recently, she linked her name and reputation to Urandir Oliviera - a sheep rancher that has tried to pull the wool over our eyes with his incredible claims of UFO related items. It means that everything Ms. Howe speaks about now is brought into question and this Roswell fragment she has was proved back in 1996 by Nicholas Reiter as being something that does not show any significant other world technology. In fact, his comment was, "My own opinion is that the artifact probably represents a curious piece of industrial by-product from the thin films industry or a Mg casting plant. However, until a match-up is found, I will not rule out the possibility of a more unusual origin."

So there we have it, NASA withholding information, unknown elements about Mars, explained UFO sightings and UFO researchers seeming to back frauds and con-men.

But with all of that, the question remains; what exactly is the real story behind UFOs? Tens of thousands of sightings, reports by people saying they know and have been told to shut up and still and motion images of craft that we cannot explain.

UFOs are real and although we have no further proof at this point in our history, I firmly believe that we will get to the bottom of the mystery.....

But that's just my take on it.....