Paranormal events or unidentifiable animal etc?

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

Hi, we don't know anything about the paranormal or skeptic sciences, we are just a normal couple, but we keep seeing some odd black and grey "things" in different places in our house that defy explanation.

My girlfriend has several times seen a black shape come out of our kitchen oven when it was opened (either before or after serving dinner) which then moves swiftly away in a gentle curve following a similar path each time. Upon further investigation in the areas it can be last seen nothing can be found, and it does not reappear again on the same day when noticed in this fashion. It makes no noise, and our cat does not usually notice or take a notice in it (with one possible exception, I wasn't present in the room but my girlfriend said the cat chased after it). The cat has though been known to be very interested in the area around the oven, and has been known to probe it very thoroughly as though searching for something (based on knowing my cat and previous cats very well so it seemed like unusually directed and curious behaviour to me even for a cat, and we didn't make a lot of fuss around the area ourselves for the cat to be interested in it herself).

On one occasion when we were both prepared to see it (it had appeared the previous two nights running to my girlfriend), we both observed in direct frontal view a grey smoke-like in texture and appearance (but not behaviour or shape) thin straight/missile shape appear to exit the oven when it was opened (before putting dinner in, a first as all times before it had appeared to my girlfriend when dinner was taken out) which seemed to disappear around the corner behind the washing machine (this would probably require a curving or otherwise complex (not straight) flight path). It did not look or behave like any known steam, gas, smoke or animal to me, nor was a light trick from something moving in front of the bulb (already did some tests of my own with the bulb after initial sightings).

Up to this point it had only been sighted in the kitchen around the oven area and always displayed fairly similar behaviour and movement paths, and after this event where we both saw it we did not see it again for at least several weeks during which we decided it had gone. Usually when we saw it, it was around 10pm.

Sometimes I think I have seen a black shape moving quickly out of the very end of my peripheral vision (far ends of my endsight) but I consider these sightings inconclusive and possible imaginations (they are also rare sightings, so you don't think I'm a total nutcase or something, and most times I think its just a light trick anyway, but the times I think I saw something in periphery, I'm very sure that I did, although I still need to convince myself with a direct sighting after a peripheral sighting). The first sighting we had of the black shape was at the far right end of my vision, but it spooked me and I was uncertain enough that I had imagined it to believe that I actually saw something, so I told my girlfriend about it. I should say at this point that whenever I think I have seen something for definite at the ends of my vision (and not just me or the lights playing tricks), its always a fair bit larger than the sightings in direct view, so peripheral sightings are scarier, they are also more "unknown" as in, I didn't know if I saw it or what I saw exactly, so that makes it a bit more scary, as opposed to it being in direct view (where it has also always appeared smaller). All the next sightings for a while was my girlfriends until the time we both saw it come out as a grey missile, and it was only then when I saw it in direct vision that I fully believed there was something there (whatever it was), and that it was something I could not identify or find an explanation for (obviously I thought of several explanations but none that I could think of fitted the facts very well of what I saw with my own eyes). This also went partway to convincing me that maybe I did see something in the first place after all.

So, it was a long while since we had seen it and we had both thought it was gone. Last night (well early hours this morning, we had gone to bed very early as we were feeling very tired) I was working on my computer. I had got up around 2am (very early in bed the previous night as I said) as I couldn't sleep and didn't feel tired any more. After about 2 and a bit hours working on the computer I saw a possible black shape (exact shape and size I deem not important as its at the end of my vision I don't think what I thought I saw would be an accurate description, but it seemed large in my peripheral) moving quickly at the right end of my vision (towards the mantleplace, left of me was just a wall), which moved straight into the mantleplace. I immediately turned to look and saw nothing there. I felt a little unnerved, but continued working on the computer after assuming I had seen nothing. This was around 4:13am (computer clock). Then around 4:27am, I thought I saw a large, scary, sluggish-seeming smoky grey cloud shape moving at the far end of my right vision towards the mantleplace. I immediately turned and expected to see something as it appeared to be a much slower moving shape than the others, but there was nothing there. This made me fairly suspicious because I saw nothing, however I was still starting to feel quite on edge and decided to go back upstairs.

My girlfriend was slowly rousing herself out of bed, so after going upstairs I decided to come back down and almost immediately upon re-entering the living room, I clearly saw in direct vision a comparably (to the peripheral sightings) small black circular shape unattached to anything else moving quickly over the floor toward the cabinet which holds the gas meter. It wasn't my shadow or anything caused by my movement as it was at the other end of the light fixture on the ceiling, but other than that I know it was something strange and not an animal, insect or shadow and you would know what I mean by that if you saw something like it too, because it doesn't look like anything other than a black shape. Seeing it in direct view gave me a large shock because it almost confirmed the previous two sightings that I had been very unsure of just minutes ago. This was the first direct sighting in a different place to normal, outside of the kitchen. This was also the first time that we had multiple (and it was quite a lot indeed) sightings in the same day (previously just one per day it was sighted, and previous sightings were rare).

The cumulative shock caused me to flee at this point, and I waited until my girlfriend was up and ready to come downstairs before I went back downstairs. Upon entering the livingroom again with her, she then gave a loud shout and said she had seen something, but at the time she was blocking my view so I did not see anything.

For the next few hours my girlfriend repeatedly saw the black shape moving across the floor in the same area, in the same direction, but for the most part as I will explain later I did not. I occasionally left the room to get something or to see if it would appear to my girlfriend, and then at some point she would give a shout and I would rush back and she would tell me she'd seen it again. I also remembered to put the computers webcam on at some point, and try to record the shape, but given its nature, high speed/velocity, where it appeared relative to the cam's positioning (lots of blindspots unfortunately) and the poor quality and of the cam and recording I was unable to get anything on cam concerning the strange black shape itself. If I had stand-alone recording equipment that I could set up and leave running anywhere that would have been a blessing for recording it.

Our webcam did pick up on one thing that was odd that we didn't notice ourselves until we looked at the video. When I was moving through the frames on one of the clips where the cam recorded my girlfriend screaming loudly just after a sighting, I also went through some other clips, including some where we decided to leave the cam on and go upstairs to see if the cam would pick up the shape. We went upstairs for about 10-15 minutes, and the odd thing that the cam did record during that time was the window drapes moving significantly, which I noticed at first because the shadow of the curtains is very different at the beginning and end of the clip. The drapes can't be seen to be move themselves as the cam is pointing at the floor, but the shadow of the drapes moving is seen and no other shadows move. The shadow doesn't move in any of the other clips at all its completely static, so something odd happened to make the drapes move. The normal explanations would be the cat, a strong gust of air, or either of us moving the drapes ourselves, but we don't think it was caused by any of those things, and we think the cat was outside the house at the time (but she came in after and started messing with the cam among other things).

On the topic of other things moving strangely, I did find the cat-flap lock in a unknown and very unusual configuration (configured to be almost open to the outside, but not quite) recently. If it wasn't my girlfriend then that is very odd, because it wasnt me and I think it would be fairly impossible for the cat to change the lock herself, and the lock is only accessible from inside the house. Other strange occurences in the house are all coincidental if you ask me but that one stood out more than the others. The cat-flap is in front of the oven (we were keeping the cat in for a bit because of the fireworks).

So, like I said earlier, my girlfriend had seen it several times but I had not being out of the room most of those times (apart from when I couldn't see because she was in the way of where it was seen). She described it as an oblong box shape the first time she saw it, then as a triangle shape the second time (upon getting her to describe the triangle shape with her fingers I gathered it was not equilateral, probably isosceles in shape). Remember that I had seen a definite circular shape.

Then my girlfriend left the room for a while and I sat where she had sat and watched the area. Then something odd happened, a tiny kinda circular black shape seemed to exit from underneath an opening in the mantlepiece, moving slow comparitively to before, and stopped for a brief moving before receding under the mantlepiece. This time it appeared almost spiderlike in size and it reminded me of a very large black spider (therefore much smaller than when I had seen it earlier that night/morning), although it still appeared to be a black circle and because it retreated quickly I was unable to get a closer view (I should say at this point my girlfriend always describes the black shape as being ratlike or mouselike, but upon questioning her she says it has no features of either animal so this always puzzles me. It doesnt remind me of either animal when I see it and I think she probably has allowed herself to be clouded by discussing this with other people who suggest it is a rat or a mouse or a spirit of either and so now thats what she thinks it is. I don't believe in spirits/ghosts either and its definitely not a mouse or rat in appearance, and its completely silent) . I was too apprehensive at this point to investigate further. After I left, my girlfriend reported sighting the shape in the same place and displaying the same behaviour that I had just seen. I was admittedly feeling skeptical about her sightings feeling as though they were copy-cat sightings but I could not doubt my own direct-view sightings. It would help if there were more than one sighting where we had both seen the shape.

The shape continued to appear to my girlfriend up until 6.45am when it started to get light outside and we decided to turn off the cam and go back to bed for a bit as the situation was a bit exhausting. Neither of us could really sleep though.

Later today, my girlfriend was making lunch and I was at the computer when I heard a very loud and long scream from the kitchen. I rushed in and expected to see something but saw nothing, upon questioning she revealed she had just seen the black shape exit the oven again. I investigated the area where it should have gone but found nothing. This has been our first daylight sighting as well although I've yet to see the shape in daylight myself. Up to now we both considered it a nocturnal phenonemon but I suggested to my girlfriend that theres no reason we would not see the shape during the day (although it has always seemed to favour lingering in dark places, because the sightings have always ended and begun in a very dark place even if that means it has to travel through some light areas (or we would never see it in the first place if it didnt))


Anyway I don't know what you all will make of all this, possibly you might disbelieve or think its rubbish or group induced hysteria or hallucinations or some such (I don't know every possible explanation that an outsider would consider fitting the facts), but thats all very well until you've seen it for yourself.

What I would really like is some better recording equipment so that I could prove 1) the black shapes existance in the household and 2) that it really doesn't have a normal scientific explanation, at least none that I know of, or at least if it does then its still something very unusual.. I'm reasonably sure I would have heard of something like this if it wasn't.

Also I'd quite like to get a third person to see this shape for themselves. I believe anyone would be able to see it (as long as it shows itself of course), as theres nothing special about us and I've not seen anything like this before. The shape whatever it is possibly fairly unique/rare or this household is unique and thats why it is seen here and not seen everywhere else by everyone. Its also appears quite "real" even if it doesn't appear exactly solid, but then we are made of mostly water even if we like most things look solid so I haven't let that put me off its validity too much, its very black or grey anyway and fast-moving so it would hard to tell in any case.

So if anyone else is interested in seeing it they would be quite free as well, only we don't want anyone particularly interfering with the shape or trying to bless or exorcise or communicate or coerce or anything else we haven't implicitly asked for at this time. I'm interested in getting proof for it, although my girlfriend is quite interested in getting rid of it. I consider it a unique opportunity though. I would like to get the proof before the shape decides to take another "vacation", possibly a permanent one.

[Credo Veritas]

Hmmm. Intriguing.

Was the oven always on before the shape appeared? If a splash of oil, grease or fat from a previous meal remained in the oven, then the heat from warming the oven up might be enough to break-down the triglycerides and form the extremely nasty acrolein.

Acrolein in that ghostly grey vapour that appears when oils/fats are overheated, and is the result of partial decomposition. It also has that choking, lacrimatory smell and usually stings the eyes. It is also quite toxic!

Acrolein is a viscous, oily-looking liquid at room temperature. I'm wondering whether there has been a build-up of the vapour along the top surface inside the oven, and the action of opening the door has flushed it out in a narrow sttream. The hot vapour would quickly condense in cool air, possibly looking semi-solid if seen at a glance. The strange curved path to behind your washing machine could also be caused the the draught from opening the oven door, thereby creating a short-lived eddy or vortex.

So, has anyone noticed an acrid, burning, stinging smell within a few minutes of the shape being seen in the kitchen?

The shape in the lounge is more difficult. Does the shape look 3-D or is it more 2-D like a shadow? You don't mention where your house is set, but could it be due to shadows cast on your floor by the headlights of vehicles passing outside and casting the shadow of a bush or tree by a window?

That would explain the apparent rapid movement and the absence of any noise. Have anyone ever seen this shape during bright daylight when the would be no lights fom outside?

Again, the apparent shaking of the curtains, which you only deduced from moving shadows, could also be from external moving lights.

Good story, though. Let me know what you think.

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

Hi.

Well whenever the shape appeared to come straight out of the oven, the oven was always heated and probably to fairly high. There was one or so times when the oven might have only been switched on or even off, when the dinner was put in and the shape appeared, but I don't know if the oven had already been pre-heated.

I've only seen it come out of the oven once myself (the rest was my girlfriend's sightings), and that was putting the dinner in, so it could've been either hot or cold (my girlfriend might remember which).

I wouldn't rule out acrolein as possible because the oven was fairly dirty and has only recently been cleaned (the rest of the house is also less clean than it should be).

I didn't detect any smell whatsoever when it happened. I don't have the best sense of smell, so my girlfriend might remember better, but I can't remember any funny smells around the oven, and I can smell when pasta is being cooked if I'm nearby. It was nowhere near our eyes as it stayed at around the same level and was confined to a small jet if it was smoke at all.

My girlfriend always described it as a black shape of varying sizes usually oblong in shape when she saw it alone. She has described the back end as being black/brown (having only seen the back end because it always moves away she said). Shes always been much closer to it than I have (obviously if you're the one opening the oven door), but Ive been no further than 1 or 2 metres from the shape in the livingroom and it didn't seem to have any discernible features or color differences at that distance, or a discernible front or back end other than you would assume it always moved forwards (now that I write that, theres no reason why it might not have moved sideways or backwards, because there are animals and insects that do that fine, but theres no way for me to tell as Ive not seen a head or legs or any other feature).

When I saw a shape come out of the oven, it was definitely a mixed color grey. When I saw a shape in the livingroom, it was definitely black all over, from my viewpoint.


The shape in the livingroom I would say looked almost 2-d but more 3-d than 2-d, but then it was strange to look at, hard to describe. When I saw it briefly as a black circular shape travelling away it looked as though it was almost floating above the ground as it moved, and I was too scared at the time to really notice if it had a third dimension but I think it did albeit a small one, and when I saw it pop out briefly from what seemed to be under the mantlepiece, only a metre or so away from me, there was nothing 2-d about its appearance, but again it was odd to watch, and for some reason its been hard to determine where it had come from and where it had actually been, even though I remember it appeared over the orange wires for my tv (thus easy to see as it was much darker black) which are draped over the end of the bottom of the mantlepiece. Possibly the reason is just because the tv cables have been moved since.

Due to it being much darker than the floor, a stable black (dark black if you like) color, whereas the floor in that area is a combination of white, orange and red, theres no doubt in my mind that it wasnt a shadow of anything, because a shadow would just leave a slightly darker shade of color over whatever it passed, and this shape definitely didn't do that.

There is a street outside my livingroom window, but the drapes were either completely or mostly pulled closed. Given the steep angle between where the shape was, the wall, and the window, the lighting in the room etc, I don't see how a shadow could have been formed even if it had looked like one. There is a clock with the same approximate dimensions sitting on top of the tv, but the tv would be in the way, even if it wasnt, theres still no way I can see it could cause a similar shadow to that area.

Theres no bushes or trees outside the window. Its a one-way street with moving cars going in the wrong direction to cause shadows in remotely that area. Im no expert on light dynamics however, but all this aside, it was entirely black and didn't look like any of the shadows in the livingroom or anywhere else, so that convinces myself it can't have been a shadow.

My girlfriend claims to have seen the shape come out of the oven in daylight once with the lights switched off, but we've not observed it in the livingroom during daylight. We've only observed it in the livingroom on one night ever, and that was multiple sightings, but it still leaves me on edge whenever I'm in the livingroom on my own now.

I don't think the shadow change was due to external lights. From the cam recording, the shape of the shadow of the curtains was the same most of the way through, then goes through a tiny transition of change, then remained in the new shape the rest of the video. If it was from an external or internal or otherwise light change, it would have had to have a slight permanent change of lighting. Hmm Im thinking while I write this, given the time of the day, between 4 and 7am this was happening, its possible a street light could have been switched off, still to me it appears the shadows the drapes leave are created by the light in the livingroom, but I'm no expert on light dynamics so I don't know if external lighting might have an effect on the curtains. I doubt it though, but as the cam cant show the actual curtains moving, I cant say they definitely did either.

I write a lot, so to cap it off.

Grey shape from the oven:
Acrolein: quite possible because I don't know what acrolein would look like, and the oven is dirty enough.
Theres no smell I can detect.

Black shape from the livingroom:
hard to tell really but I would say 3-d over 2-d
definitely not a shadow, based on its stable dark black color (as opposed to a shadows chameleon shading/coloring and 2d qualities) and solid/"real" appearance more than the possibilities or non-possibilities of it being caused by lighting changes
I don't think external lighting would have much effect in this house under these conditions. (I've never even seen light changes from headlights in the livingroom under any conditions at all since I've lived here, possibly in the bedroom upstairs which is rarely curtained but I wouldn't spend much time looking at the walls etc to notice in there)

Seeing it is like seeing something out of a horror book but in the flesh, thats how it felt like when I saw it. I suppose because it is black and appears featureless, changes sizes in between sightings according to my girlfriend and previous sightings (if its the same thing seen each time) and I have no idea what it is, that makes it scary.

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

Less paranormal seeming things about the house that probably arent related or important:

Theres a lot of tiny black seed-like things on the floor in certain areas of the house, also just outside the back door. They are mostly found in front of the sofa, which is the area that also collects a lot of dust and other messy looking things much faster than anywhere in the house. They are probably just seeds that my girlfriend brings into the house on her feet and the mess that builds up quickly in front of the sofa is probably because its the main living area. If the shape leaves any noticeable droppings than these seed things are the only things I can think of that they might be.

Ive seen some strange insects in the house that I've not seen anywhere else. They look like grains of rice, but they are red on one side and on the other side they are orange and with very close inspection there are dozens of indentations on the orange side which are very insect-like and could be legs. Its been a while since I saw one so I cant remember if it had two tiny black dots on the red side for eyes or not but its possible it did have. Ive never seen one which appeared to be alive, as they never move or give any indication that they were alive or ever alive. I don't know where they come from, and my girlfriend usually denys they are insects, however she also denys that the house is not clean and denies that we get fungus sometimes.

The places Ive seen them are in the bath after my girlfriend and I took one, and in the kitchen sink cluttered around some grayish-green-black fungus on a fork which was in the washing, and possibly other places but I cant remember, but I have only seen them rarely and have no idea where they come from or where they go. Ive never seen one that seemed to be alive and moving.

There was some thin black fungus growing in a glass the other night, it must have grown in there overnight or two nights because Im sure that glass had coke in it and so must be recent. There was only a small amount of liquid in the bottom of the glass. I always find it disturbing how fungus can grow rapidly seemingly out of nowhere even though I suppose it can be a normal thing for an unclean house.


I'd love to get an identification or explanation of the insects, Ive never seen anything like them before. They are very rice-grain-like. Ive not seen one since I found the fork with fungus on it in the washing up bowl in the sink.

Edit:
Well after a little bit of googling I think I've found a likely culprit for the insects myself. I found a picture and description of common house fly pupae which to a reasonable degree of accuracy describes them. The picture on the site looks fairly like one side of the insects I saw and the description given is very similar as well. We got quite a few flies in the house during the hot summer. The only "mystery" is how fly eggs & maggots managed to become pupae in the bath and amidst fungus on a fork in the middle of a filled washing bowl in the kitchen sink and also completely unnoticed given the very lengthy development cycle reported on the below website. I don't recall seeing any maggots either which are supposedly easier to see than the pupae.

http://www.agr.gov.sk.ca/apps/insectPes ... se_fly.asp


I imagine the fungus and the seeds are normal as well, but then I've always considered them in a completely different league to the black shape, which just seemed anything but "normal".

[Credo Veritas]

You say that you saw the dark shape emerge from the mantlepiece. Is there an open fireplace there?

Piecing together a few of the bits you've told us, could it be that something has died (e.g. a bird) up your chimney, house flies have laid their eggs in the corpse, the maggots have fed upon the decaying flesh and pupated, and then have been pushed/fallen down the chimney, disturbing old deposits of soot?

Your black 3-D shape, could it be a small ball of soot that has fallen down the chimney, and 'floated' across the surface of the floor before dispersing?

Forgive me for saying this: have you ever considered giving your oven a really good clean and vacuuming all your floors thoroughly? Dirt attracts all kinds of nasties into your house and can harbour disease-causing organisms. You must have a lot of airborne fungus spores to have colonised the dregs of a glass of coke in a couple of days. Are you sure it didn't take longer?

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

Nice thinking, but unfortunately we don't have a fireplace or a chimney. We just use the mantlepiece as extra storage space, it came with the house, usually theres just a couple of dvds on there. We haven't seen house flies for quite a while either, its the wrong time of year now, I've seen one or two few tiny midge-type insects flying around recently but thats only in the past couple of days since the livingroom sighting. I've seen them in the livingroom and one in the bedroom.

Well what I mean by no chimney, is that it certainly doesn't open into any of our rooms. We live in a block of terraces, and theres a large bigger-than-chimney shaped enclosure in the middle of the wall in both of the livingroom and diningroom, and the mantlepiece is placed against the one in the livingroom, and a cabinet against the other one, but if you look behind either theres no visible hole or gap from a chimney. The mantlepiece is only built to accommodate an electric fire, not even a wood fire really as there would be nowhere for the smoke to go.

There is a small crack in the wall thats in the cabinet for the gas meter, but it would only lead to the next house if it went anywhere and it doesn't even appear to go that far, not far at all really, but I haven't looked into it too closely. I noticed it while looking for the black shape.


However, one could assume it might be a ball of dust or something instead of soot from under the sofa, blown away from me (somehow given the sofa would be in the way of most air from my direction) as I entered the livingroom and that still wouldn't really fit the description of what I saw.. I've never seen dust travel like that. Dust would be featureless, but I'm sure I would recognize what it looked like whereas this shape was more like a tiny black circular cloud.

If I assumed that it was something like dust that was blown away from me and also looked like this black shape. We'd still need explanations for the shape that I saw move a little bit out from under the mantlepiece, pause briefly and then back in (and I was sitting completely still when I saw that). Of course, you could say it was just a spider this time. I would agree, but it didn't look like a spider to me, and I was fairly close and I've seen enough spiders to be sure I can recognize one if I see it directly. What I saw was more like a black blob. Also my girlfriend said she'd seen the black shape moving across the floor and underneath the gas meter cabinet (theres a sizeable opening underneath the cabinet doors so you can see under there, but its all in the shadow) several times, as well as in and out from the mantlepiece like I did (after I saw it).


We have been cleaning the oven out lately. Its still dirty inside but we've cleaned the trays and the various bars and grills. My girlfriend is still somewhat afraid to clean the inside of the oven due to the black shape. She says the vacuum cleaner doesn't work. I dusted up in front of the sofa a while back and it looked a lot better but it soon became messy again. We have a bird in the livingroom that somehow seems to get his food chucked all the way across the room as well. I put paper down around his cage to get random bits he drops out.

How do you get rid of airborne fungus in the kitchen? Its always seemed to be there. Does that mean theres a mold colony or something we don't know about?

I don't like dirt or mess in the house, its not like we ever leave food out or anything. The house is fairly cluttered and seems to get that way after any tidy ups, it can be difficult finding places to put everything, and at the moment hoovering would be difficult as we'd have to move half the room around each time just to do it (or into another room).

I'm fairly sure it only took one or two days to make the mold in the coke glass as we only recently had coke in a glass, and we also recycle our glasses for use frequently, but I can't be 100% certain. I think there was also a glass of water by the windowsill, and water in the washing up bowl in the sink, and a pair of oranges in a pot that was right next to the glass, but none of these things seem to have any fungus on them at all. I turned the oranges all the way around, because when I saw them I thought they would be the most likely culprit because oranges often get a green fungus on them even when they are in the fridge, but they look fine.


Also, the other night I was sitting on the sofa and I started to hear a strange popping sound coming from underneath the short table in front of the tv and slightly to my right, which I ignored but the sound continued until it started to arouse my curiousity. The sofa is right next to the tv and table so the distance I thought I heard the sound from was about 1 metre. I'm not very good at describing sounds so popping might not be an accurate description. I've not heard that sound before, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was just a hidden insect or some furniture creaking, possibly the sofa I was sitting on but it didn't sound as if it was coming from underneath me. The sound was the sort of sound I would normally associate with a hidden household insect, not that I've heard sounds like that more than once or twice in my life.

I turned off the tv, and the sound continued, but when I got up to investigate the sound, it stopped, and when I sat back down, it didn't resume. It might've been just an insect and unrelated to the black shape but if it helps anyone come up with any theories that would explain both. Its the only strange sound I've heard though, none of the sightings of the black shape were accompanied by sound of any sort (other than gasps and so on, from us).


Anyway to recap:
The house doesn't have a chimney or fireplace.
It didn't look like dust or soot in any form I would recognize.
It also moved out, paused, and back in from under a man-made gap in the side of the mantlepiece, seen from approximately 1 metre away while I was motionless. The light was on (as always in the night sightings).

I think it only took one or two days to colonize the dregs of coke.
How do you get rid of airborne fungus in the kitchen?

Is there such a thing as an air-filter that sucks in air particles and spits out clean particles that would be of use? I've just thought of that, thats the sort of thing that would come in handy for us, we're not much up to regular manual cleaning as you can probably tell. How dangerous is airborne fungus anyway? It doesn't sound and has never seemed very healthy to me whenever I've observed fungus in the kitchen, but I always kinda assumed there was nothing I could do about it and that it was natural to get a bit of fungus in the kitchen at times.


I just "Wiki"ed this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_purifier

We might get one of these for the kitchen, if it will get rid of both fungus spores and traces of acrolein or other harmful gases, etc in the kitchen. I don't suppose anyone here has a recommendation based on expertise in a related area?

[Credo Veritas]

Well, it was just a thought. I don't think that the flies and the black shape are necessarily linked at all.

For the flies, there must have been something at some time that attracted the females to lay their eggs and then to sustain the maggots until they pupated. Where that something is, is anyone's guess. If you're in an old-style terraced house, those bulges might still indicate where the chimney flues are routed. Are there any chimney pots protruding from any of the houses in your, or a similar, terrace?

Still, you only need to introduce a regular routine of vacuuming every room in your house. This also goes for the fungal spores. Think of an ordinary mushroom. It starts off 'button-shaped'. As it matures, it curls upwards revealling those dark fins underneath: that's where the spores are released - millions of them. The same sort of thing happens on a microscopic scale with other fungi and moulds. Vacuuming regularly will remove the dirt that is feeding the fungi so that they can produce the spore-releasing fruiting bodies.

Don't waste your money of air filters: buy a decent vacuum cleaner instead. I have a Miele "Cat & Dog" model (not that I have either a cat or a dog) that I bought from 'Argos'. They're not cheap but they are very good. Still, anying in your budget range is going to be better than doing nothing at all. On a warmish day, air your house thoroughly. A through draught will flush away anything airborne and excessive moisture build-up.

Think of all those spores that you and your girlfriend are inhaling with every breath. At best, they'll make you feel bunged-up and phlegmy as your body produces masses of mucus to flush out all those alien particles from your respiratory system. At worst, they can lead to fatal infections.

Stop the spores entering the air by dealing with the root problem: that the fungi are finding plenty to feed upon and reproduce too easily.

Oh, and check the walls for damp. Black mould is usually due to build-up of surface moisture (e.g. bathrooms, kitchen walls, cold window frames, etc.).

Dry rot is a fungal infection, too, so check all wood fittings (e.g. window-frames, doors and doorways, etc.) for the tell-tale flaking.

Keeping your house clean is all that it takes.

I am not an expert but I used to be an analytical chemist in the food industry, so I know about acrolein and the kinds of probelms that microbiological contaminations can lead to.


As for the mysterious black shape, what kind of diameter does it seem to have? Is it always the same or does it seem to change as it moves?

I'm still finding it difficult to pin down what you mean and visualise it in my mind.

[Credo Veritas]

Sorry, I also forgot to mention about your oven.

Visit a supermarket and buy a pair of rubber gloves, a pack of disposable cleaning cloths and a spray-bottle of any oven-cleaner that you fancy the look of - supermarket own-brands are usually fine.

Wear the gloves and follow the instructions on the product to clean your oven. Discard the dispoasable cloths are soon as they go manky.

Repeat the whole process until the oven is clean. Repeat every few months to keep it that way.

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

Thanks. We'll probably get oven cleaner with our next shopping if we don't forget.

I've no doubt that there is enough to attract the flies. Across the street, there are chimney pots between every 2 doors in the terrace, so its probably the same on this side, our house might even have one and ours might just have been covered up. Its an old house. Rubbish on our street is only collected once every two weeks, so it collects for up to two weeks in everybodys wheelie bins as well.

We'll air sometimes, but I hate letting flying insects and spiders into the house more than I have to, its a pet phobia. I haven't especially noticed damp on the walls or ceiling but I can't say I know exactly what I'd be looking for. I just went and had a look in the kitchen and found a dark green patch at the side of the bottom of the backdoor and a large area of green/blue dashes above the oven, but I can't tell if its paint or something else. The normal color of the kitchen walls is white.

I haven't seen the black shape as many times as my girlfriend has, but I don't think its shape or size changes as it moves (but girlfriend says its been different sizes and shapes in between sightings). I'm not sure about diameter, I can only guess, about 5 inches, when I saw it in the livingroom.

Its hard to describe because I can't think of what to compare it to. It was black and fuzzy, more fuzzy like a cloud than fuzzy like sticking up fur but somewhere in between, closer to cloud-like. If you can imagine a tiny black circular cloud, but proper black and not grey like storm clouds, thats what it was like, also it was thicker than a cloud, it certainly wasn't transparent anyway. It was moving quite quickly (as it always did before).

When I saw it come from under the mantlepiece, I think it seemed less fuzzy and more solid, also it looked smaller. I was closer then, and it seemed less cloud-like. Somewhere in between a black ball and a cloud but closer to a cloud I'd say. It wasn't round though, so somewhere in between a black ball and a black coin. I think my earlier description of it as a black blob was probably just as accurate having said all that.


I don't know if its worth mentioning, but we were looking for a dvd box that belongs to my brother the last couple of nights and couldn't find it. We have a standing shelf on top of a normal shelf above the computer and I remember it tipped over and spilled its contents on the floor. The dvd box was on the standing shelf, and we couldn't find it after the spillage.

It turned up this morning in the place where I had left it on the shelf. I noticed it when I got out of bed because I said I was going to look for it and then saw I didn't have to. I kept asking my girlfriend if she had put it there and she said she hadn't, though she admitted looking for it earlier that morning and the previous night and she wasn't able to find it. I still think its highly probable she put it there herself but only because I don't believe that things move by themselves, with a much smaller probability that we both didn't notice that it was still in the right place when we were looking for it because its plainly visible now (I thought it might have fallen behind the mantlepiece when I didn't find it at first and was going to look behind there). Of course, she might not have known exactly where I put it on the shelf, but then again she might have seen it there before the shelf tipped over and so she knew where it went or put it in the right place by luck.

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

Would the oven have to be hot for acrolein to be expelled? My girlfriend reckons the oven was switched off when she opened it and the grey missile came out, and she'd seen something come out on the two previous nights.

Can a malfunctioning fridge produce a magnetic field or EMF? Not that our fridge-freezer doesn't work, but the light in the fridge doesn't, and the freezer section did get blocked with ice very fast. One of the coincidences I noticed afterwards after thinking about it is that one person opening the fridge door happened at the same time as a sighting from the other person in at least 3 cases in the kitchen and livingroom (so about 25%). The fridge is located in a corner of the diningroom.

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

My girlfriend says she just saw the black shape, oblong shaped, again while checking dinner in the oven (I heard her scream and rushed in but didn't see anything). It didn't seem like the oven had been on for very long at all, but my girlfriend reckons about 10-15 minutes. Very frustrated because I wasn't there again, so I can't confirm if she actually sees anything or not. I checked around a little where its supposed to go and can't find anything. Opening the oven several times more and when checking food again and nothing has come out for me.

I've done earlier tests by heating the oven for up to 25 minutes, without putting any dinner in, and nothing ever comes out for me. We've partially cleaned the oven now, I was cleaning it this morning, and I've only just fitted in the grill and things in the oven a couple of minutes before she started dinner, and nothing happened then either. We haven't used the oven for a while, last time she cooked in there a shape came out but I didn't see it because I was in the other room, so hopefully next time she cooks in there I'll get to see if anything is there or not.

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

I just tried the oven again, there is a smell from the oven if you lean down, when its switched on and heated. It seems like a normal oven smell and its not unpleasant, but I wouldn't know, does the smell mean acrolein? No visible gases or smoke or black shapes or anything came out, I was on my own.

[Credo Veritas]

Hi

I’ve spent the week trying to think what on earth could be causing the phenomena that you describe. I’ve had a few chats with some of my scientifically minded mates and they’ve drawn a blank too.

Is there any chance that the black shape from the mantelpiece could be the rear-end of a rat? Rats can move very quickly, and if you saw only the rump, it might look like a black cloud-shape.

If there’s any chance that it might be a rat, then notify your local council’s environmental health department and they’ll probably (have to, in the past) investigate further and look for tell-tale signs of rat infestation – and deal with it. Might be worth mentioning the flies/maggots/pupae too, but expect a severe telling-off for letting your house get into such a state.

The oven ‘thing’ is still a mystery. Acrolein boils at 53 degrees Celsius (just Google the name to get more info), so if there is a deposit of oil/fat/grease near the oven’s heat source (gas flame or electric element) it would easily reach that temperature within minutes of turning the oven on. I would have thought, though, that the acrolein vapour would condense on the cooler parts of the oven until they too have exceeded the boiling point.

The smell of acrolein is pretty distinct: it’s a sort of burning choking smell that brings tears to your eyes or, even at concentrations that you can’t really smell, you’ll feel a prickling sensation on your eyeballs. If you’ve ever left a deep-fat-fryer on for too long, then the whole kitchen will fill with low-level acrolein vapour and you’ll certainly know all about it when you venture in – pleasant, it is not.

Forget the fridge, I can’t see that making any difference.

This couldn’t be some trick of the light, could it? Could the opening oven/fridge door reflect a streak of light from somewhere else and, at the periphery of vision, look like a solid/semi-solid object?

[ve see ded ppl kinda]

Hi again,

I've just performed a dangerous experiment with acrolein(/last dinners oven tray remains) (by accident though), but at least I've got a better idea of what it looks and smells like now. I was going to heat and check the oven again, but then forgot about it and as soon as I realised, ran to the kitchen to turn the oven off and was greeted by a unpleasant, acrid smell and bad stinging sensation in my eyes, also the kitchen and diningroom seemed very steamed-up.

Anyway, after I had left the inside of the oven to cool down for a few minutes (I didn't want to mix a burst of oxygen with anything possibly oxygen-starved at high temperatures), I opened it and no grey missiles or black shapes came out. It seemed like some highly transparent steam-like vapour (but even less visible) the width of the oven door crept upwards from either the tray that we cooked last dinner in or the roof of the oven (the tray was on the uppermost shelf) and quickly dissipated directly upwards within about a foot.

I took the tray out and then put it back in, to see if anything would happen (my girlfriend says she was sometimes interacting with the trays when she sees the black shape). There was liquid fat or something inside the tray but not much. I observed the same thing after leaving the oven on for a few minutes the other day (liquid in the tray) but there was no signs of acrolein after that short period.

I didn't stick around to see if anything came out after, because my eyes were still stinging but at least the windows were open.


On conclusion, experiencing acrolein seems very different to the grey missile we observed. It could be an eddyed, highly condensed jet of acrolein but I'm less convinced now, there was no resemblence to the brief vapour that rose from the oven tonight in any case, and previously no steamy room or stinging sensation. As you say, acrolein most likely condenses on the sides of our oven first and its only because I left the oven on for longer and/or with nothing cooking inside that I experienced it in full this time. I haven't ruled out acrolein and likely won't unless I see a black shape for myself from the oven, but I won't be performing this experiment again. Regarding the black shape from the oven, only my girlfriend has seen that so far, so she could be making it up or imagining it, perhaps seeing the liquidised fat or some reflection of it and imagining it to be a black shape moving away from her somehow. My single sighting of the black shape in the kitchen was at my peripheral and it was the very first sighting, so I can't confirm whether I saw anything or not, and I never touched the oven then (same place though). My girlfriend has only ever seen the black shape while actually cooking a dinner (might be why I never have, as I only switch the oven on to see if anything comes out), so food in the oven might be an important interaction. Also the way she describes it, the shape doesn't always come out as soon as the door is opened, sometimes it comes out when she is handling the trays, which is where my liquid fat theory comes in. Its a black tray so the fat appears to be black liquid, though I don't see how anyone could possibly mistake it for anything else, or to mistakenly believe that it could exit to the left and go around the corner in the form of a black shape, but its the only thing I can think of.


I don't think our house is in anywhere near such a bad state as you make it sound in that statement. The pupae were very rare, no maggots, and flies during hot periods doesn't seem too unusual to me. I'd only expect a telling off if we did actually have rats, and I don't think we do.

A rat wouldn't fit under the tiny gap where I saw the black shape emerge from under the mantleplace, I guess only a very large insect could. It would easily be able to fit in the gap under the gas cabinet where I first saw the black shape depart to, but the second time I saw the black shape from under the mantlepiece doesn't seem possible.

Rat has been suggested by the people that don't jump to the conclusion that its "a spirit or something" or as an alternative suggestion. Theres a lot of reasons why I don't think it can be a rat:

I think I would be able to recognize a rat, as easily as I could recognize a puppy or a kitten, and it didn't appear to be one. There was no tail, and I couldn't see ears, eyes, legs, snout, teeth or whiskers either, but not noticing whiskers is nothing new to me as I have a cat and rarely notice hers. This would be the main reason.

I'd expect a rat to make noises, such as scratching or something audible. I've not noticed droppings either, but it could hide them. My cat doesn't seem repeatedly interested in any part of the house, and hasn't killed any rats. I've not found a rat during searches for the black shape. A rat would have to come from somewhere else first and also be able to gain entrance before it could even be seen here. My cat doesn't bring in any animals to the house and if she did, chances are they wouldn't be in any shape to remain alive for long. I've never seen a rat around here before or heard any mention of them around here.

Theres no food on the floor of the house for a rat to sustain itself, apart from a bit of cake I'd put down for the black shape to see what would happen, which has remained untouched. I put the cake piece down on the same early morning we saw the black shape in the livingroom, and the second time the black shape emerged, if it had not paused and retreated, it could well have taken a path towards the cake piece as it emerged heading in that direction, but that might be coincidence, and it would have had plenty of opportunities afterwards to collect the cake while we've been asleep.


I mentioned the fridge because I read somewhere on wikipedia that EMF can produce hallucinations. I don't know if theres any scientific backing (I didn't see any wiki [citation needed] though), or if someone just wrote that because they've been watching Lost and made their own theory.

I don't think the black shape could be a trick of the light. Certainly not in the livingroom, but I don't know about the kitchen as I've never seen it directly. I've opened the oven repeatedly and nothing special happens, it was usually me opening the fridge when a sighting occured elsewhere, and theres a wall between the fridge and the livingroom.

[Credo Veritas]

Sorry, I don’t mean to criticise your housekeeping skills but I’m only going on what you’ve told us.

Congratulations on your accidental encounter with acrolein – everything you described sounds precisely the kinds of sensations that low-level acrolein vapour would produce. It is a very nasty substance, however, so always bear in mind that, whenever you come across it, you need to air the room and get yourself away from breathing it in. The occasional accidental exposure should be of little consequence, though.

Right, well I’m baffled. Nothing springs to mind that could give rise to the effects that you describe. Electromagnetic fields (EMFs) need to be very powerful to affect the brain and cause hallucinations. A fridge just couldn’t do it.

I’ll keep thinking about it and asking around. In the meantime, do report any further experiences or ideas of your own – we might crack it yet!