QUOTE
Big Foot fans disappointed
By DALE McFEATTERS - Published: Sunday, August 31, 2008 10:22 AM EDT
Admit it. Intellectually, you knew that the supposed discovery of Bigfoot was hoax, but deep down a small part of you hoped that this time it might be for real.
Grainy videos, blurry photos and breathless eyewitness accounts of Bigfoot or Sasquatch or its Himalayan cousin, the yeti or abominable snowman, occur regularly and with such similar details - a towering, ape-like figure walking erect that quickly disappears into the forest - that people believe, well, there has to be something to it.
Scientifically, no, there does not. None of the sightings prove anything and some have turned out to be clumsy hoaxes, none perhaps clumsier than the claims by two Georgia men that they had the corpse of an actual Bigfoot - 7' 7'', 500 pounds - encased in a block of ice.
The early photos showed, with that trademark lack of clarity, what appeared to be fur, entrails and teeth. The block of ice was sold for what the Associated Press says was ``an undisclosed sum'' to two legitimate Bigfoot researchers, if there be such a breed.
The fact that the finders would sell it should have been a red flag. The real money, if the corpse were legitimate, would be in exhibiting it, rather like King Kong but without the carnage and histrionics on the Empire State Building.
An early test of a fragment of the contents was not encouraging. It showed evidence of human and possum. A total defrosting proved definitive: It was a rubber gorilla suit. One of the finders is a retired correction officer, and the other is a county police officer on leave.
You saw this coming, of course. Everybody did. But weren't you just the teensiest bit disappointed that it turned out to be the inevitable fraud? Come on. Admit it.
By DALE McFEATTERS - Published: Sunday, August 31, 2008 10:22 AM EDT
Admit it. Intellectually, you knew that the supposed discovery of Bigfoot was hoax, but deep down a small part of you hoped that this time it might be for real.
Grainy videos, blurry photos and breathless eyewitness accounts of Bigfoot or Sasquatch or its Himalayan cousin, the yeti or abominable snowman, occur regularly and with such similar details - a towering, ape-like figure walking erect that quickly disappears into the forest - that people believe, well, there has to be something to it.
Scientifically, no, there does not. None of the sightings prove anything and some have turned out to be clumsy hoaxes, none perhaps clumsier than the claims by two Georgia men that they had the corpse of an actual Bigfoot - 7' 7'', 500 pounds - encased in a block of ice.
The early photos showed, with that trademark lack of clarity, what appeared to be fur, entrails and teeth. The block of ice was sold for what the Associated Press says was ``an undisclosed sum'' to two legitimate Bigfoot researchers, if there be such a breed.
The fact that the finders would sell it should have been a red flag. The real money, if the corpse were legitimate, would be in exhibiting it, rather like King Kong but without the carnage and histrionics on the Empire State Building.
An early test of a fragment of the contents was not encouraging. It showed evidence of human and possum. A total defrosting proved definitive: It was a rubber gorilla suit. One of the finders is a retired correction officer, and the other is a county police officer on leave.
You saw this coming, of course. Everybody did. But weren't you just the teensiest bit disappointed that it turned out to be the inevitable fraud? Come on. Admit it.
