Cue the “Twilight Zone” theme.

On April 14th, 1561 the skies over Nuremberg, Germany were reportedly filled with a multitude of objects. Known as the "Nuremberg Event".

Link to the Nuremberg event

Okay, I know that the rest of you sometimes question your own sanity, and have seen things that you don’t talk about because it’s just too weird. Sometimes you get a good explanation and other times you don’t. Like when a few years ago I saw a Roadrunner run down the main street of Garberville, hop over the bank above the Bowling Alley parking lot, and hit the ground running off toward the river. I looked around to see if anyone else saw it, and I didn’t see a soul. So I thought; “This is something that I’m just going to keep to Myself.” And I did.

About a year later I was in a conversation about strange happenings, and a friend of mine said “You’re not going to believe this, but I saw a Roadrunner run through Garberville one time”. Of course, after that, I felt a lot better about my sanity. And cautiously admitted that I saw it too. I still have no idea how it got there, but I was satisfied that there must be an explanation, and at least there was one other witness.

Another time I was hunting on Red Mountain and I saw a Chinese Pheasant fly around the hill. After about a month or two I cautiously asked my hunting buddies if they had ever seen any pheasant on Red Mountain. They answered “nope”, but they had heard a story that the Fish and Game planting some up there a few years ago. Phew, dodged another bullet.

One night after a fire meeting, it was a bright clear winter sky and the stars were shining and sparkling, I always watch the sky at night and pick out the constellations, and I’m fascinated with the stars movement with the changing seasons. There is a beauty in the night sky that I always take the time to appreciate.

As we were leaving the meeting, I was standing outside talking to a fellow firefighter while I was staring at the black, diamond filled, sky. When I saw lights glittering almost straight up and half way off to the west. I watched them for a while and they would glitter in all the colors of the rainbow. The blue would glitter for a while then a yellow would glitter, then an orange, a green and a violet. Then I noticed that the violet glitter was always in the same spot, and all the other colors would glitter in their own respective spots. After watching them for a while and they weren’t moving, I asked the fellow standing with me to look at all the colors in the sky, and what did he think that they were. He glanced up and said “it’s an airplane” and he just starting to leave. I said “no wait, it can’t be, it’s the wrong colors, and it’s not flashing right, and they are all in the same spots.” he went on to leave, and I stood there and watched them another five or six minutes trying to figure it out. Finally I decided that they were going to be there for a while and I called the other guys out to witness my discovery. You guessed it, the minute that they stepped out there, they started to fade away. They didn’t see anything and I had to put up with all the ridicule; “Ernie sees Lights in the sky”, that I normally try to avoid.

Once you see something with your own eyes, you can’t help but believe it, so I set about trying to figure out what they were. They were as bright and distant as pin- pricks. They were all colors of the rainbow and they weren’t moving.

CLUE: rainbow. I found that when a clear cold front abuts a clear warm front it can cause an “Atmospheric Lens” that will distort normal starlight just like a prism would. Bingo, an explanation to what would have otherwise have bothered me to my dying day. I took great joy in chiding my fellow firefighters that they didn’t even know about “Atmospheric Lens”. What a bunch of ignoramuses. Atmospheric Lens, became my new favorite words. And, I got to see something that few people will ever see in their lifetime. I consider myself very privileged.

I have a friend that works for the state highways. One night north of Garberville, in the deep Redwood forest, he saw Bigfoot run across the road right in front of his truck. Of course he didn’t tell anybody, but soon it was eating on him, so he cautiously told his wife about it. She seemed to accept it okay, so he told a few of his closest friends about it, and as you might have expected he got the hardy-har-har horse laugh, and he stopped talking about it.

I have no idea what he saw, and if you’re going to talk about things like that you have to either prove them, or you get to be crazy until you do. So, be’ins I don’t know what he saw, I am quite content to think that he’s crazy. Hey, he’s the one that told on himself.

Okay, now here’s the sticker. I “feel” Earthquakes before they happen. Cue the “Twilight Zone”, start the horse laugh, giggle behind your hand, and have a round of mirth and merriment on me. Just remember, I get even.

Back before we had the series of three earthquakes back in 1992, I was working in the basement of the Benbow Inn and I kept getting this overbearing feeling that I shouldn’t be there. I remember looking around me and reassuring myself that I was perfectly safe and the building had already survived many severe north coast quakes. I put it out of my mind I remember thinking that it was strange that I hadn’t had that feeling before when I worked there. The next day we had the first of three severe earthquakes.

This strange feeling has come over me before, just previous to having earthquakes. But, this time it really made me take notice, I took the hazard of telling my wife about it; that I got a strange feeling before an earthquake. And she reassured me that I was okay by making a noise kinda’ like a horse makes when they blow through their lips, only with a small and wife mouth size noise. I didn’t become reassured.

Sometimes before and earthquake I get the same feeling of disconnectedness, where it feels like your footing isn’t quite solid, and you’re sure that if you look around you things will be swinging and moving but they are not. It’s totally weird. My wife says that it’s easy to prove, that all I have to do is tell her about it before it happens. So several times I’ve told her about them, then pointed out on television that there was an earthquake. She say’s; Well, sure, there’s an earthquake everyday somewhere”. Then other times I get that strange feeling, and it doesn’t pan out. It’s like when you hear a tree popping and cracking, and you know that it is going to fall, but you can’t say exactly say when. I feel something impending, but I’m not certain when.

By now, you are probably wondering what all this is leading up to. The other night, before the China quake, I walked over to the television and was checking the mounts that was holding it to the wall, and it occurred to me that I was feeling that feeling of an impending earthquake stronger than I’ve ever felt it before, and I told my wife. I didn’t tell her I have that feeling again. I told her flat out “There is going to be an earthquake”. The next morning I turned on the television and they were talking about an earthquake that had just happened in China. Her response was “Well there’s an earthquake somewhere all the time”.

I have heard that animals can sense that same feeling of impendingness, that they become restless for no reason just before an earthquake happens.

It is my opinion that there is something tangible that can be sensed before an earthquake. But, like my wife, who I have to agree with: what good does it do to know that there’s going to be an earthquake somewhere sometime? We already know that.

I’d be really relieved to find that I’m not the only one to think that they sense earthquakes. Maybe someone knows of a scientific explanation. Because, I’m big on science, and really weak on superstition. And, I don't like to think that I'm crazy