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LAUGH: Fact or Faked Testing Techniques



(It's Friday the 13th--there's only one blog to be at: Max Evel--enjoy--I totally did!--Freaking brilliant!)

BEN: Okay team, let’s go about finding a way to test this film. I’m excited about this Patterson-Gimlin footage. I think we can go about this in a logical and methodical manner eliminating the most obscure and working our way down to the most obvious.

JAEL: (raises her hand)

BEN: Yes?

JAEL: We could start out by proving that the weather was, in fact, clear that day. It appears as if the sun is shining. We can go through the weather records for that place and date and see if this was actually feasible to film sunshine on that day.

BEN: (Pauses) O-kay.

BILL: I’d like to find out the height of Patterson. The camera is jerked around and it points to the ground. I’d like to get a similar camera and get men of all heights to hold it and aim it at the ground and see just how tall this bastard was.

BEN: (Frowns) How tall Patterson was or Bigfoot?

BILL: Patterson, of course. We need to know if he actually filmed this. We’ll check with his wife how tall he was and see if it lines up.

BEN: (shrugs) O-kay.

(Later, after proving the sun was shining that day and the photographer was between 5-feet 8-inches and 6-feet 2-inches, they sat down for another plan of attack)

BEN: So, now that we know the sun was shining and the relative height of the photographer, can we move on to prove if this film is legitimate?

JAEL: (raises her hand)

BEN: Y-es?

JAEL: I think we need to figure out what animal this wasn’t.

BILL: (snaps his fingers) By golly, yes! We can rent a panther, a cockatoo, a dog and a pig.

JAEL: (shaking her head) Bill, I think we should consider something more like this creature.

BEN: (sighs) Thank you, Jael.

JAEL: I say we rent a Panda Bear.

BILL: Why a Panda Bear?

JAEL: They’re black, right? This creature was black, right?

BILL: She’s right. We probably should get something really hairy too.

BEN: Yes, please. How about a –

BILL: A Llama.

JAEL: And probably something as tall.

BEN: Yes, please. How about a –

JAEL: Giraffe!

BEN: (collapses into his chair, shaking his head)

BILL: Once we eliminate all the potential animals in the world, then we can say that this is not one of them, therefore it is unknown.

BEN: It seems an easier way to go about this would be to show if this could be faked by having a large guy in a monkey suit walk the same path and film it the same way.

JAEL:
(laughs) Oh Ben, there you go being all logical and practical again. (waves her hand dismissively)

BILL:
How about if I make a set of the location to scale?

JAEL: (rubs her hands together) Oh, that’s a great idea! Can I paint the bushes and the trees?

BILL: Sure!

JAEL: Oh goodie! Once we finish the little set, we can make a clay Bigfoot and put him in there and a little horse and Patterson and a little tiny camera and, oh, this is so cute!

BILL: We have our work cut out for us. Debunking is hard.

BEN: Team, ah, shouldn’t we get back to seeing if the film can be faked?

JAEL: I want to test this female Bigfoot’s voice and see if she’s lying or not.

BILL:
Great idea. We can run it through our program and we’ll know how legitimate her testimony is.

BEN: (puts his hand in the air) Wait a minute! Bigfoot was not a witness. Gimlin is the only living witness.

JAEL: (pouts) Well, now we have to make another clay figure.

BILL:
Yeah, and another horse.

JAEL: I get dibs on making the horses.

BEN:
Wait, everyone, please just stop and listen to me. All we have to do is get a 6-foot 10-inch guy and a fur suit and let him walk along the same path and film it the same way that Patterson did. End of story.

JAEL: (shrugs and turns to Bill) How many steps did it take this Bigfoot to get across the clearing?

BILL: You know what this reminds me of?

BEN:
(under his breath) Third grade show and tell?

BILL: That question; how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop?

JAEL: Oh yes! The owl! I saw those retro commercials online. I’ve always wondered about that. Do you think we could try that experiment?

BILL: (waves his arm) I’m sure we could get one of these anonymous peripheral characters around the room to try it out.

JAEL: (serious expression) But, do you think the cherry one might be easier to lick than the grape? Perhaps we should try each flavor.

BILL: This team is brilliant! I’ll get on that right away.

BEN: Excuse me, guys, but aren’t we supposed to be working on the Patterson-Gimlin film?

JAEL: Ben, how are we going to answer how many steps Bigfoot took if we don’t look at how many licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie pop?

BEN: (runs a hand over his face and growls)

BILL: (takes Jael aside) I was thinking we should consider doing something a little more practical first.

BEN: (throws his hands in the air) Thank you!

BILL: We’ll get that clay you can bake in the oven and then it’ll harden and Bigfoot can be painted to look real. I love this job. It’s like every day is preschool!

JAEL: (nodding) Me too and you’re right Bill, we do need Bigfoot to look real. We wouldn’t want to make this project look amateurish

BEN: (Rolling his eyes) No, we certainly wouldn’t want that.

(Later on, after every animal had been eliminated and they studied the little miniature set of the Patterson-Gimlin film, had found out how many licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie pop and haggled over who got to ride in a helicopter to look down on a clearing in some woods to count the amount of stones on the ground, Ben tossed down his mic and battery pack and walked off into the woods. Many days later he was found hitchhiking along a California back road babbling incoherently about an ex-FBI agent parenting a preschool)

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