CRAIG CONLEY (Prof. Oddfellow) is recognized by Encarta as “America’s most creative and diligent scholar of letters, words and punctuation.” He has been called a “language fanatic” by Page Six gossip columnist Cindy Adams, a “cult hero” by Publisher’s Weekly, a “monk for the modern age” by George Parker, and “a true Renaissance man of the modern era, diving headfirst into comprehensive, open-minded study of realms obscured or merely obscure” by Clint Marsh. An eccentric scholar, Conley’s ideas are often decades ahead of their time. He invented the concept of the “virtual pet” in 1980, fifteen years before the debut of the popular “Tamagotchi” in Japan. His virtual pet, actually a rare flower, still thrives and has reached an incomprehensible size. Conley’s website is OneLetterWords.com.
We encountered and determined the cause of a temporal anomaly in Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania. The clock tower of the Chestnut Hill Baptist church (whose motto, ironically, is "a historic church with a timely message") displays faces with three incorrect times. As constant investigators of such phenomena, we diagnosed the source of the problem at a glance. An oculus window replaces the clock face on the fourth side of the tower and is the cause of the trouble. The architect presumably sought to save a quarter of the cost of clockwork, and while three-quarter time may keep waltzes spinning, such an imbalance in a clock tower is its own death knell. Though the cause is simple enough, great mysteries yet abound, for precisely why does a window into the nature of time trigger a standstill?
It's both 4:10 and 4:25 in this Michiganian temporal anomaly captured by Josh May at Flickr. Though we weren't on location to discover the exact cause of the timely weirdness, we offer this photo to help hone the insights ofwould-be investigators of temporal anomalies. The more clocks one sees that are "on the fritz" (Fritz being the German clockmaker who first went "cuckoo"), the better attuned one will be to time warps in the wild.
"A decrepit clock tower told the Byzantine hours" (Colin Thubron, Night of Fire, 2017).
We encountered a temporal anomaly in the city of brotherly love, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. All four sides of the clock tower at St. Paul's Episcopal in Elkins Park told a different, frozen time. As constant investigators of such phenomena, we carefully searched the church grounds for the source of the problem, sidestepping slippery acorns and dodging a fallen electrical wire by the graveyard. The entire property is frankly decrepit, with the cemetery unkempt and the overall impression being one of abandonment. As historic preservationists ourselves, the state of this 163-year-old church was painful, to put it mildly. With so much disorder, it was difficult to pinpoint a specific cause for the temporal anomaly, so we looked within the name of the church itself. "St. Paul's Episcopal" is an anagram of "as collapses tip up." You will no doubt recognize that last phrase as a twist on the great Hermetic axiom, "as above, so below." The collapsing physical structure of the church, having slowly fallen into decrepitude over time, is reflected above, in the clock tower. "It is time for Episcopalians across the country to rise up" (Ruy O. Costa).
The time in Melbourne, Australia is 79:91 — one of the most distressing temporal anomalies we've encountered, documented by Jurgen Schaub. Though we weren't on location to discover the exact cause of this timely weirdness, we spotlight this photo to help hone the insights ofwould-be investigators of temporal anomalies. The more clocks one sees that are "on the fritz" (Fritz being the German clockmaker who first went "cuckoo"), the better attuned one will be to time warps in the wild.
Unsolved mystery! We encountered a temporal anomaly on the 1754 steeple of Philadelphia's Christ Church. The clock tower displays four faceless non-clocks beneath its bells. As constant investigators of such phenomena, we scrutinized the surrounding area thoroughly so as to diagnose the source of the problem, only to determine (regretfully) that time itself seems to have erased the evidence.
Unsolved mystery! We encountered a temporal anomaly on the clock tower of Philadelphia's 1873 Corn Exchange building. The tower displays four incorrect times, with one of the clocks reading five minutes faster on its wrongness than the other three. As constant investigators of such phenomena, we scrutinized the surrounding area thoroughly so as to diagnose the source of the problem, only to determine (disappointingly) that time itself seems to have erased the evidence.
It's simultaneously 12:10 and 11:45 at this temporal anomaly in Sloboda, documented by Ira Paradox over at Flickr. Though we weren't on location to discover the exact cause of the timely weirdness, we offer this photo to help hone the insights of would-be investigators of temporal anomalies. The more clocks one sees that are "on the fritz" (Fritz being the German clockmaker who first went "cuckoo"), the better attuned one will be to time warps in the wild.
We encountered a temporal anomaly in Front Royal, Virginia, where the court house clocks were half an hour off. Though we scanned the area to determine the cause, this anomaly remains unsolved.
We encountered several temporal anomalies in Martinsburg, West Virginia. Both faces of the Merchants and Farmers Bank clock displayed incorrect times. The cause of this particular anomaly remains a mystery, probably because there is a city-wide rift in time/space.
What charms us about this particular anomaly in Vancouver, British Columbia is that is was documented at a Victorian "afternoon tea house." Apparently, visitors become automatic time travelers, with afternoon turning into 7:30 and 8:42 simultaneously. Though we weren't on location to discover the exact cause of this timely weirdness, we spotlight this photo to help hone the insights ofwould-be investigators of temporal anomalies. The more clocks one sees that are "on the fritz" (Fritz being the German clockmaker who first went "cuckoo"), the better attuned one will be to time warps in the wild.
When this photo of a Madison, North Carolina clock tower was taken, the actual time was 1:58, not the 12:11 displayed. As constant investigators of temporal anomalies, when we encountered this shot by photographer Whe-renot, we immediately diagnosed the source of the disturbance: the bricked up "lost windows." That's because "Time stops in a cell without windows” (Olen Steinhauer, The Confession, 2010). Speaking of lost windows, consider this: “It’s nice to have a window, even if it’s bricked. I like the idea of a bricked window, because it engenders no delusion of being helped. That’s the hardest thing to accept, that no one’s going to turn the light on, and if you need the light on now, you’ve misunderstood how to see in the dark” (Brandon Keith Nobles).
We noted an air of timlessness at Aldridge Gardens in Birmingham, Alabama. As chronologicians, we investigated the area for the cause, and (as per usual) it was virtually staring us in the face — a giant frozen pendulum. Say what you will about modern art, this piece sure does the trick in terms of manifesting and maintining a temporal anomaly.
We encountered and determined the cause of a temporal anomaly in the mountain town of Trinidad, Colorado. A clock on a funeral parlor displays an incorrect time (four hours early, plus the shadows of the clock's hands depict a bonus time five minutes later). As constant investigators of such phenomena, we saw the source of the problem with a mere turn of the head. Directly across the street is an historic gothic house, the Bloom Mansion. That haunted relic from 1882 is the cause of the funerary clock's error, the effect compounded by the existence of a mini version of the mansion in the form of a Little Free Library (boosting the disruptive signal, as it were, from the macrocosm into the microcosm). Though the cause is simple enough, great mysteries yet abound, for does a fourth-story widow's walk have the power to disrupt the flow of time? By the way, as we walked toward the Bloom Mansion on the day of our investigation, our progress was delayed by an improbably long funeral procession that passed in front of us. As plutocrats of the supernatural, we expected nothing less.
We encountered and determined the cause of a temporal anomaly in the town of Clayton, New Mexico. A streetside clock displays faces with no hands, bizarrely distorted numbers, as well as incorrect times. As constant investigators of such phenomena, we diagnosed the source of the problem at a glance. Directly below the troubled timekeeper is an old sculpture of a dinosaur. That relic, itself conjuring a past that is forever timeless, is the cause of the pole clock divergence, magnified by the site's proximity to the extinct volcano Capulin. Though the cause is simple enough, great mysteries yet abound, for precisely how and why do relics have the power to disrupt the flow of time?
We encountered and determined the cause of a temporal anomaly in the scenic city of Chattanooga, Tennessee. A clock at the old train station (transmogrified into a hotel) displays an incorrect time. As constant investigators of such phenomena, we saw that the source of the problem was adjacent to the clock. The famous Chattanooga Choo Choo itself, now permanently inoperative and displayed as a monument, is the cause of the station clock's inaccuracy, the effect being magnified by another nearby train car (converted into an escape room) with the emblazoned words "Can you escape in time?" Though the cause is simple enough, great mysteries yet abound, for how could a frozen train, formerly famous for keeping to timetables, be so disruptive?
To celebrate having a chapter in Steve Drury's new Dice Mysteries book, we shot a 3-minute video about the weirdness of when to roll unspotted dice upon a dusty tome. As so often happens, our blank dice rolling created a temporal anomaly at the end of the video. (We're still woozy!)
