RIPPED HIS TROUSERS
If there's no such thing as the paranormal, somebody please explain this to me.

Myself, sister, sister's daughter and son were having a séance one night. We'd made letter cards and spaced them out on a glass table. We also had a YES and a NO card. We used an upturned wine glass in the centre and each placed a finger on the glass.

We began by asking 'Is there anybody there?'... as you do.

After a short time, the glass started going in circles and moving to random letters then back again to the centre.

After it spelled stuff like KJEBSPFDB for a few minutes, we were almost ready to give up, but then it started to spell the words TROUSERS, HIS, PURSE, MAM, RIPPED in no particular order.

Eventually it settled on
RIPPED HIS TROUSERS several times, with the odd PURSE thrown in. This is all it was saying now. After a while it changed to MAM.

All it was saying was MAM. MAM MAM MAM MAM MAM. We decided that it probably wanted my mother at the table, so we gave her a shout and she happily joined us. As soon as she sat down, it went back to
MAM PURSE
RIPPED HIS TROUSERS
repeat...

It spelled that no more than twice when my mum suddenly let go of the glass and all the colour went out of her face.

She instantly put her hand to her mouth and looked totally freaked. We asked her what was wrong but she just sat there in the same position just shaking her head whenever we asked if she was ok. I can still see her now.

After a minute or two she got up and went into the kitchen. We all followed her in there and found her taking her purse out of her handbag. She then took a photograph out of her purse, one I had never seen before. She showed it to us, it was a photo of her dad and a mate of his (both long dead). They were standing in front of a building with iron railings in front of it.

She went on to explain that she had found this photo about a week previous, and had not seen it for years before that. I think it was somewhere her dad used to work, and one day he had got locked in by the locking up guy who didn't realise my granddad was in there working late.

Apparently, he managed to get out of a window, but then had to get past the iron gates. He got on top of the gates ok, but when it came to jumping down, his trousers had caught and it ripped them. My mum remembers her mum giving her dad a right telling off because he'd ruined the trousers.

My point is, none of us at the table knew this story, mum had never mentioned it to us, because, the simple reason she had also forgotten it until the words were spelled out on that table just a few days after rediscovering the photo. A photo that had been missing for years.

We decided that day, none of us together or individually would ever have anything to do with another séance, and we never have.
( Black Moon Not cracked, I'm all up to be., Sat 15 Sep 2012, 22:45, 9 replies)

The simplest explanation
is that your memory is faulty - the "message" about the ripped trousers only appeared when your mother joined the 'seance', and she created it herself using the ideomotor effect (which is how the ouija board works). Memory's a very deceptive thing, and although you might be convinced that the 'message' had appeared before she joined you, it almost certainly didn't.
(TheImmortalJenkins, Sun 16 Sep 2012, 1:13, closed)

Yeah
Obviously I wasn't there, but this seems likely. There's also the possibility that she'd actually mentioned the photo to one of the other people at the table, but due to forgetfulness, politeness, or a simple love of drama they'd played along with it - consciously or not.
( Zoroastermouse thinks therefore he am, Sun 16 Sep 2012, 3:28, closed)

I'd already said
"Ripped his trousers" appeared before my mother joined. There's four people who all remember it the same. This actually happened, I was there.

Be a skep if you like, one day, maybe you'll realise there's something more than this 'life' thing we all think is so important.
( Black Moon Not cracked, I'm all up to be., Sun 16 Sep 2012, 10:49, closed)

Woah, you're not under attack you know...
...but you asked the question about "how could this be explained" and I provided a possible answer.

Step back from this, and think about the whole concept of "talking to the dead" logically, and in an evidence-based way.

If there was any sure-fire method of getting messages from "beyond the grave" then we would really know about it by now. But like all "supernatural" phenomena, there isn't a single shred of **evidence** to suggest that this is fact, repeatable in scientifically controlled circumstances. Have a look at the Randi Foundation - which has offered a prize of a $1m for some decades now if any "supernatural" phenomena can be replicated in a controlled, observed environment.

The prize remains unclaimed. Fact is, there is nothing "supernatural" that can't be explained. We all have "weird" experiences in our lives, which can basically be logically explained. However nothing can be "made" to happen under controlled conditions, and nothing ever has.
(TheImmortalJenkins, Sun 16 Sep 2012, 12:30, closed)

I know.
I see if from your side of the table, I really do, but I can't deny what I saw that night.
( Black Moon Not cracked, I'm all up to be., Sun 16 Sep 2012, 20:27, closed)

You're a tinfoil-hatted nutter.

( stuj (^(^;;^)^) GO TEAM SPIDERS!(^(^;;^)^), Sun 16 Sep 2012, 4:45, closed)

You. Gullible. Spastic.

( BraynDedd Natasha Kaplinsky's labia majora, Sun 16 Sep 2012, 9:36, closed)

Anytime I was in a Ouiji session
I found it very easy to subtly steer the the tripod thing to wherever I wanted. Usually I outed one my pals as a wanker.
(the other guy not the one that gave you coochie warts, Mon 17 Sep 2012, 4:25, closed)

It's only spooky if it's something everyone doesn't already know...

(moon monkey is busy making memories worth repressing, Mon 17 Sep 2012, 10:34, closed)