THE FAIRIES WANT MILK – THE ALIENS WANT TWINKIES

If fairies and aliens are just the same weirdos in different outfits, maybe all it takes to stop an abduction is a well-placed snack-cake.

Listen to “THE FAIRIES WANT MILK – THE ALIENS WANT TWINKIES” on Spreaker.

So here’s a fun bedtime thought: what if the little gray aliens with the bug eyes and the weird obsession with cow butts… are just fairies?

Yes, actual fairies. Like Tinkerbell, but with less sparkle and more abduction.

In a book ominously titled The Super Natural — which sounds like something you’d find in the Self-Help section right between “Communicate With Your Dead Hamster” and “How to Meditate in a Shark Tank” — author Jeffrey Kripal teams up with legendary alien abductee Whitley Strieber and points out that “Grays” (you know, the classic space critters) are suspiciously similar to the fairy folk of old Europe. They’re spooky. They show up at night. They take people away. They don’t call first. Very rude.

Kripal also casually mentions that most of the people experiencing this phenomenon have Irish or Scottish surnames. What does that mean? He doesn’t know. Nobody knows. It could mean that ancient Celtic blood attracts interdimensional weirdos like moths to a porch light. Or maybe the aliens just really enjoy bagpipes.

But wait, it gets weirder.

Because fairies weren’t just twinkly little forest hippies with flower crowns and giggles — oh no. In the folklore of the British Isles, they were basically forest mobsters. They lived in trees, lakes, and that one weird hill behind your aunt’s cottage. They could spoil your milk, murder your cows, steal your children, and leave you a cheap knock-off changeling that looked like your kid but screamed like a banshee and ate dirt. These weren’t Tinkerbells — they were Tinkerhells.

So what did people do about it? Simple. They developed the most adorably passive-aggressive protection rituals you’ve ever heard of. Sprinkle a little iron around your door. Say a magic prayer before sneezing. And of course, leave out a dish of milk at night so the fairies wouldn’t burn your barn down or replace your toddler with a lizard.

Fast-forward a few centuries and suddenly people are waking up with the feeling that something invisible is sitting on their chest, staring at them with the kind of eyes that scream, “We’ve abducted your cousin and replaced his fillings with tracking devices.” This, according to folklorist David Hufford (whose job description probably includes the phrase “professional nightmare analyst”), is what people once called being “hag-ridden.”

Let’s pause here and appreciate that phrase. “Hag-ridden.” It’s like DoorDash, but for demonic entities who enjoy making your lungs feel like beanbags.

Hufford documented that this experience — paralysis, hallucinations, the distinct feeling that something is standing over you humming the X-Files theme — was the same across cultures. In Appalachia, it was witches. In West Africa, it was devils. In Ireland, it was banshees. In 1970s Newfoundland, it was probably just a moose in a trench coat. But scientifically, it’s now called… sleep paralysis.

Which is a fancy medical term for “Your brain woke up and your body hit the snooze button.”

But here’s the twist: the terrifying experience is biological, yes — but it’s also psychological – and possibly spiritual. What we think is happening depends on our culture. Are you being abducted by aliens? Sat on by a demon? Snuggled to death by a cranky Victorian ghost? Doesn’t matter. Your brain interprets what that evil spirit entity is doing to you based on what stories you’ve heard. That’s what Hufford calls a “core experience.” Everyone has it. It’s baked into being human — like belly buttons or regretting middle school photos.

But now comes the disturbing part: if people across time and culture are experiencing the same kind of supernatural terror, and if our brains need to explain it somehow, then the real threat… is that we don’t know what it is.

Let me put an exclamation point on that: THE THING IN YOUR ROOM AT NIGHT MIGHT BE REAL.

We just don’t know whether it’s from Fairyland or Alpha Centauri or from the bowels of hell.

So what do we do about it? Well, in the old days, we left out milk. Hung up horseshoes. Carved little crosses in our soda bread. We had a cultural toolkit. It may have been goofy, but at least it gave people something to do. These days? Not so much. You mention aliens and people either laugh nervously or hand you a tin foil hat and suggest you try decaf.

And without any shared way to handle this kind of existential boogeyman panic, people go off the rails. They spiral. They build landing strips for the aliens. They start cults. They buy 700 gallons of bottled water and hope Jesus raptures them out of there before they run out. And it’s all because nobody taught us to leave a dang Twinkie on the porch.

That’s right. I said it. TWINKIE.

Here’s my completely serious proposal, and I can’t believe I have to say this: America needs a new cultural ritual. Something harmless. Something funny. Something sweet and golden and full of high-fructose corn syrup.

We need to start leaving Twinkies out for the saucer people.

Why Twinkies? Because if any snack cake is going to survive an alien invasion or a fairy curse, it’s those little nuclear-proof yellow logs. I firmly believe aliens have been studying us for decades and still don’t understand our obsession with these things. “Zorp, what is this… ‘Twinkie’? It resists all forms of disintegration. Is it a food or a weapon?”

And don’t complain that my extraterrestrial voice sounds Eastern European. What accent SHOULD I use for them? Do YOU know?

If we all started leaving a Twinkie on our rooftops every Friday night, it wouldn’t matter whether the visitors came from Fairyland, Zeta Reticuli, or the creepy woods behind Grandma’s house. We’d be sending a message: “We see you. We respect your weirdness. Please don’t probe us.”

And even if the aliens don’t come — even if there’s no invasion, no fairy kidnapping, no hag-squatting your chest at 3 a.m. — we’d still feel better. It’s like emotional bubble wrap. Like locking your door even though your town’s crime rate is lower than a Hallmark movie.

That’s the power of ritual. It gives our fear somewhere to go. It keeps our minds from building shrines to paranoia. It might even stop the next guy from blaming the lizard people for his parking tickets.

So try it.

Put a Twinkie on the windowsill.

Hang an iron horseshoe by your WiFi router.

Cut a cross in your banana bread.

Because the fairies want their milk.

The saucer people want their Twinkies.

And us? We just want a good night’s sleep… without being suffocated, paralyzed, or having our butts probed.

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