The Walrus was Paul

So, how could someone fool me?

Don't answer that Steve.

"Fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again."
-G.W. Bush


When I got the tickets on the Internet, I had to provide my name and phone number and then show that I was the same guy when I got there. There are a lot of his followers out there and I think they are always dealing with a high demand for tickets. So I am sure they try to prevent people from pretending that they got tickets and then crashing the studio.

And actually, there were no tickets. I sent an email one week before and was "randomly selected". I just had to show ID when I got there.

Therefore, they had my name and phone number for one week before I got there. During that time, they could have looked up info on me. And since I have done family tree research, they could have looked up my family tree on a genealogy web site. Doing that, they could have found out who my uncles and brothers are, if they were certain they had the right guy. Since my last name is not common, they could probably have guessed that I was the right guy. Other people that have more common names would have been very difficult to connect to a family tree since family trees are almost always stripped of current addresses. And my family tree does not include the email address that I used for the tickets.

Still, if they had guessed that I was the same guy as the family tree guy, they would then have to connect my face with my researched background when I got into the studio. When we arrived, two young ladies checked our ID's against the list of audience members and quickly let us in. I didn't see any cameras pointed at us, and there were a lot of us in line.

Once inside, we all sat in folding chairs in a waiting room. Music was playing from speakers and there were no obvious microphones around. And during that time, the three of us talked about imaginary family members just to see if they would be mentioned. (They were not). No one asked us any questions and we did not provide any information. We did, however, sign the standard release forms saying that we give them permission to put our faces on TV, and that if we have a nervous breakdown from the experience, it isn't really their fault. I guess it is your departed relatives' fault. So, if you want to sue someone, you'll have to sue Grandpa Tavnor.

We sat there eating muffins until being led into the studio. "Loading the Audience," they called it. It was a little exciting, but I didn't feel like I was loaded at all.

Once in the studio with the show taping, John Edward answered a few questions and then started in reading people. He was fast, going quickly through references he was "seeing" and moving from person to person.

But perhaps he has an ear piece that can't be seen on TV and he is getting information from the control room. Then maybe he could identify me and a few relatives, assuming there really was a camera somewhere that linked my face to my name. And perhaps he did that for all the others too, but I doubt it.

And even if he did link my face to my name to my family tree, he wouldn't have been able to find out about the Free Spirit brother, the health care connection, the lung cancer, the brain problem, the car collector or even the fact that the car collector was a former neighbor. Those would all have been good guesses.

Would those guesses have applied to anyone? Maybe. I don't know the likelihood. But it seems like the chances are slim. And then there are the other people. He mentioned more specifics for others, like a dog's name (Sparky).

Cold Reading is based on the idea that you can throw anything out there and it has a good chance of "hitting" or being right. A few more suggestions and you can then make educated guesses as to the next suggestion or reference, based on the person's reaction.

I was very careful to not provide any information or explanations. I said a couple of times that a particular reference was valid, or applied to an uncle or sibling, but nothing more. So I must say that I am impressed that the information made as much sense as it did. I do wish it had been something even more solid, like a shared secret, but still, it was impressive.

But others claim that it only looks impressive on TV because they edit out tons of references that made no sense to anyone. But on the day we were there, there were fewer misses than hits. And many of the hits were about obscure facts. Things that you wouldn't throw out there hoping someone would claim them.

And what also interests me is that often John will claim something (like "He passed from a blood disease") and the person in the audience will acknowledge it saying something like, "That is Johnny who had diabetes." And instead of rolling with it, John will insist that it isn't diabetes. It must be someone else who had a real blood disorder. He could have taken the easy way out, but instead he pushes for a different connection, even if the person just doesn't validate it in the end--although often it does connect.

I watched as he claimed a man had a son who passed. The man nodded. John said that there was something wrong with his head. He feels pain in his head. The man nodded again. John said that he feels like the head thing was secondary to something else, as if it all started somewhere else.

No, the man says. It was just the head. John asks if he is sure that the problem didn't start somewhere else. Nope. John pushes. He is certain. He brings it up again and again. Finally the man says that the boy was being treated for an upset stomach when tests revealed that he had a brain problem. So the initial complaint was his stomach and then the focus shifted to his head.

He really didn't have to insist like that. He could have just left it as a miss. It's interesting that he doesn't take the easy way out.

Do I believe in it?

I don't know. On the one hand, it just couldn't be possible. On the other hand, I go to church on Sundays and have faith in other things that seem equally impossible. So who knows?

After the show I did the routine followup on camera, giving them some backstory to what was recorded in the studio, but I did a terrible job. I'm not sure if I said anything more than, "This is interesting," with a forced smile and dazed eyes. Nonetheless, the producer said she would like to come to my house and do another followup on location. If she does, I will tell her the whole story about those references. And then I will sing a song for Simon, Paula, and Randy.