Mystery of the Attic

This afternoon, I took my son to the grocery store for a 20 minute errand. When we came home, we found our Papillon barking to greet us at the back door. The problem with this is we put her in a kennel which is by Top Paw and it has a fold-over latch with a slide-lock. This was done before we left. I've got another dog who is in a portable baby play yard type of setup. She was still in her kennel. I've had this dog for at least 4 years and never forget to put her in her kennel. This is even if I walk outside for a couple of minutes because I'm paranoid she will find something around the rooms to eat on the floor that she shouldn't. When I go somewhere, the dogs are put in their kennels at the same time as if one action-not separate. I want to say I just simply didn't put her in her kennel but I am positive I did. Besides, she will follow me absolutely everywhere no matter where I go. When I left to go leave by the garage near the kitchen, she didn't follow us because she was latched in her kennel.

She has no way to ever get that open on her own. I'm not saying anything happened in a weird way but after we got home, she has acted strange ever since 6PMish to now as I write. I thought perhaps she got into something but she eats fine and plays fine. She has a glazed over look on her face and she's unnervingly calm. She's not herself. I am chalking this up to just nothing and not looking into anything as it would be easy to run away with thoughts after the past few weeks have been difficult. Regardless, I'm buying a camera tomorrow and setting it up. I'm not waiting anymore. This is getting old really fast. I don't want to be thinking about it this much and my wife is worn out.
 
Route 66 said:
I don't want to be thinking about it this much and my wife is worn out.
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Thanks for the update Route 66. If this thing knows you are onto it, it will turn its attention to you more and more.

Consider selling the house at some point.
 
8:50AM-Both the wife and I couldn't sleep last night. We stayed up late bothered by these bizarre events. With that said, I was awakened immediately out of a deep sleep only to hear the sound directly above and behind my headboard. Wow, it's never been in this area before... I quickly grabbed my phone to at least see if I could capture the sound and it did it one more time and stopped. I checked the Dropcam Pro website and it at least gives me a 7 day, free use of its cloud system to capture video and save it so I will utilize that. If I can go month to month, I will do that as well until this is resolved. As of today, the steps have now taken place over half our entire home. Hopefully I can capture this unnerving North American mystery creature- the Evadicus Atticus.
 
Shunpike said:
Thanks for the update Route 66. If this thing knows you are onto it, it will turn its attention to you more and more.

Consider selling the house at some point.
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Thanks for sharing Shun-maybe I'm just being ignorant and stubborn but I just have to think this is something alive and with some "animal kingdom" explanation. My dog is doing well and is eating but she still acts extremely strange...distant and very, very calm. That rules out that she got into something bad in the trash or on the floor.
 
Route 66 said:
8:50AM-Both the wife and I couldn't sleep last night. We stayed up late bothered by these bizarre events. With that said, I was awakened immediately out of a deep sleep only to hear the sound directly above and behind my headboard. Wow, it's never been in this area before... I quickly grabbed my phone to at least see if I could capture the sound and it did it one more time and stopped. I checked the Dropcam Pro website and it at least gives me a 7 day, free use of its cloud system to capture video and save it so I will utilize that. If I can go month to month, I will do that as well until this is resolved. As of today, the steps have now taken place over half our entire home. Hopefully I can capture this unnerving North American mystery creature- the Evadicus Atticus.
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How long have you guys been living in this place? Maybe you mentioned but I missed it. Also go to Zillow.com, enter your address and see the purchase history on the house and see how many times it has been sold in the last 10 years. I don't think this is an animal at all. When I was in college I witnessed a possessed girl. The thing inside the girl was telling us he wanted to marry her. And claiming he was an ex minister. Two pretty large male were holding the girl down but this thing was pushing them hard. No way this was the girls own power. She was admitted to a hospital later and don't know what happened to her later.

Not trying to alarm you or anything but saying just be careful and try not to engage with this thing.
 
Shunpike-My wife and I have lived in this house for 20 years this upcoming Summer. I don't recall how long ago strange things started to happen or perhaps I just didn't pay attention to it but it was very obvious after the passing of my Bullmastiff.

Something I didn't share earlier...

When I first heard this sound, I let it go for days thinking it was just the wind or an animal. When I went to first inspect the attic, my wife wanted to go with me. She stayed at the bottom of the ladder but was by the opening. I went up the ladder and the prior owners had installed a large shop light. I turned that on and carefully started to take my steps. I've been up in this attic many, many times over the past 20 years and it's obvious to always watch your step. Well, something happened that bothered me that I have no memory of. After the 2-3 step, I immediately found myself going through the ceiling and into the bathroom area. I caught myself but received many injuries to my leg. Nothing broke but I had large hematomas, bruised muscles and ligaments. My wife asked if I was ok and I said yes. I was in quite a bit of pain but wanted to finish the job of searching the attic so I walked around the entire area and of course found nothing.

I'm not too upset about the damage to my ceiling or my leg. I am more concerned with how it happened. When you fall or do something stupid, you can recount the moment up to the time to where you took a wrong step, lost balance or whatever unless of course a head injury is involved. However, I have tried to recount the entire moment from taking my first few steps to being through the ceiling and for the life of me, I have no memory of it. It's a total blank and it makes my brain hurt just trying to go through it all over and over thinking I will remember. I know (or think I know) I wasn't dizzy and I sure didn't feel I took a step foolishly and then fall through. Of course anyone else, including this forum would obviously say, "well, no matter what you simply stepped in the wrong place." Either way, this is the only type of injury I have ever had in 40+ years of existence where one minute it's all good and the next, I'm involved in getting hurt. It's quite hard to explain.

I will just assume that this was a foolish step. This happened about 3 weeks ago and I'm almost 100%. Here is the picture after the accident. Funny thing is, one of my next projects was to get rid of this old, popcorn ceiling and re-texture it myself!

http://i1197.***BLOCKED***/albums/aa428/Redeemed67/0208151308_zps8ceff474.jpg
 
Ok, I kid you not. I am already hearing sounds. I honestly thought that this would be an uneventful action. If I'm already hearing distinct attic sounds (NOT background noises which are obvious) this early, I'm wondering if it will get even more active. I will give it some time to see if they are more discernable in the next 24 hours. If so, I will submit on here. I've already heard tapping sounds which aren't such a big deal but I did hear the wood creak and it's not the house settling.
 
Perhaps whatever is up there was watching you set it up, and it is either curious as to what it is, or unhappy about it. You will find out later when you take the camera down. Unless the screen fuzzes and mixes up, or the camera is bumped out of position. Is the camera battery operated or wired? Just curious.

Editing to add: by whatever, I meant animal or otherwise. Not just "otherwise". lol. You could see a little nose poking around the lens or anything. lol.
 
I bought a Dropcam Pro and I am very happy with it. It is wireless only fed by the power cord. I ran an extension cord up in the attack and it works great. I have it on my main TV for a feed as well as all my Android phones. So far I have heard 9 instances of activity. I want to get used to a good baseline of these noises before I post a clip on here with something that is "abnormal". The noises I have now certainly appear out of the ordinary but I want to wait a bit first. What I have now I could post and let you all decide but I haven't heard the footsteps yet since this camera was put up and would like to see what that sounds like as the audio capture of this mic is fairly decent.



http://i1197.***BLOCKED***/albums/aa428/Redeemed67/attic_zps97c73fd1.jpg
 
Nice camera. It provides a good shot of a significant portion of your attic Here are a few things I notice. Some of those rafters look overspanned, the bracing is lacking in a couple of spots and the blown in insulation is pretty worn in a few areas. I recommend you get a local engineer to go out and take a look to provide you with some recommendations.
 
Good, glad it is not battery operated. In certain "circumstances", fully charged batteries can drain within minutes. I think you are doing the right thing by waiting for the big noises to come around. Now if nothing happens tonight in terms of those footsteps and other big sounds, then tomorrow night leave the camera off and see if you hear them or not. If you do, turn everything on real quick and see if they continue or if they suddenly stop. An animal won't know the difference. Something else will. Hopefully the audio on your camera setup is sensitive. You will catch the best sound with a sensitive mic.

Good luck to you and Mrs. Route. You know that we are all pulling for yall. I sure hope it is the rat snake or some other little critter that just knows how to hide really well. That would be so much better for you guys.:)
:starspin:
 
Hey, I didn't notice the picture (shows as broken frame thing on my laptop), until I had posted my comment to you above, thanks Joseephus for bringing that to light for me, you posted your comment while I was typing, so swung up to see what you wrote. Thanks, bud.:)

Personally, looking at the pic of your attic, Route, I don't know how in the heck anything could walk up there; there is like, nothing to walk on but little tiny beams (typical attic), and most of it is covered in insulation, which would actually cushion any sound, wouldn't it? You would have to know exactly where to step, like you said in your one post. I'm not an engineer or anything, but it just seems like if an animal were scurrying or slithering around up there, you wouldn't really be able to hear it too well down below, with all that insulation. If the animal were heavy enough to hear it like yall have been, especially with creaking sounds, than surely you would have seen it, right? But if it were that heavy, wouldn't it have fallen through the ceiling, too, when it steps off a beam? Maybe whatever little critter it is, is just really smart and instinctively knows where to NOT put its feet. That's possible. If I'm wrong about the insulation muffling the sound, please let me know, I would like to learn something tonight. But, I just don't see how it could be possible. Good luck to yall, man. Good luck. I'm still pulling for that raccoon or rat snake.
 
I have a couple of some videos of some activity in the attic. I am the only one home and am in the bedroom when this started. Nothing in the house is on, no washer or dryer or any water turned on. There is no wind or anything outside during this time. These don't concern me as the real footsteps I hear across the ceiling have not showed since I installed this camera.



 
kimrose said:
Hey, I didn't notice the picture (shows as broken frame thing on my laptop), until I had posted my comment to you above, thanks Joseephus for bringing that to light for me, you posted your comment while I was typing, so swung up to see what you wrote. Thanks, bud.:)

Personally, looking at the pic of your attic, Route, I don't know how in the heck anything could walk up there; there is like, nothing to walk on but little tiny beams (typical attic), and most of it is covered in insulation, which would actually cushion any sound, wouldn't it? You would have to know exactly where to step, like you said in your one post. I'm not an engineer or anything, but it just seems like if an animal were scurrying or slithering around up there, you wouldn't really be able to hear it too well down below, with all that insulation. If the animal were heavy enough to hear it like yall have been, especially with creaking sounds, than surely you would have seen it, right? But if it were that heavy, wouldn't it have fallen through the ceiling, too, when it steps off a beam? Maybe whatever little critter it is, is just really smart and instinctively knows where to NOT put its feet. That's possible. If I'm wrong about the insulation muffling the sound, please let me know, I would like to learn something tonight. But, I just don't see how it could be possible. Good luck to yall, man. Good luck. I'm still pulling for that raccoon or rat snake.
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This is what concerns me. Whatever is going across the ceiling knows to step on the wood beams. Any animal wouldn't know how to do that. A large rodent would not fall through but it would also not cause the creaking of the wood as pressure is applied. That's why this is so perplexing because an animal just wouldn't make that sound (to me) and also insulation rustling around on ceiling board just doesn't make any sound whatsoever. When I walk up there on those exact beams, both my wife and son say that's the exact sound.
 
Probably just your house settling. Mine does it all the time.
 
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