So where do I begin?  Let's start with Friday - I came home from work in the early evening and I was rather tired from a long day, so I laid down on the couch and fell asleep for about an hour and a half, which made it about 8:30 PM.  After I got my shower and got dressed and packed a few things, I kissed my lovely wife goodbye and headed out the door.  As I got fairly close to Baltimore, I realized I had to pull over for some gas.  I was in mad panic to get down to the conference, as David Biedny and Dr. Sue were coming down on Friday as well, I didn't want to keep them waiting.  I figured we'd be hanging out quite a bit that night.  I have to preface all this by saying that I was not staying at the hotel, but was commuting to the conference day by day.  As I got out of the car to go pay for gas, I stared at my GPS / Cell phone clipped to the dashboard and thought, "if I leave this cell phone in here to go pay for gas, sure as hell that's
when Biedny will call."

My amazing, stupendous psychic powers were acute that night, as when I got back in the car, I had a message from David on my cell phone.

 "We're just getting to Delaware Memorial Bridge, and there's a lot of traffic, so I don't know what time we're actually be getting in there", David said through the muffled headpiece.  It was that point that I think I muttered something akin to "F*** it", made a u-ie and headed for home.  I knew full well that David wouldn't arrive until 2:00 AM which left us very little time for fireside chats that night--and I knew both David and Dr. Sue would be tired and would much rather get to bed anyway...truth be told I was ready for bed right then and there myself.

So Saturday morning, I woke bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and headed down to Gaithersburg.  As I got to the conference and got my badge, David had said Dr. Maccabee was towards the end of his lecture, so I caught maybe the last five minutes.  Not long after that, just outside the lecture hall, we briefly met Dr. Edgar Mitchell, who I found to be a very very kind and accommodating man (I HAD to get a picture with him).  He answered some of Jeremy's questions for The Culture of Contact podcast and we headed out for lunch. 
After we arrived back from lunch, it was time for what was billed as the "pinnacle event" of the X-Conference--the incredible, the stupendous George Noory of Coast to Coast fame.  Now it has to be said, I haven't been a regular listener of Coast to Coast in many years, so I wasn't that thrilled.  However much of the crowd seemed to think that this was about as good as flying saucers landing on the White House lawn.  George spent about 15 minutes regaling the crowd on his interest in the paranormal, a couple of jokes, and how he got the Coast to Coast AM gig.  George then took questions for the next (approximately) hour and a half, referring to the left half of the room as west of the Rockies, and the right half of the room as east of the Rockies. Ha...yeah...funny. In all honesty, I think I would have rather gone outside and watched the grass grow.  It doesn't seem to me, and this is strictly my opinion, that Noory is really all that interested in the quality of guests or the subject matter they present.  I think his angle is more about widespread listener participation, which I guess is okay if you're coming at this from an entertainment standpoint.  I suppose that's what sells commercials and gleans ratings.  To each his own, I guess.  I just have a certain amount of disdain for relegating the UFO/alien subject to entertainment.

After we left Noory's lecture, we headed off to the bar for some snacks... and then things got interesting.  As we sat having a couple of drinks and chatting with Rick Wood of AudioMartini.com, a man of medium build with a full head of grey hair passed by on our left.  David's eyes quickly turned to tea cups and whispered loudly...

"Jeff, that's Jim Dilettoso!"

I did glance at the man as he walked by, but frankly, I didn't think it was really Jim.  Although I had seen him there at last year's X-Conference, we didn't get an opportunity to talk.  Now, as many of you may or may not know, Jim Dilettoso is the man touted by the Meier case supporters as being the chief image analyst who authenticated the photos.  I often referred these people to an article called "The Hack and the Quack" by Tony Ortega of the Phoenix Times: in that article Jim is "exposed" as somewhat of a bullshitter who would freely use technical terms to describe his findings, and not really know what those terms mean.  One of the big sticking points in that article for me was that it was said that Jim claimed to be able to do spectral-analysis from video tape--a physical impossibility (Jim gave insight on the article, and it's pretty amusing).  I had long ago summed this guy up as someone who fully supported the Meier case just by virtue of how often the media rep for the Meier case chucked around Jim's analysis report.  Through the years, I often perceived Jim as an adversary for such things.  At any rate, about the time that I told David that I didn't think it was Jim Dilettoso, this gentleman walked around the bar towards David and introduced himself. I was pretty surprised to hear "Hi, I'm Jim Dilettoso."

Knowing how vocal David and I both had been over the Meier case, the first words that echoed in my skull were "Here we go."

I was introduced to Jim by David not long after he had relayed to David that they had a close mutual friend.  Jim shook hands with me and smiled, and I said it was nice to finally meet him. David immediately piped in, "Jim, as you know, or maybe you don't, Jeff and I are pretty vocal critics of the Meier case."  Jim furrowing his brow said "Okay."  David continued, "And you're listed as the chief image analyst on these photos, and are often touted in Michael Horn's conversations and on his website as authenticating the photos."

Now I'm recounting this from memory, so I don't want to go into too much depth here, as David interviewed Jim on the record for The Paracast.  But allow me to just give you the brief.  When asked about the analysis on the Meier case, Jim said  that he had only examined three or four photographs and found no evidence of a hoax, but kept stressing "with the equipment I had at the time...and you have to realize this was back in the 70's."  Then came the part in the conversation that really got my pulse going.  David mentioned Meier's dreaded Wedding Cake photographs--you know the ones I mean.  The ones that look like a pie plate and a trash can lid took a bath in silver paint and Christmas ornaments, and were shot by a six year old child in his backyard. A lot of the found parts used to fabricate it have been identified.

I then heard what I thought I would never hear from Jim Dilettoso...

"Oh, those were clearly models... yeah."

I turned around to Jeremy and then to David, and gave my best Chandler Bing impression - "Oh--My --God!!!"

So let's summarize this.  We have the Meier case's image analyst telling us there are models involved. Well, yeah, we knew that... but now it's coming from Jim Dilettoso himself. Not to mention he prefaces his analysis results by saying "with the equipment I had at the time", which to me insinuates it wasn't as good as today's technology...which again is a given. Jim also relayed that he never said these pictures showed anything extraterrestrial, nor anything other then "unknown". He did solidify his take on the Meier case and the pictures, but I don't in any way want to misstate it. You'll hear it on the Paracast or Culture of Contact podcasts. It's not what you've most likely been led to believe.

Now make no mistake about it, I don't agree with Jim on a lot of cases...the Phoenix Lights, etc. But he certainly wasn't the staunch Meier supporter that had been portrayed to me over the years. I had tried to email and even call him several times over the years and never seemed to be able to collar him for a talk.

When David and I brought up Michael Horn's information and Jim's inclusion in it based on his analysis,  his answer was "I can't comment on that, since I'm not familiar with Michael Horn. We've never met, and I've never spoken with him."

Holy. Shit.  

Jim went on to say, " Why is he providing data and an analysis report that I did in the 70s...as if I did it yesterday?"
I got the feeling Jim wasn't particularly pleased about a lot of what was being said about him via Horn. But there's another player besides Horn in Jim's distaste for being misrepresented: Kal Korff. He alluded that Korff had a part in the "Hack and the Quack" article, and that several points I asked him about (namely the spectral analysis claim) wasn't what he intended. He explained that he had to simplify his procedures explanation so the interviewer would understand, and he mentioned "spectral" and "spectrum" in relation to a histogram. The reporter (or Korff?) in turn twisted that into an impossible claim of being able to do spectral analysis on video. I got the feeling Jim was far more familiar with Korff's words about him then Horn's...but wasn't happy about either one. There's more on Korff from Jim, but I'll leave that to The Paracast and Culture of Contact to tell you about.

Let's suffice to say I found Jim to be open, perfectly willing to talk to us about the photos and the case, and very generous with his time. He's also a hell of a nice guy personally, and fun to hang with - he's got more wild ideas for technology then you can think of... the scary part is some of them would probably work. Jim is like the crazy, genius uncle you wish you had as a kid to equip your toy robots with guided missile systems. I may not agree with Jim on his findings in a lot of cases, but he's certainly (in my freshly revised view) NOT in the Meier "camp" of being a hard core supporter or defender. From my perspective he's been misrepresented by the American Media Rep for the case, and I told him so. I think he agreed with me on that point.

One of the last words he said to me before I left was "Look, David mentioned that you guys saw me as some
kind of adversary and I don't see it that way..." I again told him he'd been misrepresented to me over the years, and it was a pleasure finally meeting him. And, it truly was. Jeremy Vaeni just wrote me today (Tuesday 4/22) and said Jim communicated to him after I had left, that he felt bad of the opinion David and I had of him for so long because he had no clue, and doesn't read all the hoopla online.

Ya know what? I feel bad too. I genuinely like the guy personally, even though we don't agree on a lot of things. It's friggin' surreal...if you'd have told me I'd enjoy having morning coffee with Jim Dilettoso ten years ago, or 6 months ago I'd have said you were insane.

Now keep in mind, it was only talking over the course of a weekend, so no one can make a judgment on someone that quickly...but I don't have the same professional opinion I used to of Jim Dilettoso - because half of that opinion was established by one Michael Horn and his band of venomous zealots. It's clear to me more then ever that it doesn't matter what side of the fence you're on with regard to the Meier case - whether your Jim Dilettoso, Jeff Ritzmann, David Biedny, Michael Malin or Robert Post - you're guaranteed to have your statements and actions misrepresented in whatever way best suits Horn selling his Meier crap, and continuing his parade of bullshit against those who speak out against it. My personal thanks to Jim for setting the record straight on his opinions and involvement, and speaking with us at such length.

There's so much more that Jim talked about with us regarding the Meier stuff, which Jeremy and David will both have on their respective podcasts interviewing him. We also had a literal and lengthy round table conversation with Dr. Bruce Maccabee that blew my mind (as usual). But, it's getting late and I'm still rather out of normal sleep mode. I'll have more tomorrow, and lots of it.