The Monsters Among Us

Hank Stuever: America's seeing monsters again, so Mommy needs to open the door a crack and leave the hallway light on:

1. Some sheriff's deputies in Cuero, Tex., released footage captured by one of their dash-cams on Aug. 8 of a . . . something (the legendary Mexican goat-sucker, el chupacabra?) running along a dirt road in broad daylight. This went along with reports (and pix!) of bodies of long-fanged, doglike creatures found in Texas. Weird!

2. A news cycle or two after the Texas chupacabra came the dead . . . something, allegedly a Bigfoot, discovered in the (cue banjo) backwoods of Georgia. Two men have pictures of it and say they've got the body, too. They held a news conference (cue flat trumpet bleat) last Friday, which CNN showed live. Bizarre!

3. Meanwhile, for days, Gawker and other Web sites busied themselves with discussion of the so-called "Montauk Monster," brought to us via photos of the bloated corpse of . . . something (a de-shelled tortoise? a skinned bulldog?) that allegedly washed up on the Long Island shore sometime in July. Yucko!