A couple times I have been exploring the wasteland, and once a cave, and received a notification with a confused PipBoy face that read "..." . Does anyone know what this means? I tried searching the forum, but ... doesnt search well.

That means there is a Wild Wasteland encounter, I believe.

Yeah. I've gotten it 5 times but only understood it twice.

Ok, that has to be it. I went back to one of the locations and found a "Life of Brian" reference