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I can't remember now. Not a Grimm's or anything like that.
 
Around a week after consuming way too much red meat and probably more beer and G&T's than is recommended, I was duely rewarded with an attack of gout in my big toe.
Still, I managed to get up and about and go to work and we'd stopped in Acton to grab a bite to eat before heading back to Wiltshire.

The cafe is right next to a railway line and I was doing my best not to put any pressure on said toe, hobbling back to the van and feeling pretty sorry for myself. I happened to look up and see the last carriage of a passing frieght train, which had one massive, brightly painted graffiti word daubed across it: TOES.
Recognising the flawed connection, my first though was "ahh...but it's not TOES, it's just the one, so IN YOUR FACE WEIRD UNIVERSE!"

Later that afternoon I called my wife about something trivial and was a bit puzzled by the slightly annoyed manner in which she responded. Several minutes later by way of apology, she sent me the following text message:
20180707_093540_rmedited.jpg


Unfortunately I only saw the last carriage of the train, so have no idea weather or not the preceeding waggons carried graffiti by the artists "Boob", "Head" and the infamous and highly sought after "Eight Knees" (possibly urban rhyming slang for something?).

I should also point out that the image is of two badly bruised knees. I've left it blurry as some viewers may find them too disturbing :)
 
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Extremely minor coincidence, this, but it's an excuse to trot out a song which rivals Too Much Too Young for the best ever penultimate line, so... I have a bunch of students working on a project for an end-of-term performance,and so I set up shared google docs for them to work on. I was in a bit of a rush when I did this, and used my personal gmail account, not my work one. Last Wednesday, one of my students, who is both bright and easily distracted, brought up my page on google plus (remember that?). Turns out the last post I shared publicly was back in September 2011. It was this:

 
When my younger daughter was born, she experienced a birth injury that left her right arm partially paralyzed. By various referrals, my wife and I were lead to a surgeon who could perform experimental surgery to help our little girl - but we agonized over the decision. It was then that a series of minor coincidences involving names started to occur. We would encounter key people in the process leading up to the surgery who had the same name as one of our two daughters. It reached its climax when we met the head surgical nurse just prior to the procedure. We started to chat, only to discover that she had two daughters with the same name as our two as well as the same maiden name as my wife. This revelation had a strange calming effect on both my wife and I - we felt reassured that we were where we needed to be.

Perhaps it was all coincidence but we saw them as signposts to let us know we were on the right path - just what a couple of frightened young parents needed. BTW, my daughter was greatly helped by the surgery. She has since grown up to be a health care professional helping people with mobility issues.
 
Whilst emptying yet another box of my books from my parents loft, I came across a book which reminded me of a particularly odd coincidence.

When I was but a callow youth, I bought lots of the "true" ghost story type books, as well as many compendiums, usually edited by Colin Wilson.
To ensure no one ever thought of nicking them, I always wrote my name in the back cover.
No, I don't know who'd want to nick them, either.

Anyway, one of these books was "Spinechiller" by Peter and Mary Harrison (quick review: entertaining, but obviously bobbins).
When it was time for me to go to university, I disposed of these childish things to a jumble sale, so I could move on to the mature pursuits of cider and girls.
Now, I should point out here, that said jumble sale is in Leeds.

Some years later, when I realised that both cider and girls had their own drawbacks, I found myself in London, killing time before my trip back to the frozen north.
I happened upon a second hand bookshop, and realising I had nothing to keep me entertained on the train, I searched for suitable inspiration.
What should I spy but a copy of said Spinechiller.
After paying a significant sum for what was a tatty old tome, I relaxed into my train seat.
Somewhere around Doncaster I finished and came to the back cover where... you've guessed it, my name is scrawled.

Somehow the book had a journey of a couple of hundred miles, and ten years, just to come back into my possession.
Spooky, huh...?

That’s a very interesting story.
I have it somewhere in the back of my mind, that there was a similar quirky coincidence, which also had a story of a long lost and found book, but this story happened to the actor Anthony Hopkins.
Anyone.?
 
Whilst emptying yet another box of my books from my parents loft, I came across a book which reminded me of a particularly odd coincidence.

When I was but a callow youth, I bought lots of the "true" ghost story type books, as well as many compendiums, usually edited by Colin Wilson.
To ensure no one ever thought of nicking them, I always wrote my name in the back cover.
No, I don't know who'd want to nick them, either.

Anyway, one of these books was "Spinechiller" by Peter and Mary Harrison (quick review: entertaining, but obviously bobbins).
When it was time for me to go to university, I disposed of these childish things to a jumble sale, so I could move on to the mature pursuits of cider and girls.
Now, I should point out here, that said jumble sale is in Leeds.

Some years later, when I realised that both cider and girls had their own drawbacks, I found myself in London, killing time before my trip back to the frozen north.
I happened upon a second hand bookshop, and realising I had nothing to keep me entertained on the train, I searched for suitable inspiration.
What should I spy but a copy of said Spinechiller.
After paying a significant sum for what was a tatty old tome, I relaxed into my train seat.
Somewhere around Doncaster I finished and came to the back cover where... you've guessed it, my name is scrawled.

Somehow the book had a journey of a couple of hundred miles, and ten years, just to come back into my possession.
Spooky, huh...?

I once bought a second hand book that turned out to have belonged to the late mother of an ex. This was nearly 20 years after her death.
 
That’s a very interesting story.
I have it somewhere in the back of my mind, that there was a similar quirky coincidence, which also had a story of a long lost and found book, but this story happened to the actor Anthony Hopkins.
Anyone.?

Didn't he leave a novel on a Tube station while preparing for a role in the fillum being made of it, then much later buy it back in a junk shop?
It might have been the director's own copy or summat.
 
"The British actor Anthony Hopkins [who shot to fame as Hannibal Lecter] was delighted to hear that he had landed a leading role in a film based on the book The Girl From Petrovka by George Feifer. A few days after signing the contract, Hopkins travelled to London to buy a copy of the book. He tried several bookshops, but there wasn't one to be had. Waiting at Leicester Square underground for his train home, he noticed a book apparently discarded on a bench. Incredibly, it was The Girl From Petrovka. That in itself would have been coincidence enough but in fact it was merely the beginning of an extraordinary chain of events. Two years later, in the middle of filming in Vienna, Hopkins was visited by George Feifer, the author. Feifer mentioned that he did not have a copy of his own book. He had lent the last one - containing his own annotations - to a friend who had lost it somewhere in London. With mounting astonishment, Hopkins handed Feifer the book he had found. 'Is this the one?' he asked, 'with the notes scribbled in the margins?' It was the same book."

Found here!

Well remembered! I think it featured in a book of celebrity encounters with the uncanny, by Jenny Randles. :cooll:
 
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"The British actor Anthony Hopkins [who shot to fame as Hannibal Lecter] was delighted to hear that he had landed a leading role in a film based on the book The Girl From Petrovka by George Feifer. A few days after signing the contract, Hopkins travelled to London to buy a copy of the book. He tried several bookshops, but there wasn't one to be had. Waiting at Leicester Square underground for his train home, he noticed a book apparently discarded on a bench. Incredibly, it was The Girl From Petrovka. That in itself would have been coincidence enough but in fact it was merely the beginning of an extraordinary chain of events. Two years later, in the middle of filming in Vienna, Hopkins was visited by George Feifer, the author. Feifer mentioned that he did not have a copy of his own book. He had lent the last one - containing his own annotations - to a friend who had lost it somewhere in London. With mounting astonishment, Hopkins handed Feifer the book he had found. 'Is this the one?' he asked, 'with the notes scribbled in the margins?' It was the same book."

Found here!

Well remembered! I think it featured in a book by Jenny Randles of celebrity encounters with the uncanny. :cooll:

Well, I got a BIT right!
 
That's like Frank Morgan in The Wizard of Oz, where he played the Wizard and his "real world" version Professor Marvel. For the latter, the costume designer picked up a coat they found in a thrift store for him to wear. It turned out to be originally owned by L. Frank Baum, who wrote The Wizard of Oz some decades before.

This story is disputed, but I like it because it sounds good enough to be true.
 
Today at work for some reason I started singing 'In The Navy'. A couple of colleagues jokingly took it up and a third began looking a bit, y'know, emotional.

Turns out two of his best friends joined the Navy today and he's really missing them.

Dunno why I was singing it but it set him off!

This is what I mean when I say I think there's a lot of low-level telepathy going about. Which is how I think some 'psychics' get 'hits', they pick up a few things through a very low-level telepathic field. I've done it a few times myself, and got the stock 'how the hell did you know that?' response. I didn't know how I knew, but I'm sure I picked it up somehow.

Maybe sometimes if people are dwelling really hard on a particular thought, idea or person, somehow it can be transmitted? Not in any way that could be useful, but just enough for another brain to pick up on...
 
I once bought a second hand book that turned out to have belonged to the late mother of an ex. This was nearly 20 years after her death. I kept the receipt just in case something weird happens. Sometimes even a simple excel invoice works too Heck now they even have people management software that does even more.

Well did you read it? I believe it was a message of some kind. Perhaps get in touch with your ex see how things are. Good thing you kept the receipt. You don't want to get billed for some bad karma :)
 
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Well did you read it? I believe it was a message of some kind. Perhaps get in touch with your ex see how things are.

I'd bought the book to make up a '6 for £1'-type offer. It was The Count of Monte Cristo, which I loved as a child and had already read many times. The books were on sale in the town where the ex's mother used to live.

The book's themes of imprisonment and escape are relevant. There is NO chance of getting in touch with the ex!
 
For some reason, the other morning, Mr123 decided that we needed to have a competition about songs with horses in the title or the lyrics. I won with
This morning we were having a discussion about my casting aspersions on his SW heritage upon which he started singing this:

Same tune!
 
Didn't he leave a novel on a Tube station while preparing for a role in the fillum being made of it, then much later buy it back in a junk shop?
It might have been the director's own copy or summat.

"The British actor Anthony Hopkins [who shot to fame as Hannibal Lecter] was delighted to hear that he had landed a leading role in a film based on the book The Girl From Petrovka by George Feifer. A few days after signing the contract, Hopkins travelled to London to buy a copy of the book. He tried several bookshops, but there wasn't one to be had. Waiting at Leicester Square underground for his train home, he noticed a book apparently discarded on a bench. Incredibly, it was The Girl From Petrovka. That in itself would have been coincidence enough but in fact it was merely the beginning of an extraordinary chain of events. Two years later, in the middle of filming in Vienna, Hopkins was visited by George Feifer, the author. Feifer mentioned that he did not have a copy of his own book. He had lent the last one - containing his own annotations - to a friend who had lost it somewhere in London. With mounting astonishment, Hopkins handed Feifer the book he had found. 'Is this the one?' he asked, 'with the notes scribbled in the margins?' It was the same book."

Coincidentally I was watching a YouTube video about Strange Coincidences yesterday, and it mentioned this very same story :D
 
Here's another strange one. A while ago I found a great uncle of my father in law who had died in WW1. He is buried at Euston Road Military cemetery in France. On saturday my father in law was on the way back from a business trip in France and called me to ask for directions to the cemetery, he wanted to drop in for the first time and view the grave.

He took the attached photograph. The first line of the gravestone is Joseph Boyd's soldier number. Also co-incidentally it is my father in law's Date of Birth. 12-11-58 How spooky is that!

37553578_10157461419454688_1371649586103320576_n.jpg
 
Is there a horse in Una Paloma Blanca? I thought it was a bird...
 
Here's another strange one. A while ago I found a great uncle of my father in law who had died in WW1. He is buried at Euston Road Military cemetery in France. On saturday my father in law was on the way back from a business trip in France and called me to ask for directions to the cemetery, he wanted to drop in for the first time and view the grave.

He took the attached photograph. The first line of the gravestone is Joseph Boyd's soldier number. Also co-incidentally it is my father in law's Date of Birth. 12-11-58 How spooky is that!

View attachment 10888

That's absolutely brilliant.

(I am especially impressed because the 13th of November is the DOB of a late, very much loved close relation of mine who also served in the army.)
 
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I was thinking last night it was odd that nobody had ever portrayed John Wayne in film or TV, I supposed it was because he was too iconic to be tackled. Just now I've watched the latest episode of Preacher. One of the characters in it is John Wayne.
 
I was thinking last night it was odd that nobody had ever portrayed John Wayne in film or TV, I supposed it was because he was too iconic to be tackled. Just now I've watched the latest episode of Preacher. One of the characters in it is John Wayne.
He'd have to be depicted by someone who is big-leggy. And drinks milk.
 
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