Here is something odd. We went to Brussels on Tuesday, and once we had settled in tHe hotel, we went to the centre of the city. We walked past a bar where, last time we were there, we had a beer or several with Simon Aughton.

Simon no longer lives in Brussels - he's moved to Switzerland. However, as we walked past, he was there, and caught up with us. He was in town on a visit, and spotted me as I waked past. I don't know the odds of that happening, but it was a rather good surprise. Neither of us knew the other's plans to visit Brussels, so one big chance happening.

We had beer.

In my younger days I never believed in coincidence, but the older I get...

coincidences hapen but alot less than people think. How many tmes have you gone out in another town/city/country and not seen someone you know. How many times has the phone rung and you have no idea who it is? etc
Humans look for patterns and remember those that happen but forget all those times it doesnt.

Unless of course your thinking of afate and that is a different ball game.. free will vs predeterminism.

I've lost count of the amount of time that I've thought "I must ring the wife about something or other" and as I go to pick up the phone it starts ringing... guess who's phoning me!

Once or twice maybe, but this happens several times a week.

Normally, this kind of thing doesn’t happen to me. If you roll six dice, you will get six sixes. If this happens on your first roll or one of the subsequent thousands, it will happen.

HUman nature likes us to think of more picturesque reasons for this happening. Whatever the reason, I’m glad it did.

Does he not have an account here?

Talking about bars in Brussels, I highly recommend the Delerium Cafe:
http://www.deliriumcafe.be/



I was talking to a friend about this the other week, she met one of her lecturers in New York, neither had a clue the other was there. It made me think, if this happens the amount of time it does, how often do people miss each other by a small fraction? For instance how many times might you miss someone who is walking down a street parallel to you or on the other side of a busy street, etc?

Had we taken the other exit from the metro station, or had Simon not be sitting where he was, we would have never known that the other was there. It probably happens more than we realise.

On a similar topic, I used to drive into Manchester to work and park up in this car park near Picadilly which was 2 quid to park all day, its since been built on.
I used to get there at different times, anything from 8.35-8.50. I then had to walk across part of the city centre to get to my office. More or less, most days I saw this guy coming the other way also going somewhere. He was distinctive because he had an eye patch, I saw quite a few people I saw regularly, but this guy had the patch so was memorable.

Anyway, every day, no matter what time I was walking down a certain street, this guy was always in the same spot, walking, not standing still. It was uncanny. I used to think the only way he could have been in the same spot all the time was because he saw me coming down the road, from a window or something and set of, just as I got to a certain point. But that of course would be ridiculous. Or would it ? It still baffles the hell out of me !

Hallucinationstation?

who the hell is Simon Aughton?

He is one of the Illuminati, part of the Bilderberg group, and generally a really bloody nice bloke.

Sh*t, im outta here

Yup - well worth meeting up with if he's in the area.

Yeah, right... we wish! :etc: :Relax_I'm_Joking!: