While American novelist Anne Parrish was browsing bookstores in Paris in the 1920s, she came upon a book that was one of her childhood favorites – Jack Frost and Other Stories. She picked up the old book and showed it to her husband, telling him of the book she fondly remembered as a child. Her husband took the book, opened it, and on the flyleaf found the inscription: “Anne Parrish, 209 N. Weber Street, Colorado Springs.” It was Anne’s very own book.
Courtesy of Listverse
(Submitted by friend of the blog, Spencer Marks)
Around 1987, I was a young man of about 25 or 26, and went to a party on a Saturday night. This party was in the hills above Beverly Hills, and while there, I met (for the first time), Barry Williams, who played Greg Brady on “The Brady Bunch.” We ended up having a conversation for about 20 minutes, and then I moved on with mingling with other guests.
About three days later, I was in a supermarket, turned the corner, and there was Barry once again, shopping! I said, hello, and had to remind him that we had just met 3 days before, and where. We ended up talking for another 10-15 minutes, and I joked about, “well, see you soon!” even though we did not exchange any information or make plans to do so.
About two days later, I went into a place that I had once worked, an indoor shooting range, and there was Barry once again! This time, he actually remembered my name, and said, “Oh, hi Spencer!”
So, in one week’s time, I ran into the same person three different places, unconnected to each other, and separated by some distance.
I did not see him prior to that, or after that, until I was at a July 4th party in 2009, and had to remind him of that one odd week, 22 years before.
A facebook friend Jana Morales noticed that I’d “friended” a man by the name of Trevor Jenkins… and she commented that I had friended her grand nephew! I asked if she was sure, and whether he lived in Canada, as that’s where my new FB friend is from.
It took awhile to find out, but it turns out that there are well over 100 people named Trevor Jenkins on Facebook, and they are not the same Trevor Jenkins. My new friend and I met on a bulletin board for science writer Gary Taubes, and we are both skeptics; my friend Jana’s grand nephew is the first other Trevor Jenkins that he has known of indirectly, ie known someone who knows someone who has the same name, coincidentally.
(Submitted by friend of the blog, Kathleen Scott)
My husband’s grandfather got into genealogy and tracked down their surname – Engstrom. It’s a regional uncommon alternative spelling of Angstrom. In the ’30s most of the Engstroms had moved to Chicago.
My grandfather moved to Los Angeles in the ’30s but his brother stayed in South Africa. I’ve started to meet the SA contingent through Facebook. Including one Colin Engstrom Scott.
I can’t tell you how weird it was to see my husband’s uncommon surname as my 2nd cousin’s (x times removed) middle name especially as he was born and raised in South Africa. Turns out it’s his maternal grandmother’s surname and that she came from this same area in Sweden.
A coincidence of truly amazing proportions happened on a private mailing list. Two members of our group (Jim Underdown and Jeff Nuttall) posted requests to record Spike TV‘s 1000 Ways to Lie on a Wednesday night. I checked the listing, and there were several episodes that evening; it was an interesting coincidence that their performances were on the same series on the same night. There were not enough details in their messages, so I randomly chose to watch the one about Natural Born Liars. Jim had said the show was starting at ten p.m., but I have DirectTV, and satellite TV has a different schedule than cable, and at ten p.m., there was a different show on. Jeff had called me and told me that he played the husband of a woman who told him she was giving birth to baby bunnies… so that sounded about right.
I saw Jeff, and a few minutes into the episode, I saw Jim Underdown explain how people will do anything to achieve fame. Neither Jim nor Jeff had seemed to know that they were in the same segment of the same TV show.
As coincidences go, it was pretty amazing that two members of our group would be performing in the same brand new TV show, and not know about one another’s participation, and even have posted about it on our mailing list. As if that was not enough, a friend of another member of the group was the Supervising Producer of the show, and also unaware of the connection between the two performers.
Related:
Where everybody knows your name…
(Submitted by friend of the blog, Steve Muscarella)
A few months back I met two friends one night at Houston’s in the Century City mall. We came in separate cars at different times. Later, as we came down the escalators to the parking garage we noted that we must all be on the same level. No big deal.
We kept walking, looking for our individual cars – expecting one or the other to say “goodbye” and branch off in another direction. Instead, we found ourselves walking to the same row and discovering that all three cars were parked, 1,2,3, in adjacent parking spots. It was funny because, like a “movie moment,” we got just about all the way to the doors of our cars before we realized what was happening.
So here’s the story. Around the turn of the century, my great grandfather, Oscar Adams homesteaded a ranch in Northern New Mexico, about 24 miles north of Las Vegas, NM. His daughter Nina, and husband, Charlie Middleton ran it as a guest ranch (Evergreen Valley Ranch) for about 50 years, until about 20 years ago, when my great uncle Charlie sold it to a group of families, shortly before he passed away. Even though the ranch is no longer in the family, my mother has kept in close contact with those now in ownership, and we visit regularly.
This August, my mother and I visited the ranch, and while there, met the great granddaughter of the man who homesteaded the ranch next door to Evergreen Valley Ranch – Terrill Ranch; the ranch through whose meadow we have crossed for over 40 years, to go on our favorite hikes in the area. I was amazed to discover that she (Alex) works with me at RAND, in our Santa Monica office. We had never met, but work with some of the same people. More amazing still is the fact that we were both visiting our respective ranches the same week, and had opportunity to meet each other! Her fiance, Michael who also works at RAND was with her, in NM.
Less than a week after this amazingly coincidental meeting, my boyfriend Paul and I were at the Hollywood Bowl to hear Shostakovich’s 5th Symphony; one of two concerts we got tickets for this season. As we were eating, he looked up, and lo and behold, who was passing in front of us, but Alex & Michael. Of all the people there and all the timing of looking up, the odds must be crazy that we would run into them there; on a Tuesday night – with Shostakovich!! The other tidbit, I discovered when I ran into Alex the next day at work (really, how many times have we unknowingly crossed paths??) – that her fiance is a violinist, and Paul is a cellist. 🙂 So there you have it. The Odds Must Be Crazy!
(Submitted by reader Donald Chesebro)
Last night, a very loud bird outside my bedroom window kept me awake late and woke me several times through the night.
This morning, while checking e-mail and listening to the BBC’s World News Hour on my local NPR station, I was thinking of searching for a website with bird calls so I could try to figure out what kind of bird was being such a nuisance. Before I got to that, I suddenly heard the bird’s call on my radio. It was almost exactly the same sound I’d been forced to listen to for hours. The BBC was doing a report about the declining population of the nightingale in England. They can have mine!!!
(Submitted by friend of the blog, Ross Blocher from Oh No, Ross and Carrie!)
Recently I was teaching myself how to solve square roots by hand. As a practice number I randomly chose 532 and worked for a while to get the value out to the trillionth place… 23.065125189341. I realized it was getting pretty late in the day, and wondered if it was time to go home yet, and I looked up at the clock on my computer to find it was exactly 5:32. I did a double-take and looked back at the piece of paper… sure enough, the same number I’d just solved.
Oh, and this is weird. I’m finishing this email, and my clock says it’s 5:31. Spooky… :0)
(Submitted by reader Donald Chesebro)
This afternoon I was walking past a bus stop and saw a poster for the upcoming film “Step Up 3-D” and started wondering what other films eligible for a second sequel might be coming in 3-D. The first thing that came to my mind was “Oh God! Book 3-D”. A few minutes ago, I saw a note in the news that someone is planning to remake “Oh God!” starring Betty White. No word on whether it’ll be in 3-D.
