What a Co-inkydink!

Let me give you some fascinating statistics I found on the Internet about the odds of certain events happening. Totally random, I know, but read on....

Odds of bowling a 300 game: 11,500 to 1

Odds of being an astronaut: 13,200,000 to 1

Odds of winning an Olympic medal: 662,000 to 1

Odds of an American speaking Cherokee: 15000 to 1

Odds of being killed on a 5-mile bus trip: 500,000,000 to 1

Odds of being struck by lightning: 576,000 to 1

Odds of dating a supermodel: 88,000 to 1

Odds of being born a twin in North America: 90 to 1

Odds of being on plane with a drunken pilot: 117 to 1

Odds of being audited by the IRS: 175 to 1

Odds of writing a New York Times best seller: 220 to 1

Odds of finding out your child is a genius: 250 to 1

Odds of catching a ball at a major league ballgame: 563 to 1

Odds of finding a four-leaf clover on first try: 10,000 to 1

Odds of striking it rich on Antiques Roadshow: 60,000 to 1

Odds of a meteor landing on your house: 182,138,880,000,000 to 1

Chance of dying from a mountain lion attack in California: 32,000,000 to 1

Chance of an American home having at least one container of ice cream in the freezer: 9 in 10.

Now, I want you to consider what the odds are of this event happening: Going jogging in the middle of a weekday afternoon, through a completely empty neighborhood and running directly into the path of an old woman who happens to be crossing the street at the exact same time you are running by- so much so, that you have to stutter step to avoid a collision with her. I am guessing that it is somewhere between a meteor falling on my house and getting eaten by a mountain lion, and yet this happened to me the other day! I couldn't believe it! There was not a soul in the neighborhood but I almost took this old lady down. Crazy! Furthermore, I was biking the other day through my neighborhood and a car backing out of a driveway had to stop and wait for me to pass (I was the only person on the street, of course). Not that unusual in and of itself, right? But then the following day at a completely different time, I was running by the same house and the same car was backing out of the same driveway and had to wait for me to pass- again. How does this happen? What are the chances? I decided to find, just for your reading pleasure, more stories of coincidence. So after hours of Internet research on everything from synchronicity, coincidences, chaos theory, and UFOs, I found a few stories, that, if really true, will blow your mind. Try this one:

When Sue Hamilton was working alone in her office in July 1992 when the fax machine broke down. Unable to fix it, she decided to call her colleague Jason Pegler, who had set off home a little earlier. Finding his home number pinned up on a notice board, she called him and began to explain the problem. But Jason quickly stopped her: "I'm not at home", he explained. "I just happened to be walking past this phone booth and when it rang, and I answered it!" .
The number Sue found on the notice board was not Jason's home number at all. It was his employee number - which was the same as the number of the phone booth he was walking past when she called.

Or this one about a guy named Arthur Butterworth of England:

During the Second World War, while serving in the army, he ordered a secondhand book on music from a London bookseller. The book eventually reached him at his camp - disguised by the usual military postcode -in the grounds of Taverham Hall, near Norwich. Standing at the window of his army hut, he opened the parcel and, as he did so, a picture postcard - presumably used as a bookmark - fell out. The writing on one side showed the postcard had been written on 4 August 1913. To his astonishment, when he turned it over, the picture showed 'the exact view I had from my hut window at that very moment . . . Taverham Hall.'

Or try out these little jewels I lifted off a message board: (These are real, I am not making these up. (How could I? People are hilarious!)

During last summer I was dancing in my aunt’s living room. Her friend Josh was there and he said “do you like Journey?” and I told him that I have never ever listened to them and he said “Well I will get you a CD” That night we went to a steak house in downtown Des Moines. I saw something shiny in the grass so i walked over. It was a mix CD labeled “Journey’s Greatest Hits!" I was astonished. Apparently God wanted me to listen to Journey that day. -----Sarah

Okay, one time I was reading this billboard (out of my peripheral vision) and I thought that the billboard said ”Eat more chicken”, like for a Chick Fil-a sign. It really said ”Beat Morris Chestnut”(it was for a gym membership and they were saying that you could be buff and beat him at arm wrestling). Then, like a week later, it was replaced with a Chick Fil-A sign that said ”Eat more chicken”. So it was like I saw it before it was there. ------Judith

Back in gradeschool, while studying in my room for a Science exam, I got a nosebleed and it dripped on my notebook. Guess where it landed? On the word “blood”. I thought that was pretty cool! -------DJ

I was listening to “Don’t wanna miss a thing” by Aerosmith before bed one night. Then I decided to turn my cd player off in the middle of the song since I wanted to get some sleep. But, for some strange reason I had this sudden urge to turn my radio on. When I turned it on, the same song was playing right where I had left off when I turned my CD player off. -----Josh

The website where I found all these user-posted coincidences is here if you want to read them. Warning: there are 81 pages of them! And not all of them are as short and funny as these, just FYI...

Anyway, coincidence and freak chance events are something that Jacob and I talk about a lot. (Mostly because it seems every time we come home and want to pull into our driveway there is a lone dog-walker in the way) but it certainly makes you wonder, doesn't it? If you have any weird coincidences like this and want to share, comment here or send me a note on Facebook. I would be thoroughly entertained with any stories you had. Besides, you just had a weird coincidence and then sat down to read this blog post, didn't you? Coincidence???! Maybe.....