Norwich City/Purple Gang Coincidences

My first coincidence: In June 2004 I was sitting in the departure lounge of Dinard Airport in France, awaiting a flight back to the UK. Next to me were two strangers who struck up a conversation. One was from Norfolk (Swaffham?) while the other was from London. After a while, the Londoner announced that he was a huge Chelsea fan and asked the other if he liked football. “Not really” came the reply. “But I sort of follow Norwich City. In fact, one of the few matches I’ve ever seen was between Norwich and Chelsea, about 30 years ago. It was abandoned five minutes from the end because of fog”. “League Cup Semi-Final!” enthused the Londoner, “I was at that game too – that's amazing!” But little did they know that I too – despite living in Colchester and having no real interest in either team – had also been at that very same football match, in 1972…… In fact, I would imagine that if one takes a planeload of 150 or more passengers, the likelihood of any three individuals on the flight having something obscure in common is quite high. The remarkable part is the combination of circumstances that allows that “something obscure” to come to light. My second even more eerie coincidence: As a student in Leeds in the mid-70s, I was hitchhiking back to university from Colchester one day, and ended up at a roundabout on the A1 near Sheffield. As I stood there with my thumb out, I suddenly found myself humming a catchy but obscure song called “Granny takes a Trip” by the Purple Gang, a group that had known a small degree of popularity amongst listeners to pirate radio ships in the 1960s. A van then came spluttering round the roundabout before dying an apparent death on the roadside right next to me. Ignoring me completely, the driver got out, swore loudly, lifted up the bonnet, fiddled about and somehow managed to get the van restarted. He thought for a bit, then looked in my direction and asked where I was going. I told him. “Hop in” he said, “I’m delivering some shampoo and stuff to a hairdressers in Burley in Leeds”. The salon was, in fact, 100 metres from my student flat so I was delighted, and grateful that the van had broken down where it had. As I am nosy to the point of indiscretion (which must help in the uncovering of coincidences), I asked the driver at one point if he had always been a hair products rep. “No way!” he replied, “I used to be a musician”. “In a group?” “Yes, but you wouldn’t have heard of them”. “Try me”, I said. “The Purple Gang” he retorted, “There, I said you wouldn’t have heard of them”. It even turned out that the van driver actually co-wrote "Granny takes A Trip". Similarly to my first coincidence, this particular coincidence would still have existed even if the van had happened to have broken down half a mile further on; in the sense that it would have been amazing enough that the writer of the song I was humming had driven past me. Even then, it would also have been perfectly feasible for me to have had a lift in the van without our conversation ever turning to the driver’s past life. It's the finding out that matters.