Stephen Grieve

I can recall (could hardly forget) two examples possibly worthy of reporting. 1. Last year at work (a hospital with I think 2,000+ employees), I found an identity swipe card in a corridor. I telephoned the lady in question and arranged to meet midway between our bases. When I handed it over, she remarked that she too had just found a swipe card, and recalled aloud a name that sounded so much like mine that I checked the clip-on card carrier in my pocket. It was empty, and the card she had left in the post room was indeed mine. She works in the EEG department, and I in Clinical Coding. We did not know each other, but I do know and have known a colleague and former colleague of hers, having worked in the EEG field myself (did VERs for Peter Fenwick in 1977). 2. In 1974 or '75, one evening, I thought to try an ESP experiment. I took a pack of playing cards and placed one, facing away from me, against my forehead with eyes closed, and predicted, getting it wrong. It was the King of Clubs. I replaced the card, shuffled, and repeated. I was wrong again, but again it was the King of Clubs. Appropriately surprised, I repeated the procedure, with an identical result. Appropriately shaken, I shuffled once more, and during this a card fell out: King of Clubs. I made no more attempts. The following day was the first of the flat racing season. In those days I was interested in horse racing, and though I had no betting interest on this occasion, I glanced at the Doncaster results on the day following that. One of the winners was King of Clubs, at 4-1. This racing result is certainly verifiable, though for some reason it has proved too tedious today per Google. I am a scientist by education (my degree was in botany), though I am not a 'scientific materialist'. My attitude to such occurrences is that something or someone, somewhere and/or on whatever level, is having a laugh.