By Coincidence We Find Spike Milligan's Grave

Nothing too dramatic today as far as coincidences go but it's another small personal experience from one of our holidays.

We were staying in a 16th century cottage in Rye, East Sussex, England. That's the row of cottages at the front of the photo. The picture was taken from the church bell tower opposite.

One day my wife and I set off for a long walk heading in the direction of the sea. As we crossed some open fields I started talking about Spike Milligan, a British/Irish comedian, writer, actor, musician and poet who died back in 2002. Nothing specific, just general chat as we walked.

After crossing the fields I wasn't too sure which way to head but saw a sign saying Winchelsea, so I suggested we went in that direction. We approached the village which was highish on a hill and looked to be old and interesting.

We made our way through the old gatehouse and into the village. It was typically, old fashioned England with a big church at the center. Though I don't belong to any organised religion I like churches: the way they feel, the atmosphere inside and so on. They are usually full of history.


We spent an age in the church and my wife even made a 'rainbow' woollen bracelet while there, which she attached to her rucksack. As we were leaving my wife noticed a photo of Spike Milligan in the church!

She beckoned me over and, sure enough, it was Spike's picture - with directions of how find his grave in the churchyard. This was completely unbeknown to us. We had no idea where he lived when alive or where he was buried. We now know that prior to his death he was living in Rye.

We found his grave outside and paid our respects. In typical Milligan humour his stone bears the words "Dúirt mé leat go raibh mé breoite". This is Irish and translates to "I told you I was ill." I have since read that the church would not allow this to be written in English.

Below is a very silly video showing Spike Milligan - he's the 'woman' in the horned helmet!


Further Reading:
Ghostly Rye: The Most Haunted Town In England
The Unexpected Meeting Coincidence
An Unlikely Coincidence Meeting

Nine Questions Including The Most Difficult Of All

One of the Wise Men of Ancient Greece, the Sage of Miletus, was asked nine of the most perplexing questions of the age. He answered them without hesitation.

1. What is the oldest of all things?
"God, because He always existed."

2. What is the most beautiful of all things?
"The Universe, because it is the work of God."

3. What is the greatest of all things?
"Space, because it contains all that has been created."

4. What is the most constant of all things?
"Hope, because it still remains with man,
after he has lost everything else."

5. What is the best of all things?
"Virtue, because without it there is nothing good."

6. What is the quickest of all things?
"Thought, because in less that a minute
it can fly to the end of the universe."

7. What is the strongest of all things?
"Necessity, which makes man face all of the dangers of life."

8. What is the easiest of all things?
"To give advice."

9. What is the most difficult of all things?
"To know thyself."
Photo: © Luc Viatour

Gurdjieff Transmitting And Receiving Energy

I've always been interested in human energy and if it can be controlled or increased. I feel we could all live much, much longer lives if we could properly unravel the secret of prana or chi - as some call this energy.

This came to mind recently when researching more on George Ivanovitch Gurdijieff. I mentioned him in my post Get Keyed Up Said The Witch And Gurdjieff Agrees. He's the bloke who reckoned that we mostly sleep our way through life on automatic.

What I came across was that Gurdjieff appears to have been able to control this energy to revitalise himself and others. The following is a piece from Fritz Peters, who met up with Gurdjieff while he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

"When we reached Gurdjieff's apartment, he led me down a long hall to a dark bedroom, indicated the bed, told me to lie down and said, 'This is your room for as long as you need it.'

I laid down on the bed and he left the room but did not close the door. I felt such enormous relief and such excitement at seeing him that I began to cry uncontrollably and then my head began to pound. I could not rest and walked to the kitchen where I found him sitting at the table.

He looked alarmed when he saw me, and asked what was wrong. I said I needed some aspirin or something for my headache, but he shook his head, stood up, and pointed to the other chair by the table.

'No medicine,' he said firmly, 'I give you coffee. Drink as hot as you can.'

I sat at the table while he heated the coffee and then served it to me. He then walked across the small room to stand in front of the refrigerator and watched me. I could not take my eyes off him.

I remember being slumped over the table, sipping at my coffee, when I began to feel a strange uprising of energy within myself - I stared at him, automatically straightened up, and it was as if a violent electric blue light emanated from him and entered into me. As this happened, I could feel the tiredness drain out of me, but at the same moment his body slumped and it was as if he had been drained of life.

I looked at him, amazed, and when he saw me sitting erect, smiling and full of energy, he said quickly: 'You are all right now - watch food on stove - I must go.'

There was something urgent in his voice and I leaped to my feet to help him but he waved me away and limped to his room.

I was convinced that he knew how to transmit energy from himself to others.

It also became obvious within the next few minutes that he knew how to renew his own energy quickly. I was amazed when he returned to the kitchen to see the change in him: he looked like a young man again, alert, smiling and full of good spirits."

Gurdjieff had learned how to transmit and receive energy. If one man can do this so can we all.

Energy takes us into the world perhaps of Chakras and the like within the body. There is a lot of information on this on the Internet so I'm not about to dish up a recipe. But if we can take the time to learn to fully wake up, who knows, we may just find the secret to lasting health and extremely long lives.

Further Reading:
Slow Down Your Heartbeats To Live Longer
Gey Keyed Up Said The Witch And Gurdjieff Agrees

The Worlds Biggest Unsolved Mystery

There are many mysteries in life: the solar system, quantum physics, what we actually are and where we came from and so on. I've even written a few post on mysteries such as Knowledge Learned From Fish Like Aliens, Ancient Secret Transmitters Of Energy, Exclusive Photos Of The Stonehenge Mystery but today I want to raise the biggest mystery of them all - and this is how it came to my attention ...

It was a day like any other until I looked out of the window. In the distance I could see just one thing hanging on the washing line at the bottom of the garden - a solitary sock.

I went to investigate and, sure enough, my eyes hadn't deceived me. A single sad looking sock was gently blowing in the breeze, looking quite lost and all forlorn, a tear drop was trickling down one cheek.

I reached to remove the red peg holding the sock to the line but a voice said, "Please don't, I want to stay here until Sidney returns."

It turns out that Sonia, who was the remaining sock, had been deserted by her partner and she wanted to wait until he returned. She felt lost and useless without him.

I discovered that Sonia sock had been alone now for the best part of a day and had been racking her elastic as to why Sidney would have left her. She's been a good partner, their sox life was good and she had kept herself in good shape. She wasn't saggy or baggy. Her figure was trim and her polyester skin sprung back into position after she had been used. She felt lost and useless without him. The whole purpose of her existence was gone.

I left her with her thoughts to see if I could find Sydney.

The mystery fascinated me (and upset me as well, of course) so I set off to try and find out more about these sock creatures, their habits and indeed why Sidney had disappeared.

Shhhhhh! Now be very quiet as, being a modern man, I'm pretty sure I know where a lot of socks live. I want to infiltrate their home to see what's happening. Perhaps there has been some form of sock flu or goodness knows what.

Ah, this looks like the place (photo right). If I open it up gently - whoops! What on earth? No, definitely not socks ... mustn't linger I have a job to do.

I'll creep quietly round to the other side of the room and see if I can get it right this time. Yes, this is definitely the place. I'm sure I've been here before. It's quite magical actually as it keeps getting filled up with more socks without me doing anything - most odd.

I think the socks must mate, must be something to do with their sox life that Sonia was talking about.


So here we are at the sock den. Now the first thing you notice is that they are virtually all paired off and are intertwined. This is the mating process and goes on for ages. Maybe a week or a fortnight or sometimes even a month or more. Tantric has nothing on them.

I heard of one pair of socks that had been intertwined for the best part of a year and were so old that they had to be removed to wherever it is that good socks go once their usefulness is over. But they died happy.

Sometimes, when new socks arrive, they are a bit shy and tend to just lie next to each other but after a while they get the idea and copy the others.

Then there's the special group who all look identical and end up with whoever is the nearest. They frequently swap partners over and over. But they don't normally talk about such things, it's all a bit hush, hush.

This is all very well but there are no single socks in the den and certainly no Sidney.

Not getting very far with my enquiries I went to the top and asked the wife, "Where might you find a missing sock?"

"Under the bed, in the washing machine or in the dirty linen basket," she answered without even giving the matter a second thought.

"Erm, right .."

"Bedroom, utility room, right hand side of bedroom," she said wearily.

I already knew that, of course.

I did a thorough search of the wife's suggestions - well you have to now and again, but to no avail. No Sidney anywhere. I need some more clues so I went to see Sonia Sock again.

"So," I said in my best detective voice, "Had Sidney been seeing someone else - or maybe you have?"

This took her by surprise. "No, no, of course not. I have seen Sidney looking lustfully at a silky stocking with a lacy top but it's all in his head. And as for me, when we have our communal wash, I have admired Wally Walking Sock - so well padded and manly looking but I would never take it further. Oh and Sidney did get entangled with a thong thing once but I'm sure it was all very innocent."

This got me, erm, thinking: silky stockings and thong things - but after half an hour I was back on the job. I continued my enquiries.

The local newspaper was a great help. Sidney missing hit the headlines. As you can gather not a lot happens where I live. And in came reports of several Sidney sightings.

Some of these sightings were a little disturbing and worrying. I must warn you that the following photos may upset sensitive soles or even single socks on the loose. It looks like Sidney may have been on the booze ...


... and even worse may have been in collision with a car.


This was probably the lowest point and I kept the newspapers away from Sonia, who was still fluttering on the washing line.

Some of the other photos were much more hopeful. People were searching our house and garden for Sidney with their cameras at the ready - below is a selection of these photos.




I went to the bottom of the garden and showed Sonia the best photos. It cheered her up in a tearful sort of way and she continued to blow in the wind.

I didn't really know what else to say so I said I'd keep in touch and that the case definitely wasn't closed.

As I walked away I heard her singing softly into the breeze ...

"I had a sock
Sidney was his name
Since he left me
I've never been the same
'Cause I love my sock
Sidney where can you be? Where can you be?

Well, darlin', now that you're gone
I don't know what I'll do
All the time and all my love for you-ou-ou .."
It brought a lump to my throat, I must stop eating so many sherbert lemons.

But not all is lost. There have been sightings of Sidney and he seems to be on his travels judging by the photos.



Then there was this postcard (viewcard) which arrived from Sidney Sock to Sonia! It's from northern Germany and the pic is of the restaurant and cafe Zur Fahre in Bonsberg, Gelting. I didn't do too good a job of scanning the postcard but I think you can see it okay.

It's a puzzle! Whatever next? The mystery deepens.



I see the cafe/restaurant/hotel above has a website Fahr Cafe & Hotel - Bonsberg. Will see if I can find anything out from them about Sidney Sock, now where is my German phrase book!

I contacted Germany following the postcard above but they didn't seem to understand me. Their reply sounded something like, "Sidney Sock, Was is das?"

It's amazing, to think we have small children, knee high to a grasshopper, speaking English in England and yet in Germany ... oh well.

Perhaps you have some ideas as to what happened to Sidney Sock, you might even have come across this mystery yourself. Maybe it was an alien abduction, a worm-hole or even a black hole in the washing machine. Perhaps he slipped into a parallel existence where all of the other missing socks hang out. I don't know the answer myself.

Poor Sonia.

Alex Kingston And Her Ghostly Encounter

One of the actors appearing in the new supernatural (UK) ITV television series, Marchlands, has her own ghostly tale to tell.

Alex Kingston, former ER star, says of her own supernatural experience:

"I remember watching my daughter interacting with someone that I couldn't see at our home in LA ... it frightened the life out of me.

At around the same time, I came home one evening and there was this awful smell in the living room - a bit like rotting flesh. It was totally inexplicable. That night, the smell shifted to our bedroom and the temperature dropped dramatically.

I'm convinced it was the ghostly presence of my grandad. He had been desperate to see Salome (her daughter) and had been bowled over by the ultrasound pictures of her that I'd sent to him in England.

He died before he could meet her, and I reckon this was his way of 'seeing' her from beyond the grave. I believe he visited us in LA."

Marchlands, in which Alex appears, is about three intertwined families who live in the same house at three different times - 1968, 1987 and 2010. They are all linked by the ghost of a little girl who becomes the 'imaginary' friend of one of the child characters in the story. Similar, in a way, to her own experience.

Alex added, "I'm convinced there's something in it. A person generates all this energy during their lifetime; it has to go somewhere after they die. Why shouldn't it manifest itself in spirit form?"

The five part series, Marchlands, starts on (UK) ITV1 at 9pm on Thursday the 3rd of February, 2011.

Further Reading:
Where Is Heaven?
The Voices Of Dead People Captured On Tape
Ghostly Rye: The Most Haunted Town In England

67 Not Out Readers Coincidence Stories - 13

67 Not Out Readers' coincidence stories today - my thanks to the contributors. If you have an interesting coincidence story you would like published on this blog please use the Contact Button at the top of the page. Many thanks, Mike.

Coincidental Neighbors
A girlfriend of mine is splitting up property with her ex. She decides to surrender their main house for a smaller one they own in a different neighborhood some distance away. She's concerned by the possible lack of friends and support in the new neighborhood.

Discussing it with an acquaintance, he says he has a friend that lives two doors down from her new place. Bingo, instant neighbor. Another friend reports a professional contact within two blocks of the new house. Finally, her aunt is able to connect her to yet another friend in the new neighborhood.

Seems like a sign ... and my friend is prepared to move, encouraged by such a series of coincidences that lead her to social contacts in her newly chosen place.

P.S. We're in Southern California, where you can live in a suburb for years and never know your neighbors. So moving into a strange new neighborhood and already connected to new neighbors is remarkable indeed!

- Liz Sutherland

Ancestors Coincidence
Here's a couple of coincidences. The first one. About 10 years ago I first contacted my great aunt, who told me my father's great grandmother and her sister, Faith and Phoebe, had come from England, a small village called Morchard Bishop. I phoned my sister, who had recently moved from America to England to tell her. Without knowing anything about these ancestors my sister had also named her two daughters Faith and Phoebe and had bought her house there, 2 miles from Morchard Bishop.

Another little one. When we were very little kids my brother and I were given silver dollars by a visiting guest. In a fight with him I threw his coin into the garden. In looking for the coin later that day a grown-up said take a rock and throw it where you threw the coin. I (a lousy throw) threw a rock and it landed on the coin, which popped into the air like a tiddlywink and I was able to find it.

- JC

Further Reading:
67 Not Out Readers Coincidence Stories
The Book And Suffragette Coincidence
The Coincidence Of The Devil

Hitler And His Divining Rod For Dark Forces

Symbols can play a powerful role in our lives, they can trigger something previously hidden deep inside us. Unfortunately, however, symbols are not always for the power of good - as illustrated in the following post:

A 19 year old, rather odd, psychologically troubled man was in Vienna roaming the ancient Heldenplatz trying to sell his postcard sized pictures and paintings. He wasn't being too successful and went into the Hofburg Museum, perhaps for shelter or maybe even inspiration.

As he wandered through the exhibits, not really paying too much attention, he heard a tour guide addressing some foreign tourists. This simple, almost coincidental meeting, may well have changed the course of the world.

As the young man later said, "The guide pointed to an ancient spearhead ... and then I heard the words which were to change my whole life: 'There is a legend associated with this spear that whoever claims it, and solves it's secrets, holds the destiny of the world in his hands for good or evil.'"

In this instance the destiny of the world was to be changed in an evil way, for the man was Adolf Hitler.

As for the spearhead it has been named many things including the Sword of St. Maurice, the Spear of Destiny and also the Holy Lance or Spear of Longinus. The latter was supposedly the spear a Roman Centurion had used to pierce the side of Jesus as he was crucified on the cross. The spear was said to have magical powers with 45 emperors having carried it on the battlefield to ensure victory.

Hitler wrote of the spear: "I knew with immediacy that this was an important moment in my life. And yet I could not divine why an outwardly Christian symbol should make such an impression upon me. I stood there quietly gazing upon it for several minutes quite oblivious to the scene in the Schatzkammer around me. It seemed to carry some hidden inner meaning which evaded me, a meaning which I felt I inwardly knew yet could not bring to consciousness ... the spear appeared to be some sort of magical medium of revelation for it brought the world ideas into such close and living perspective that human imagination became more real than the world of sense.

I felt as though I myself held it in my hands before in some earlier century of history - that I myself had once claimed it as my talisman of power and held the destiny of the world in my hands. Yet how could this be possible?"

Somehow the spear / symbol had awakened something within Hitler - perhaps a past life.

In one report, after taking mescalin, Hitler is said to have tapped into the Akashic Records where he glimpsed images of his past lives as if part of a movie. He also saw himself as a character of Wagner's opera Parsifal where he was the villain, Klingsmor, the embodiment of evil.

Adolf Hitler, as we know, rose to prominence in Germany. Prior to Word War II on the 12th of March 1938, as he prepared to enter Vienna to announce the annexation of Austria, he felt he desperately needed the Holy Lance - so that his grip on power could not be loosened.

As the crowds shouted Sieg Heil, with Nazi salutes all around him, his mind is said to have been fixed on taking hold of the Spear of Destiny, which he first saw in 1913. Hitler and Himmler went to where the spear was displayed. Himmler returned alone while Hitler spent time with the spear or Holy Lance. He 'knew' he now had the whole world in his hands.

Adolf Hitler Vienna, Austria 1938
It's strange how one of Christendom's most sacred relics ended up with the Hitler empire. The spear, along with imperial crown jewels, were transported under SS guard to Nurenberg where they were exhibited for the public to view at St.Katherine's Church.

Hitler is often said to have had occult leanings and the Spear of Destiny is sometimes described as having acted like a divining rod for dark forces seeking entry into our world of matter. Who's to say if there is any truth in this: but a man, who Mussolini thought looked like Charlie Chaplin and described him as 'a mad little clown,' certainly made his mark in history.

Further Reading:
Visualisation Helped Man Escape From WW2 Prison
The Old Soldier Coincidence Story
WWI Grandfather's Bugle Found On Market Stall

Photos:
René Hanke (GFDL) via Wikimedia Commons
Bundesarchiv, Bild 119-5243 via Wikimedia Commons