The 48 hour rule

You must have heard of the 48 hour rule, right? No? OK, well let me give you an example:

You are chatting with a friend, and randomly into the conversation comes a subject you don't usually talk about such as "What was your favourite sweet (candy to any American readers!) when you were a youngster?", to which the reply was "Curly Wurly". Within 48 hours you will have heard Curly Wurlys mentioned by someone else, on TV, in a newspaper or whatever. That's the 48 hour rule. Any questions? Good.

So why do I mention it? A couple of days ago the subject of the software Sibelius cropped up very briefly in a conversation with a friend and I mentioned that I had another friend who was a close friend (are you following this?) of the brothers who originally wrote the software Sibelius. I also mentioned that this friend and his wife now live in her native Germany and had done so for a few years. They had both sung with me in Glasgow Chamber Choir and we had subsequently been amongst the founder members of Glasgow Renaissance Singers (who for some bizarre other-worldly reason are now called Cathures). End of conversation.

So I was walking down Byres Rd in the west end of Glasgow yesterday morning, thoroughly enjoying not being at church, and heading for a coffee shop when I noticed that blocking the front door of said emporium was a pushchair as its unseen owner was presumably in the process of leaving. As I reached the door I was prepared to administer a loud EXCUSE ME when I looked straight into the eyes of the pushchair owner who was my German friend and her husband (the friend whose friend wrote Sibelius)!

Spooky or what?

They were in Scotland only for a couple of days while doing some house-related business.

The 48 hour rule. Never fails. Sometimes.