What are the odds?

[pylon]

OK, ultra stoolborycro incoming, but the odds of this happening, have to be utterly astronomical. Like a billion to one. I don't even know if you could possibly calculate it.

So here I am at work, working on a loan for a customer. We had her old address on file, and it hadn't been updated yet. I was off on the weekend and never met her this time around, but picked up the file since I had dealt with her before. So after working on it for a few hours, I reach to pick up the phone and call her. Just as I am doing that, I get an email from the condo management company about an issue in the building, and stop dialing to look at the email. As the president of the condo board, I get all tenant emails sent to me. I read through the email, and the name of the tenant, is the name of the client I was just picking up the phone to call. Not a common name either. I look at the phone number and email, and it in fact the same person. Neither of us were aware we were living in the same building as she had moved in a month or so back, and I haven't been staying at that address for a couple months.

The odds are already astronomical enough to receive this email from her at any point in time on two completely unrelated matters involving both of us. But the fact, I stopped dialing the HER phone # on an unrelated matter at that exact moment I received this email from HER on another completely unrelated matter takes this thing into the "Um did I just break the matrix?" territory.

Anyway, both of us are completely blown away by what a ridiculously random coincidence this was.

Thanks for reading, and carry on with your lives.....

[Fuzz]

You should probably marry her and buy a lottery ticket.

[burn_this_city]

The sentinels are being deployed, standby for liquidation.

[Bring_Back_Shantz]

The odds that this would happen to someone, somewhere, at some time?
Pretty good.

The odds of you winning the lottery are basically zero, the odds of someone winning it is much closer to 1.

[ken0042]

When I was in England on a school trip (decades ago) I was traveling into London to meet my friends. I would buy a day pass that was normally £4.30 and I could use that on the Tube, British Rail, and buses. One day I bought my pass and it was only £4.10. I figured it was Saturday, so must be cheaper.

As I was getting off British Rail, they were doing the standard checking of tickets. That's when I found out I had bought the wrong one, and was subject to a £50 fine. I started to plead my case when the one guy noticed my Canadian flag pin. He asked if I was from Canada, and whereabouts. He also asked if I knew his cousin "Gord" who lived somewhere in Central Canada. I played the whole "yes, I think I might know him" card, and was let off with a warning. The ticket checker said he was coming to Canada in a few months, and when I saw him, I owed him a beer or two. Sure- no problem I said.

I get home and start telling this story to my friends at work. Everybody is sharing a laugh, when one of my co-workers, named Gord pipes up "I have a cousin who works for British Rail. He is coming to visit me in a couple of months." I had that sudden realization that both my friend and this guy were both also Pakistani, which solidified the fact that in this case I did know "Gord from Central Canada."

And yes, I bought a few beers when we went out.

[GreenLantern]

I for one welcome our new condo emailing loan applying overlords.

This kind of thing happens every 0.00232 seconds in Saskatchewan fyi.

[SportsJunky]

It's The Secret dude. Oprah says it happens all the time.

[peter12]

Once when I was watching final Jeopardy, I guessed "What is Chicago?" even though I didn't even remotely know the answer, and guess what, I was right. WHAT ARE THE ODDS?!

[pylon]

Originally Posted by Bring_Back_Shantz

The odds that this would happen to someone, somewhere, at some time?
Pretty good.

The odds of you winning the lottery are basically zero, the odds of someone winning it is much closer to 1.

I get that, but could you even calculate a formula to account for this.

Population of Calgary 1.3 million +/-

People of legal age to take a loan? Let's call it 700,000?

People shopping for a car? 10,000?

But how do you factor the timing of the call and email being exact?

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

You should probably marry her and buy a lottery ticket.

Nah, that probably was his life lottery moment.

[mrkajz44]

Well, the chances of that happening are 100%...now.

[Weitz]

Stalker.

Run.

[MrMastodonFarm]

During a family vacation to Disneyland when I was about.. 11(?) Mom finally got to pick a ride and selected It's A Small World. In the line up for this thrilling adventure she saw a girl she went to nursing school with years prior. They both cackled with glee while suggesting that yes, it was in fact a small world, afterall.

No idea what the chances of that actually are, but the chances of MMF and his siblings being utterly embarrassed was 100%.

[Wormius]

Expecting Han Solo meme. Leaving disappointed.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by mrkajz44

Well, the chances of that happening are 100%...now.

Correction: they were always 100%, given the state of the particles in the universe and the consistency of the laws of physics. We just didn't know they were 100% until now.

[You Need a Thneed]

Some things like this are improbable. However, in our daily activities, there are thousands upon thousands of opportunities for improbable things to happen. The chances of any one of them happening is very small. However, the chances of something improbable happening is, in fact, nearly certain.

[Leeman4Gilmour]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Correction: they were always 100%, given the state of the particles in the universe and the consistency of the laws of physics. We just didn't know they were 100% until now.

Spoiler!

[Nyah]

This is somewhat a ‘What are the odds’ experience:

About a month ago I drove downtown to work from the SE because I had to leave a bit earlier that day. I decided to leave work at 3:10 to give myself a head start so I wouldn’t get caught in traffic. As I was taking the off ramp from Memorial onto southbound Deerfoot, everyone hits the breaks because about 5 cars up, a window van had just lost a large pane of glass on the road. So that delayed me about 5-10 seconds as I went into the right hand lane to go around. Then in between Blackfoot & Barlow-Peigan, everyone again slams on their breaks and I can see a bunch of white smoke coming up about 10 cars in front of me. It was a pretty decent sized accident, I don’t think there were injuries but there were 3 cars involved in the middle & left lane, and a bunch of debris in the two right lanes. I managed to squeak by, only to come to another screeching halt because there was another accident that had just occurred on the Calf Rope bridge.

The whole time I was thinking that it was a good thing I left 10 minutes earlier than I was planning because that would have been a complete nightmare of a commute, but then I realized that if the van with windows hadn’t lost a pane of glass on the off-ramp from Memorial, I may have been stuck in the middle of the first accident and if the first accident hadn’t happened I may have been stuck in the middle of the second one on the Calf Rope. So...what are the odds that a window van will lose a pane of glass and potentially save me from a couple car accidents? Pretty good, I guess!

[prarieboy]

So what the OP is saying is that Matthews is as good as ours come Saturday. Excellent!

[Huntingwhale]

Originally Posted by pylon

I get that, but could you even calculate a formula to account for this.

Population of Calgary 1.3 million +/-

People of legal age to take a loan? Let's call it 700,000?

People shopping for a car? 10,000?

But how do you factor the timing of the call and email being exact?

This is literally proof that God exists.

Repent.