I consider myself a mostly reasonable and rational person. I don’t have a problem living with my black cat, she’s crossed my path a gazillion times; I’ve walked under many ladders without fear of mishap; I’ve sat at tables of 13 without incurring catastrophes; I have never felt the need to throw salt over my left shoulder; I have seen any number of lone magpies without a single urge to search for another; I can even admit to having a cracked mirror in my hallway (then again, I didn’t break it, I cannot speak for the culprit’s recent luck or lack thereof).

But I do have my own set of irrational superstitions which I’d swear by, but for the fact I do realise they’re certifiably crazy. A couple of them are bog standard, garden variety delusions, but others are my very own inexplicably weird beliefs.I always touch wood (my head absolutely counts) especially before saying things like “ooh, it’s a quiet day” because I know how quickly things can go pear-shaped on the labour ward even when it started off calm. I wouldn’t want to jinx it for everyone. I firmly believe in the law of sod so, for example, I know better than to leave house without adequate rain gear, even on a beautiful day. I’d even argue that she who defies the law of Mr Murphy and doesn’t take her umbrella is responsible for the inevitably ensuing rain. I routinely overpack because I can’t risk alienating the sun by taking it for granted. And since I know that the best way to prevent holiday sickness is to pack the remedies, well, my travel first-aid kit is…. consequential.

Not everyone is affected by The Night-time Hair Goblin, but it’s real. I will go to bed having tamed the frizz using all available technologies, from intensively smoothing lotions to exceedingly hot tongs. I will wake 7 restful hours later (no night sweats, no evidence of sleepwalking, no nightmares) with my hair in a dishevelled mess (I’m talking crazy 90 degree kinks) that can only be explained by the supernatural. There’s no known amulet; silk pillowcases offer no protection.

Most of us are acquainted with the sellotape imp. This mischievous creature makes the tape edge impossible to locate, and causes the sticky sides to curl up and twist, resulting in a useless ball of frustration and despair. This magical creature breeds around November and reaches peak peskiness in time for Christmas.

Then there’s the sock-gobbling goblin that resides in my washing machine.  Socks enter washing machine in pairs, but come out single. Said goblin will vomit them out in random places, like fur balls, several months later, you’ll never know why.

I don’t know about you, but I have cupboards elves. These guys mess with your head because no matter how much you declutter, your cupboard remains full.

Monica from Friends has the exact same problem. I recently experienced an unexpected decluttering session. I was only supposed to get our imitation (I know, the shame!) Christmas tree out of storage. I ended up removing 5 binbags full of stuff-that-might-one-day-return-to- usefulness (aka junk, this stuff hasn’t been useful for years) yet there is zero visible increase in my cupboard space. In a few days, when I do the depressing reverse-Christmas-engineering, namely undressing the fake (but still flamboyant) fir, returning it and the baubles and the neatly coiled tree lights to the decluttered cupboard, it ought to fit easily, right? Reader, it won’t.

Another time I removed an insane amount of pretty boxes that I’d kept, you know, just in case, from a different cupboard. Loyal reader, I parted with several dozen decorative  but (let’s face it) unnecessary boxes, and a plethora of other junk for good measure, filled 4 recycling bags and one bin bag. That cupboard is still full. Tell me that’s not wizardry.

I don’t know which cheeky supernatural beings to attribute this next one to, but you’ll have experienced it too: finding lost items as soon as you’ve replaced them. You will have searched high and low for said misplaced item, and you’ve concluded it has vanished into thin air (even though you could swear you lost it at home, so technically it is findable). You reluctantly hit the ‘buy now’ button on your unethical-but-diabolically-convenient app, and voilà! the vamoosed object magically reappears. Result? You have wasted hours of your life searching, you’ve spent wasteful amounts of cash replacing it, but you’ve ended up with an extra item for your cupboard elves to gaslight you with later!

My biggest nemesis, however, is the humble PC. Be it a bog standard desktop or a fancy ipad, it is unquestionably inhabited by unfriendly gremlins that deliberately sabotage my attempts to complete seemingly simple tasks. I once had a laptop that would randomly delete paragraphs. That one was particularly spiteful. 

I fear that this is just a me-problem but I’ve learned to dread requests to ‘please sign the attached document and send it back…’

So. Many. Pitfalls. 

Firstly, I’m bound to be on a tight deadline because this important email will have reached my junk folder for reasons I cannot begin to fathom. Whoever sent it thinks I cannot be serious; as lame excuses go, it’s up there with ‘the goldfish ate my homework.’ Next, I’d love to be able to use the stylus on the ipad but it’s inevitably out of charge when I need it. Then, it only works if I can figure out how to make that particular document editable, which isn’t often because the ipad gremlin usually hides the drop down menu with that option, and on the day it deigns to give you access to said option, and your stylus works, and you autograph your document, you’re still not out of the woods. The malicious imps will save your monikered document, but you won’t know where. Google drive? Apple drive? Samsung drive? One drive? The hard drive? So you send the original, unsigned document to your printer. But wait, your printer is no longer visible to your computer, which is currently convinced it can connect to a printer that you replaced several years ago. Maybe it can. But this doesn’t advance your cause. Eventually the computer gremlins negotiate with the printer gremlins and you can now sign the hard copy with an actual pen. Now you merely have to upload a copy  of your newly autographed document to the correct email address. Scanners have recently been made redundant by phone cameras (now you just have to work out how to avoid the hand-phone-shadow, that’s for another day) but previously, they would send your scanned document to a very secret location with an impossible-to-crack code name. Needless to say you’d end up sending an upside down copy of your document, assuming you ever even  located it. 

So. Many. Tears.

Thankfully, many websites have restrained (retrained?) their imps, allowing me to get things done without being perma-frazzled.  But, oh my days, the work computer gremlins remain the most spiteful. They cackle at your distress as you beg for a computer,  any computer, to make meaningful contact with one, just one of the printers.

Look, I know, these mischievous creatures aren’t real. But amid all the imaginary goblins, elves, imps and gremlins, am I the only one who, equally irrationally, believes in kind magic: mother earth,  guardian angels, fairy godmothers? You know, like when you have a near-miss (either as the cyclist or the driver) and you can’t help wondering how it was averted…Or when all 3 kids are chundering but somehow you don’t get sick…Or how, even though you feel you’ll never know enough at work, you (and your amazing colleagues) manage to keep your patients safe against all odds… Or when my broken, sent-for-recycling coffee machine found its way back to me, fully functional (I kid you not)… Or when all the traffic lights turn green as you approach them… Or when you wake up rested, having slept unexpectedly well… Or when the rain starts one minute after you’ve cycled home and you didn’t get wet… Or when you win a prize in a tombola, your lottery ticket has 3 winning numbers, or you find a tenner on the ground… Or when you see a rainbow, or the year’s first snowdrop… Or when you get an unexpected refund from an airline after getting through to their customer services in under 5 rings… ok, obviously not that one! Or you discover that you have a new subscriber…

Or simply waking up on new year’s day, happily resolving to make zero resolutions: because maintaining the status quo, in which life goes on in a suitably mundane fashion, peppered with small joys (and maybe the odd minor character-building setback), that will keep our guardian angels busy enough!