Well here it is, the first Friday the 13th of 2009. Did you know the fear of Friday the 13th is called ‘paraskavedekatriaphobia’, well maybe you did, but I bet you didn’t know that my dad was born on Friday July 13th in 1917, he’s approaching his 92nd birthday so it hasn’t been bad luck for him so far.

I’m not a completely superstitious person, but I do treat such dates with a certain amout of respect, let’s put it this way, I definitely won’t be out in the garden with my chain saw today, even if the snow does melt!

Yes, another cold and miserable day, and to think that on the 18th January I felt like Spring was coming. I’ve just been on the ‘phone to my sister in Scotland and whilst we were talking she was watching a blue tit hang upside down on an icicle so it could drink from the drip at the bottom. How do they do that?

Anyway, to get back to the matter in hand. There seems to be no difinitive explanation as to the reason why Friday the 13th is considered a bad luck day. It seems the origins have been lost, not to say confused, by the mists of time.

Take a sprinkling of religions (various) add a pinch of folklore (international) and finish off with books (fact and fiction) and films (dubious) and allow these to evolve and mature over many years, and there you have it, Friday the 13th.

Or perhaps it could also be summed up as just a figment of human beings’ over active imaginations, fingers crossed, touch wood etc. etc.