About 18 months ago, Paul introduced me to podcasts, and specifically to Dan Klass and The Bitterest Pill. For a year and a half I've listened with interest. Dan's son Hudson steals the show every time, and Dan himself restores my faith in parenthood. I've been catching up on podcasts and have only just got round to listening to Pill #89. The first half of the show is about Hallowe'en - fairly standard DK fare. But the second half has struck such a chord with me. The vaguely religious upbringing (after my mum fell out with pretty much everyone at our church when I was 13 we stopped going), the observation that so many people attending church were just going through the motions, and the pleading with God for a sign, support, even just a feeling that he exists and gives a shit about me.

I have a frustrated relationship with God (if indeed there is such an entity). I have seen supposedly devout people doing some really undevout things. When my school held a mock election, the local priest who ran our CU told me I shouldn't vote Green because David Ike was in the Green Party (he may even have been the leader at the time - I can't remember) and he went round saying he was the Son of God. Whilst I have tended to vote Lib Dem (mainly because there were no Green candidates in the constituencies) I lean back to the Greens even now. You also only have to look at the news to see the butchery being carried out by Christians, Jews, Muslims etc in the name of religion. They all believe they are right, that God is on their side and that their cause is worth dying for. And you have Warren Jeffs raping 14-year-old girls because he says it is God's will.

The closest I have ever come to feeling God was on my Part II Geology mapping project. Despite it being August, we bore the brunt of some hideous weather: low cloud, reducing visibility to maybe 5m and howling gales. The weather would come rolling in so quickly. On one occasion I could see the cloud coming up the valley towards me (I was in a gulley mapping volcanics). Within 30 seconds I was enveloped in cloud. I could no longer see the bottom of the valley, and I could only just see the point of curvature of the hill above me. My only option (as without a GPS mapping in 5m visibility is as difficult as mapping in woodland) was to climb up out of the valley, onto the ridge, set my compass north and start walking. There was a road circling my area, and the northern part of it was closest. As I walked, compass in hand, hood up, I was suddenly aware of the force of nature, of the wind louder than I had ever heard, roaring up the valley to the west of me. If God was ever going to show Himself to me, that would be how to do it.

But that's been the only time, and I have struggled for proof. I am a scientist and I need proof. I don't take leaps of faith. I know proof denies faith (and you can quote H2G2 all you like about Man getting killed on the next zebra crossing). Paul and I both feel envious of each other's position on matters of faith. Paul is so terrified of what would happen if he goes to Hell, that he sometimes thinks it would be easier to not believe in God or eternal life. I am so terrified of oblivion, of ceasing to exist, that it would be easier if I was sure that there was life after death. I have been to psychics/tarot card readers/mediums, but none of them have ever convinced me. Such people are at best masters of neurolinguistic programming, at worst con artists. If you are in any doubt, watch Derren Brown's seance, where he gets them to conjure the spirit of a dead woman (who never existed and whose photo was posed by a very much alive model who was sitting off-set the whole time). Clairvoyancy is, frankly, bollocks.

We remember coincidences. We remember our friend calling our phone and us saying "Ooh I was just thinking about you" - we don't remember all the times we think of our friend and they fail to ring. An example: in the past four years my great aunt, grandfather and grandmother on my mum's side have all died. At Aunty Bee Bee's cremation, I looked out of the window of the crematorium as the curtain came round the coffin. A blackbird, which had been hopping about on the grass, came right up to the window and looked in. I thought it was nice, as Bee Bee had always given me RSPB membership, in memory of Uncle Kenneth, her and Grannie's brother, who was a keen bird-watcher. A few weeks later, a requiem mass was held for Bee Bee. I couldn't go to Shropshire for it, so while the mass was going on I walked from the NHM (where I was working) to Hyde Park, and I sat on a bench thinking about her for a couple of hours. Again, during this time, a blackbird hopped out from a bush and came right up to me and stood under the bench for about five minutes. Grandpa died a year later, and Grannie died in January of this year. I was in the USA when Grandpa died so I couldn't go to his funeral. After Grannie's cremation, Paul mentioned that he had seen two blackbirds outside, which were then joined by a third. He said that had they then flown off together, even he would have fallen to pieces. Finally, the morning we moved into our new flat, while Paul was getting the key I was waiting with the car in case the furniture we had ordered was delivered. As I waited, a blackbird flew onto the grass immediately in front of the lounge window. It looked at the lounge window, then hopped along a bit and craned its neck to look up to the bedroom window. It doubled back on itself to our new front step.

It turned, made eye contact with me, then flew away. A sign, you may say, that either Grannie, Grandpa or Bee Bee approved of what would be our marital home. I wanted to think that it was. I even burst into tears telling Paul when he came back to the flat.

But don't we treat these coincidences as emotional Savlon, to soothe our cuts and grazes? Don't we find any kind of symbolism in everyday things to help us feel better? If the spirits of my grandparents and great aunt were appearing as blackbirds, wouldn't they have appeared as two female blackbirds and a male blackbird? And why would they appear to me and not other members of the family? They all loved us equally. But maybe as Dan Klass says, if God exists, he needs me to doubt, to look at the world as though God does not exist - to carry out my science agnostically.

Phew, another month has passed without me updating. I've been busy with work, getting my university application together, attempting to see my friends and all the never-ending paperwork (why is it so difficult to change your name and why are so many people too stupid to understand that you want to keep your maiden name as a middle name? I've dealt with post office clerks who have never seen a deed poll before!).

I'm off to the Good Food Show at the weekend. I'm manning the stall. Come find me if you want porridge. But first a meeting tomorrow discussing arthropod control in grain and flour storage. I'm hoping it involves a rolled-up newspaper and a very large boot. At least that's how arthropods are dealt with in this household.

I've been looking at my webstats again. You all managed to bork my bandwidth in October! Now, my favourite Bobfriends ladies, who have been visiting steadily over the past couple of months (one of you has notched up more visits than I have!), if you're looking to get outraged, incensed and appalled by something I've said, you won't find much of interest on here anymore. But because I'm nice and I like to give people what they've come looking for, have a look here. That should give you something to talk about in the Coffee Shop while you get all paranoid about not being able to post honestly anymore.

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