When I was a kid I was petrified of the Wirrn, a race of insectoids who infested a cryogenic arc that Dr Who's Tardis pops into - it was up there with vampire shows that I watched standing at the door of the lounge room, the open door.
The Wirrn converted people into embryonic slug Wirrn with a tiny brush of their slimy sluginess - stalking their prey from hidden corners and under the space ship grates - just like the Alien in Alien.
These days I watch almost anything - with the lights out by myself and I'm OK.
Thought I'd shaken off all those irrational beliefs - like miracles. ;)
But there I was, standing in the dim light of a toilet at Australia's premiere scientific institution the CSIRO - for real!
And as I wiped my hands the paper towel wrapped around my hand and I panicked because it felt and looked just like the image of the guy with the slimmed hand in Dr Who.
So there I am shaking my hand and trying to free it from the paper and I stop and suddenly I stop and stare at it - I snigger as my subconscious throws up this Dr Who image.
I'm quite proud of myself for having achieved a certain level headedness - but you know what I did when Darth Vader walked through the glass doors directly in front of my desk in the features department of the Courier-Mail?
My instinctive reflex was to duck under the desk - and I was halfway through a bob down when my brain kicked into gear: "Wait a minute! He's not real!"
No one can tell me that the media doesn't affect people's psychological states - lighting affects people's psychology. Maybe if that toilet had supermarket dazzle the Wirrn would have remained dormant in my mind.
But I believe that when people live through crisis - particularly prolonged crisis such as war, revolution, drought, destitution - it may change people's mindset and they may not even know it.
I know people who have kept people alive, kept families together, left everything they own behind and started again in a country beset by racism - Australia in the 1950s - and it affected them for the rest of their lives. They never forgot. How could you?
Earlier this year I read a social studies report about the communities which depend upon water from the Murray-Darling River Basin. It doesn't seem to be on the Murray-Darling Basin Authority's new website any more. Lucky for you I kept a copy. See below.
Watching the farmers' protests on the news reminded me of this report because it explains a few important points like how farmers are getting on in years - there, in Australia's salad bowl, young people aren't lining up to farm.
At least one or two generations have left their parents and grandparents to carry on because they don't fancy being slaves to the whim of the seasons and climate.
Do you wonder that farmers approaching their retirement years are panicking? Remember what self-funded retirees felt like when the Global Financial Crisis crushed superannuation funds and share prices?
These people know that they feed the country. They probably feel like they've just been slimmed by the Greens.
They don't even have anyone to take over the farm. Farmers are as scarce as hen's teeth - or as scarce as a drop of rain in a drought.
There are so many issues all wrapped in the this proposed water management plan which has panicked the farmers and made the Greens so happy.
Everyone's minds are set. Boy do we need a miracle now Saint Mary!