I never thought I’d ever be glad that I sneezed. Well, I did (sneeze) and I was (glad). I woke up on Saturday morning with a very blocked nose that I actually wondered how I could possible wake up still breathing. Then I sneezed, hard.
PHEW!
In the meantime our house is under siege by ants. Previously we were invaded by this species of red ants my mother calls semut gila – crazy ants because they seem to run around like crazy, well, ants. Now, those thin loony ants are taken over by some kind of mean, stocky black ants I like to call semut manggis – mangosteen ants – because my first recollection of them were on the old mangosteen tree we had behind the house. So now every morning my mother has a new routine engaging the ants in chemical warfare, and whenever we’re not careful the ants will strike back by swarming the kitchen cabinet or dinner table.
Two interesting news I found online today. In the first, a seventeen-year-old girl in the UK was taken to the hospital for caffeine overdose, after downing seven double espressos while working the family shop. It basically confirms that all you heavy coffee drinkers are nothing but a bunch of caffeine junkies. LOL. I typically have only one dose of coffee a day, if any, when I drop by Dunkin Donuts for the Iced Coffee/Latte Combo breakfast on the way to work.
In the second, in the Health & Science section of the International Herald Tribune was an article called ‘Sex surveys don’t add up’ by Gina Kolata. Basically, sex surveys consistently report that men are more promiscuous and have more sex partners than women. Everybody seems to accept that because men are supposedly biologically inclined to spread their genes. The problem is the finding doesn’t make sense mathematically when the male-female ratio in the population is about equal.
As explained by (Emeritus) Prof. David Gale from the University of California:
Go figure!
__________
PS: Scalzi has a really interesting explanation to the whole conundrum here.
PHEW!
In the meantime our house is under siege by ants. Previously we were invaded by this species of red ants my mother calls semut gila – crazy ants because they seem to run around like crazy, well, ants. Now, those thin loony ants are taken over by some kind of mean, stocky black ants I like to call semut manggis – mangosteen ants – because my first recollection of them were on the old mangosteen tree we had behind the house. So now every morning my mother has a new routine engaging the ants in chemical warfare, and whenever we’re not careful the ants will strike back by swarming the kitchen cabinet or dinner table.
Two interesting news I found online today. In the first, a seventeen-year-old girl in the UK was taken to the hospital for caffeine overdose, after downing seven double espressos while working the family shop. It basically confirms that all you heavy coffee drinkers are nothing but a bunch of caffeine junkies. LOL. I typically have only one dose of coffee a day, if any, when I drop by Dunkin Donuts for the Iced Coffee/Latte Combo breakfast on the way to work.
In the second, in the Health & Science section of the International Herald Tribune was an article called ‘Sex surveys don’t add up’ by Gina Kolata. Basically, sex surveys consistently report that men are more promiscuous and have more sex partners than women. Everybody seems to accept that because men are supposedly biologically inclined to spread their genes. The problem is the finding doesn’t make sense mathematically when the male-female ratio in the population is about equal.
As explained by (Emeritus) Prof. David Gale from the University of California:
By way of dramatization, we change the context slightly and will prove what will be called the High School Prom Theorem. We suppose that on the day after the prom, each girl is asked to give the number of boys she danced with. These numbers are then added up, giving a number G. The same information is then obtained from the boys, giving a number B.The researchers can't explain it, but one possible explanation that I particularly like is that men exaggerate while women understate their numbers to conform to societal expectations and stereotypes.
Theorem: G = B
Proof: Both G and B are equal to C, the number of couples who danced together at the prom. QED.
Go figure!
__________
PS: Scalzi has a really interesting explanation to the whole conundrum here.
aku tak pernah pegi prom. tak boleh confirm the G=B theory.
ReplyDeleteAku pun tak pernah pergi la.
ReplyDelete