Overheard at Table Two: Border Children

Lucky Moran:  what really bugs me is hearing Boehner talking yesterday about the President wanting $3.7 billion to send the kids back home, and then he just launches off into this tirade about how the President never takes responsibility for his action.

Otis Redwing:  that's a red herring, definitely.

Lucky:  I mean, how in the hell can you turn a border crisis into a personal blame game?

Otis:  that's Washington, my friend.

Lucky: just frikkin' nuts, I mean, look at it:  the President and the GOP want the same thing: TO CHANGE THE 2008 LAW AND EXPEDITE DEPORTATIONS!   So why are the House Republicans all "up in his grill" (as the kids like to say these days!) and blaming him for causing the problem?

Otis: you know what I think, my friend.

Lucky:  dude, no!  Not again!  No, it's not because he's black.

Otis: it's all because he's black.   These dudes have had their panties in a wad ever since they saw his high yellow skin come traipsing across that platform and the DNC.   They were all secretly rooting for Hillary to grab the nomination, because hell, they all know how to beat down a woman, they know how to manipulate and denigrate women, but a black man?  That's pushing all the secret buttons, right there.

Lucky:  dude, you can't keep playing the black card.   This is because he's a liberal, and the GOP just wants all the power.

Otis: how many times do we have to go over this?  You know as well as I do that both parties are in the same deep pocket.   What you just mentioned, that Obama wants the very same thing that the Republicans want, is absolute proof that this is a personal hatred.   They said they wouldn't agree with a damn thing he ever says or does, and they came out in his first time and laid out the plan.   Nobody does that unless it's personal.   And since he really hadn't had the time in Washington to build up any real enemies, and it can't be because he's a man, it's got to be because of who he represents, and he represents the success of the black man.

Lucky:  even when the black man is dancing to your own tune?

Otis:  they may have to allow him into the band, but they certainly don't like him hogging the spotlight!

A bumper sticker:

HERMAPHRODITES UNITE!

Overheard at Table Two: SoCo

So my wife really likes her Southern Comfort, and so we snuck some in to Captain America.  So we got the boys in their seats with their popcorn and slushies and we waited until the lights got dark, and you know you're always trying to be quiet and there I was, trying to be quiet, and unscrew the top and there's this

PSSHHHT

as the bottle top comes off, and then I don't know what happened but the bottle slipped out of my hand and it didn't just hit the floor and go clink it went

SMASHHHH!

I mean that thing shattered.   This theatre was packed, man, and suddenly the whole place started to reek like SoCo, and these people a few rows ahead of us, they got up and they WALKED OUT.  

Then a minute later, an usher comes in and he goes to the people right in front of us, and he said, "Please, I'm going to need you to come with me."  So they get up and go with him, and then about a minute after that the trailers stop and the lights come on and like the manager and a few of the staff come back into the theatre and they start walking up aisle by aisle and when they finally get to the wife and kids and me, they don't even have to say anything, because there's all the glass right there at my feet.

So there we were, the whole family, getting kicked out of Captain America!

The wife and I, man, we laughed so hard all the way to the CAR!!

Overheard at Booth 4: It's NOT Complicated!

I keep hearing everyone today talking about how their relationships, they say "It's complicated" - they say that all the time.  So, how's your boyfriend?   It's complicated.    So, are you gonna ask this girl out or not?   It's complicated.

I just wanna say, no no NO!  It's NOT complicated!   It's very simple.    You either want to:

1) Be around that person, or
2) Have sex with that person, or
3) Both, or
4) Neither.

There are only FOUR options.   It's not complicated at ALL!

Overheard at Table Two: Abercrombie and Sao Paolo

"My teenage daughter got a job at Abercrombie and Fitch.  She went to work in these cutoff jeans that were so short you could've called them a belt!   She tells me that's their dress code, so I looked it up and she's right.  That IS their dress code.   Apparently working at Abercrombie and Fitch you have to look like a Brazilian girl on the beach at Sao Paolo."

Left at Table 1: Paper on a Statistics Chapter 11

Attitude Scaling

Attitude scaling is the process of assessing an attitudinal disposition using a number that represents a person’s score on an attitudinal continuum ranging from an extremely favorable disposition to an extremely unfavorable one. Scaling is the “procedure for the assignment of numbers (or other symbols) to a property of objects in order to impart some of the characteristics of numbers to the properties in

question.  (Cooper and Schindler, p. 394)”

I’ve always found attitude scaling to be fascinating because it not only is dependent on how someone feels toward something, but also it is how they feel toward it during the moment that they are answering the question.   This is a critical distinction, because our feelings influence so much of our perception.   For example, you could expect that a person would answer favorably to almost every question on a survey if it was the day they just landed a great job, or just accepted a proposal for marriage.   Conversely, if someone just lost a job or their spouse just walked out on them, you could reasonably expect a different result.   Even if the attitude being addressed in the survey has nothing to do with their personal situation, you could expect that their answers will indeed be influenced by their emotional perception at any point in time.

Additionally, personality also might make an influence: there are certain characters of people who scale things differently.  If things are good, some will scale them as extremely favorable where another person might scale it as neutral.   That is more based on personality characteristics rather than situation feelings.

Still, all these are factors that go into the statistical collection of data, and it only serves to remind us that we humans are strange creatures with such complexity and variable hues of emotional coloring.

Miguel Mazariegos

Reference:

Cooper, D. R., & Schindler, P. S. (2011). Business research methods (11th ed.). [Vitrium Systems, Inc. version]. Retrieved from http://newclassroom3.phoenix.edu/classroom

Overheard at Booth One: Bathrooms

- Personally I think since we've got all this discussion going now about who gets to go to what bathroom based on how they identify themselves as a man or a woman that we should just do away with bathrooms all together.

- Then where are people going to go - to - you know - go?

- No no, I meant do away with separate bathrooms.   Just make them "bathrooms" - unisex.  dualsex.   omnisex.  Whatever you  call it.

- What about all those creeps who'll be creeping on the women?

- Hey look, not every plan is perfect OK?