Keynesian Economics And Dignity’s Demise.

Listen very carefully for I shall say this but once and only once. I am dof.

Late one particularly rainy Friday afternoon, last Friday to be exact, an email circulated my department as they are, vexingly, wont to do in this city. Cape Town Friday-Grab-A-Drink-At-3pm afternoons they are not.
This particular piece of communication was a teaser for Monday's little department get-together (read generally hideously boring weekly meeting). Cleverly disguised as a bit of incentive, the instructions were relatively simple: Choose a number between 1 and 100 and send it back. The person who’s figure was nearest to two thirds of the average result would win a prize. Magic words those. Within nanoseconds I was proud and delighted with my carefully considered number and eagerly sent it off, knowing that an entire weekend of Christmas Eves awaited me - the fitful insomnia in anticipation. As Monday dawned, I skipped in, acceptance speech in hand, having practiced my “Oh I *really* did not expect this at ALL! I dedicate this prize to the pursuit of world peace and accept it on behalf of Africa’s starving orphans” face in the windows of Selfridges en route. Cue weekly meeting, complete with three members listening in from New York (oh I do so love an international audience) and flashy presentation slides. Within the first sentence, I felt my face beginning to turn a delightful shade of puce and the rising nausea was making composure maintenance a little tricky. “As we all know, if every one of you happened to choose 100 as their number then the highest number possible to be closest to two thirds of the average would be 67, and the chances of that being the case are very slim.” Obviously. So glaringly freaking obvious. The ascent of the carrots had begun. Cue large colourful graph splashed across screen. There, in all hues known to modern physics,were the results. Results, all dangerously clustered around the left hand side of the chart, of some very serious high brow mathematical calculations. And just to balance it out, on the far right hand side of the screen, in the brightest and highly visible green was a lone bar, extending a mile high and most definitely visible to the New York office, if not from outer space. The Bar Of Great Hilarity. Yes folks, Yours Truly, in all her intelligent glory had chosen a number she thought was “pretty”. No calculations. No lateral thought. Nope, 77.5 just seemed like a friendly number. Except it was 10.5% higher than is even mathematically possible. HeyZEUS.

21 won.

I can assure you I will never be able to glance at Selfridges windows ever again. I am suitably ASHAMED.