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That List, Again

SHTF

Faced with imminent risk of flooding over in Britishland, the Met Office has provided a helpful emergency list for those Brits at risk of same:

“Think about putting together an emergency flood kit with essential items that will help you cope in a flood, including: Insurance documents and list of contact numbers; torch and spare batteries; first-aid kit and any prescription medicines; warm waterproof clothes and blankets; bottled water and snacks; battery or wind-up radio and if it applies to you: supplies for looking after your baby or pet. Make sure that everyone knows where to find this kit and what to do if flooding happens.”

Of course, what isn’t mentioned is whether the flood risk involves home evacuation or simply being isolated at home (surrounded, say, by floodwaters).

I have a couple of grab ‘n go chests ready if I had to leave home, and they contain all the above along with more serious survival stuff, to be supplemented only with things I keep in the house, e.g. Rx meds, rain gear and of course my laptop computer (which contains all the documentation I need to run my life).  And as long as I have sufficient gas in the car, the power inverter I keep inside it will provide all the power I’d need.  Of take-along guns we will not speak, of course, but most Brits don’t have any of those, so their supplies are pretty much there for the taking by anyone (e.g. a criminal or police officer [some overlap] ) who can simply commandeer whatever they need.

As for staying in place at home, I think we could survive for about a month, maybe even two before being seriously inconvenienced.

In other words, I’m not too worried about the problem — unless the disaster strikes (as it usually does in Texas) during a severe winter storm, in which case things might be a little more tricky, but not insurmountable.  As our apartment is on the ground floor and overlooks a large lawn, I could always park the car next to the patio railing and use the inverter for emergency power inside the apartment if necessary.  (The complex has all sorts of rules about outdoor cooking on the patio etc., but in a SHTF situation I’d ignore pretty much everything that stood in my way anyway.)

Feel free to run over all the things you’d need to get through a catastrophe of the above nature.  It’s a good mental exercise even if you believe you’re adequately prepared, and who knows, you might find that you have a few things to attend to, e.g. getting in some more batteries or non-perishable foods.

Disaster prep:  if you don’t do it, you deserve everything that hits you.

Men Are Pigs

Men & Women

This has nothing to do with yesterday’s post about boob reductions.

But it shows that when it comes to strange perversions and a desire for random sex, it’s not just the human male that’s affected.

The entomophthora muscae eats its host (female fly), and then attracts healthy flies over to have necrophilic intercourse with it so the fungus can spread. The weird footage, shared by researchers at University of Copenhagen, illustrates the behaviour, which the experts say happens frequently.

“Hey, boys… want a good time?  Come on over.”
“She looks a little off… is she still breathing?”
“Does it matter?”
“Not really.”

Wanna know the funny thing?  Even if you warned the male flies about the danger, I bet that a lot would go ahead anyway.

And there ya have it.  Q.E.D.

Big Fat Duh

Lies and Untruths, Numbers & Statistics

There’s a great deal I know only a little about, still more about which I know nothing, and a terrifyingly-small number of things I know quite a lot about. [/Donald Rumsfeld]

But one of the things which fall into the latter category is that of statistical sampling, because my very first real job was in the Statistics Department of what was then the largest marketing research company in the world (the Great Big Research Company, or A.C. Nielsen).  And my specific area of expertise was in sample selection:  the methodology of creating a sample, the data drawn from which would accurately represent reality.  A single anecdote will suffice.

One of our major clients was the yogurt-producing subsidiary of a large dairy corporation (think: Yoplait).  Our data was always being questioned by this company, because in some cases we would show their market share as being too small (the sales numbers didn’t jibe with their actual deliveries to stores, for example —  a known quantity), or else, paradoxically, far too large, for exactly the same reason:  all dependent on which geographical area we were reporting on.

My job was to investigate this phenomenon, and some months later I discovered the reason.  The various smaller dairies’ yogurts were not being delivered to all the stores in the area, but in stores where they did have fridge space, they sold extremely well.  Using a simple picture shows the problem:

Our sample of stores may have been representative of say, total grocery sales in the area (and it was), but when Yogurt sales were carved out, the sample simply sucked because of how the dairies’ distribution worked.

It’s a very complex problem, and it applies to just about any sample selection.  In this case, there was no solution other than to broaden the sample, which would have cost too much.  So unless the client was prepared to pay a much higher fee to get better data, they’d either have to live with suspect data or cancel their account altogether.  (The end result was that they stopped looking at specific markets, and only bought data at the national level, which was acceptably accurate, but less useful to the local sales teams.)

I told you all that so I could talk about this.

Harris’ So-Called ‘Surge’ Is Thanks To Oversampling: Pollsters

In the meta data from the call centers college educated Dems are 3-4x more likely to answer than non-college. While weighting can help minimize the bias if done correctly it won’t totally eliminate the problem.
— Mark Davin Harris (@markdharris) August 16, 2024

Critics point out that many polls have been sampling a disproportionately smaller share of Republican voters compared to exit poll data from the 2020 presidential election. The result, they say, is a misleading “phantom advantage” for Ms. Harris. According to them, this skewed sampling could be a strategic move to boost enthusiasm and fundraising for Ms. Harris’ campaign.

Usually, when I talk about situations like this, I use a shorthand expression like:  “They must have drawn their sample from the Harvard Faculty Lounge.”

Unscrupulous polling companies can (and do) draw their samples to show exactly what the clients want to see — tailoring the samples to produce the desired results.  We used to call this the “K factor”:  that number which when applied to the data will provide the result most favorable to the client.  It’s more commonly known within the research community as “bullshit”, but it’s bullshit that will generate headlines — so ten guesses as to whether the mainstream media will accept such data uncritically, either because it favors their own bias/opinion or because they are completely incapable of analyzing the data properly.  (If you answered “or both” to the above, go to the head of the class.)

So is the “Kamala Surge” real, or not?  Given all the players in this particular piece of theater… oh please, it’s patent bullshit.

Dept. Of Righteous Shootings

Asshole Cops, Bad News, Righteous Shootings

…except, it seems, in Honolulu.

Three people were killed and two others injured in a shooting at a home stemming from a dispute between neighbors on Saturday night in Waianae, a west Oahu community. The shooter was also fatally shot by a resident…

So far, so good.  But

…who was then arrested on a second-degree murder charge, police said.

And the cops’ response?

“In Hawaii, we are a non ‘stand your ground’ state. Even if you have a license to carry, if you’re an individual that discharges a firearm that is involved in injuring another person, … you’re going to be arrested.”

As RedState’s Jim Thompson points out, that’s not what Hawaii’s actual law states.  Looks like this asshole cop needs a swift ball-kicking  some education on the law.  Or maybe he just thinks he’s British.

At least Our Hero has since been released, but there’s no telling what will happen to him next.

Where’s the Imperial Japanese Navy when you really need them?