For some unknown reason, it seems that mothers are more apt than young guys to notice dirty bathrooms. My mom just about fell over when she first saw one of the bathrooms at the Pike house when I moved there. My sister and I had to hold her back to prevent her from cleaning it. Sure, it was a little dirty, but none of us living there seemed to notice.

I must admit that the past few years have seen me grow a bit more attentive to the state of the bathroom, but I think my mother’s standards are still higher than mine.

Therefore, I propose a test for evaluating bathroom cleanliness: Ask oneself, “What would Mother think?”

Three unrelated thoughts:

• Ever notice how things that have been imported list their countries of origin? I’m eating some nuts right now, and the list of ingredients states that the cashews came from “Africa, India, Brazil, and Vietnam.” Since when is “Africa” a country?
• Many MBA students really do walk around with their collars “popped.” Who would have thought?
• I’m trying to come up with an idea for a venture for a class, and I can’t seem to get “It’s All Been Done” out of my head.

One of the great misconceptions people seem to have about banks is that the money you deposit is still “your” money. No, that money is now the bank’s asset, and the account holders are essentially creditors </hand-waving>. That provides flexibility, but it can also lead to massive problems when things go bad.

In the largest US bank failure in 14 years, internet banking pioneer NetBank filed for bankruptcy protection last Friday. As a result, the Office of Thrift Supervision and the FDIC closed NetBank, and ING acquired NetBank’s deposit accounts.

I am (or at least was) a NetBank account holder, but I had less than $100,000 deposited, so my full account value was insured. Others won’t be so lucky. The 1,500 people with more than $100,000 in their accounts will become creditors to the bank’s receivership.

I have known about NetBank’s souring finances for a while, yet I kept my NetBank account loaded with a non-trivial (for me) amount of cash. Why? Did I feel invulnerable? Was it supreme faith in the FDIC? Maybe a little of both.

The actual failure has snapped me back to my senses, and even though I didn’t get burned this time, you can be sure that I will be more proactive the next time around.

I heard an interesting problem yesterday evening:

“A thoroughly honest game-show host has placed a car behind one of three doors. There is a goat behind each of the other doors. You have no prior knowledge that allows you to distinguish among the doors. ‘First you point toward a door,’ he says. ‘Then I’ll open one of the other doors to reveal a goat. After I’ve shown you the goat, you make your final choice whether to stick with your initial choice of doors, or to switch to the remaining door. You win whatever is behind the door.’ You begin by pointing to door number 1. The host shows you that door number 3 has a goat.” (Mueser and Granberg 1999)

Should you switch doors? What is the probabilty of winning if you do switch? What is it if you don’t switch? Does the switch matter?

(solution)

I have decided to do an experiment over the next few months, an alteration of my habbits habits. I haven’t told anybody what the change is. I wonder who will be the first to a) notice and b) realize it’s a change.