Daytrip
Yesterday I went to Philadelphia, all dressed up in my smartest candy pink wool jacket, the one which the woman in the shop assured me "don't worry it's too tight across the bust, you'll never want to button it up". I don't think she counted on how howling winds might subvert that prophecy.
This time it was not a road trip. Normally I would be happy about avoiding a solitary six hour schelp past two major cities, but on this occasion I was flying on a US Air prop plane in extremely high winds. The outbound journey was horrible, the worst I have ever taken anywhere. Like when the plane you're on loses one or two hundred feet of altitude and the bottom of your stomach hits your throat, only it happened about sixteen times on the 50 minute flight. The businessmen on the flight weren't exactly screaming and waving their rosary beads, but there were an awful lot of white knuckles clamped to armrests.
Meanwhile, in best b-school tradition, I was deciding how I could apply a framework to this situation and analyse it. The obvious place to start was with a probability tree. If in doubt, always draw a tree. Anyway, it seemed to me that there was about a 33% of me throwing up before the end of the flight, 67% not. If I waited to get the sick bag out of the seat pocket in front until I definitely knew I was going to chuck, I felt that there was a 25% chance I would get it out in time. Alternatively, I could choose to attempt to throw up on the lap of the man next to me instead. I felt this could be achieved with a 70% chance of projection accuracy. Even if I did get the sick bag out in time, I estimated a likely 85% accuracy with the bag. (I didn't feel I could guarantee 100% accuracy - for one thing as Professor Pfeifer likes to say, perfect information is hard to come by, and for another, if the vomiting coincided with another sudden drop in altitude, it could be plastered all over the ceiling whether I liked it or not.)
Moving on to the payoff of each outcome, if I got the sick bag out in advance and sat with it poised ready, and then didn't throw up after all (67% chance), it might not cost me anything but I would look like a feeble hyperchondriac drama queen in front of the cute guy sitting across the aisle ($???). If I didn't get the sick bag out in advance, and threw up without it (18.1%), I would merely end up looking pathetic and rather smelly. Normally, with a fresh change of clothes in the bag, I would be able to accept this outcome. On this occasion, however, on my way to an interview with only a spare pair of shoes in case the firm I was visiting turned out not to be the sort of place to approve of knee high leather boots, this outcome seemed sub optimal (likely payoff = $200 for an emergency trip to an Ann Taylor to buy a new suit).
At this point, being a systems thinker, something occurred to me. What if the mere act of getting the sick bag out increased my odds of chucking up? My poor nauseous brain could not cope with this new sub division of the probability tree. Maybe I needed something fluffy and non-quant to solve this one. What about Spirit of the New Workplace? That meant raisin meditation: sounds good, only one slight snag: no raisins at 26,000 feet. Aha! Managerial Psychology. What about the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People? I quickly troll through te seven habits... think win/win .. seek first to understand, then to be understood.. . None of them really seemed to fit the situation at hand, except perhaps be proactive.., which could be interpreted as stop messing round and get the sickbag out, or alternatively stop messing round and get the cute guy's digits before you barf.
Inspiration finally struck with one of our Managerial Psych texts "The Inner Game of Work" by Tim someone (I think). The basic idea is that if you focus all your attention on a very small element or aspect of whatever crappy or pointless task you are doing, and monitor how it changes as you do the task, you will get distracted from how crappy the task and start feeling really good about it. The only problem with applying this to my situation was that I wasn't actually engaged in any task, other than trying not to barf. The drinks trolley was a no-show due to the turbulence, and I did not have the stomach to read my book, which was all about how young girls become drunkards.
So instead I focused on the position of my elbow on the armrest between me and the man next to me. How long could I continue to edge my elbow fractionally along the rest, before the man next to me got pissed off and elbowed my elbow off? I know it sounds trivial, but it is surprisingly effective. I was distracted for the remaining twenty minutes of the flight, pink jacket intact, and without needing the sick bag once. See mum, my MBA was good for something.
* * *
The regular reader of this blog may be wondering whatever happened with the whole septic tank hoo-ha. Well, don't panic, you ain't missed nothin'. Drama, as I implied, unfolds in slow motion over here in Middleofnowheresville. Absolutely zero has happened since the last man who came to poke around with a stick was here.
But today, another man showed up to give a third opinion. This one I liked. His name was Mark, and he does exactly what it said on his box (or, in this case, shirt): DIGS. I'm strongly in favour of a bit of bulldozer action: none of this pathetic mincing around with sticks. Anyway, it looks like I might finally get some... I'll keep you all posted.
This time it was not a road trip. Normally I would be happy about avoiding a solitary six hour schelp past two major cities, but on this occasion I was flying on a US Air prop plane in extremely high winds. The outbound journey was horrible, the worst I have ever taken anywhere. Like when the plane you're on loses one or two hundred feet of altitude and the bottom of your stomach hits your throat, only it happened about sixteen times on the 50 minute flight. The businessmen on the flight weren't exactly screaming and waving their rosary beads, but there were an awful lot of white knuckles clamped to armrests.
Meanwhile, in best b-school tradition, I was deciding how I could apply a framework to this situation and analyse it. The obvious place to start was with a probability tree. If in doubt, always draw a tree. Anyway, it seemed to me that there was about a 33% of me throwing up before the end of the flight, 67% not. If I waited to get the sick bag out of the seat pocket in front until I definitely knew I was going to chuck, I felt that there was a 25% chance I would get it out in time. Alternatively, I could choose to attempt to throw up on the lap of the man next to me instead. I felt this could be achieved with a 70% chance of projection accuracy. Even if I did get the sick bag out in time, I estimated a likely 85% accuracy with the bag. (I didn't feel I could guarantee 100% accuracy - for one thing as Professor Pfeifer likes to say, perfect information is hard to come by, and for another, if the vomiting coincided with another sudden drop in altitude, it could be plastered all over the ceiling whether I liked it or not.)
Moving on to the payoff of each outcome, if I got the sick bag out in advance and sat with it poised ready, and then didn't throw up after all (67% chance), it might not cost me anything but I would look like a feeble hyperchondriac drama queen in front of the cute guy sitting across the aisle ($???). If I didn't get the sick bag out in advance, and threw up without it (18.1%), I would merely end up looking pathetic and rather smelly. Normally, with a fresh change of clothes in the bag, I would be able to accept this outcome. On this occasion, however, on my way to an interview with only a spare pair of shoes in case the firm I was visiting turned out not to be the sort of place to approve of knee high leather boots, this outcome seemed sub optimal (likely payoff = $200 for an emergency trip to an Ann Taylor to buy a new suit).
At this point, being a systems thinker, something occurred to me. What if the mere act of getting the sick bag out increased my odds of chucking up? My poor nauseous brain could not cope with this new sub division of the probability tree. Maybe I needed something fluffy and non-quant to solve this one. What about Spirit of the New Workplace? That meant raisin meditation: sounds good, only one slight snag: no raisins at 26,000 feet. Aha! Managerial Psychology. What about the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People? I quickly troll through te seven habits... think win/win .. seek first to understand, then to be understood.. . None of them really seemed to fit the situation at hand, except perhaps be proactive.., which could be interpreted as stop messing round and get the sickbag out, or alternatively stop messing round and get the cute guy's digits before you barf.
Inspiration finally struck with one of our Managerial Psych texts "The Inner Game of Work" by Tim someone (I think). The basic idea is that if you focus all your attention on a very small element or aspect of whatever crappy or pointless task you are doing, and monitor how it changes as you do the task, you will get distracted from how crappy the task and start feeling really good about it. The only problem with applying this to my situation was that I wasn't actually engaged in any task, other than trying not to barf. The drinks trolley was a no-show due to the turbulence, and I did not have the stomach to read my book, which was all about how young girls become drunkards.
So instead I focused on the position of my elbow on the armrest between me and the man next to me. How long could I continue to edge my elbow fractionally along the rest, before the man next to me got pissed off and elbowed my elbow off? I know it sounds trivial, but it is surprisingly effective. I was distracted for the remaining twenty minutes of the flight, pink jacket intact, and without needing the sick bag once. See mum, my MBA was good for something.
* * *
The regular reader of this blog may be wondering whatever happened with the whole septic tank hoo-ha. Well, don't panic, you ain't missed nothin'. Drama, as I implied, unfolds in slow motion over here in Middleofnowheresville. Absolutely zero has happened since the last man who came to poke around with a stick was here.
But today, another man showed up to give a third opinion. This one I liked. His name was Mark, and he does exactly what it said on his box (or, in this case, shirt): DIGS. I'm strongly in favour of a bit of bulldozer action: none of this pathetic mincing around with sticks. Anyway, it looks like I might finally get some... I'll keep you all posted.
posted by alranson | 3:10 PM
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