All guys know that girls . . . forgive me, but economists love generalization and simplification – run with me just a little bit.

All guys know that [...]]]> Books have been written on this and  Econ classes spend hours, but it’s a shockingly simple idea that I feel my good friend’s husband is the perfect example of.

All guys know that girls . . . forgive me, but economists love generalization and simplification – run with me just a little bit.

All guys know that girls like the whole babies thing. Which is why you’ll occasionally here a man in a bar say to a cute girl, ‘Yeah, I like kids, they’re great.’

But does she really believe him? It took him no effort to say that, in fact he could be lying. As the effort–what economists call cost–of that sentence is nothing, so there’s not much weight behind it. He could take it a bit further, and place a few pictures on his facebook profile playing with his cousin’s kids. Or make sure he plays with kids at a picnic when the cute girls are watching. This has a slightly higher ‘cost’, or effort required, but it’s still easy to fake.

Then there’s Joel. When he needed a new car, he knew he wanted children in the next 5 or so years – long before he would sell the car he was about to buy. So he bought a minivan – before he had even met his wife. Guy wasn’t even dating at the time. Now, that’s a message that carries a lot of weight. Guys can’t easily fake that – Minivan’s are expensive, and also change the type of woman who are attracted to you.

What Joel was doing was signaling to women that he valued family in a way they would believe. He is now happily married to a beautiful woman, but specifically one who values family as much as he does. And when he picked her up in his minivan when they were dating, his minivan said more about his desire for kids than any cheesy line or facebook picture could.

There you have it – Economic Signaling Theory. It’s a fancy sounding theory, but if you’ve ever heard anyone say, ‘talk is cheap’, they are referring to the low cost of verbal signaling (talk). Similar phrases might include ‘put your money where you mouth is’. Got a great example of a phrase that suggests one person is doubtful of another’s signaling, or wants them to increase the cost of signaling so that they believe it more?

If we start with the premise from Sexonomics 101, that men and women have the same number of sexual partners, than this [...]]]> Another popular claim is that married men cheat more than married women. This might be true, but people don’t realize what this implies – mainly that unmarried women have more sex than unmarried men.

If we start with the premise from Sexonomics 101, that men and women have the same number of sexual partners, than this posts claim that men cheat more than women presents some logistical challenges. Let’s look at two possible interpretations of this claim:

1. Married men are more likely to cheat one or more times than married women (i.e. 4 of our 5 married men/skittles cheated, while only 2 married women cheated).
2. Married men have more affairs than married women (i.e. married men/skittles have more straws terminating with them than married women) regardless of how many men or women are actually cheating.

Let’s go back to our skittles/M&M’s/Beer bottles from 101. Separate an equal number of men and women (they are the married couples), and take away all the straws between them for the sake of clutter (I use faint dotted lines to connect my couples).

Faithful Married Couples, Normal Singles

For claim #1 to work, more married men have to have one or more unfaithful straws terminating with them than with married women. The only way to do that, however, means one of two possible arguments.

1. Most of the married men’s straws terminate at a few ‘energetic’ married women–a female ‘married super-slut’ theory. This means that a smaller selection of married women are responsible for a disproportionate number of unfaithful husbands.
   

   Married Female Superslut Theory

2. OR, most of the married men’s straws terminate with unmarried women. Remember, more men are cheating than women, and we are not using the married female superslut theory. Where are those straws going? Single women! Most people initially believe that married men cheat on their spouses with unmarried women, until they realized that this suggests that unmarried women have more sexual partners than unmarried men.*
   

   Highly Sexed Single Females Theory - Single Females respsible for the majority of male affairs

Now let’s look at claim #2 in greater detail. In this instance, regardless of how many married men are cheating, the number of straws terminating with married men is higher than the number terminating with women. This implies one and only one thing – unmarried women are having on average more sexual partners than unmarried men. In this diagram, I make men and women equal cheaters – three out of five are unfaithful, but I ensure that more straws terminate with married men, resulting in highly sexed unmarried women.

Equal numbers of unfaithful spouses with a higher number of partners for married males suggest highly sexed unmarried females.

So, if we accept the claim that married men cheat more than married women, we are implying (perhaps without knowing it) that either a smaller number of married women are responsible for a surprisingly large number of married men cheating (the married superslut theory), OR that unmarried women have more sexual partners than unmarried men. Most people will agree with the claim that ‘men cheat more’ while denying the two possible implications.

* Almost always. In this particular instance, a few married female super sluts could sleep with enough single men to balance out the number of sexual partners of unmarried people. Again, not something people claim as likely.

Caveats:

• For this claim, that married men cheat more than married women, you can just as easily consider anyone in an apparent monogamous relationship ‘married’.
  

To put it mildly, he was in a state of shock and abject horror at what his new life in England would have, and not have.

The first out of his mouth was [...]]]> Tonight, at a party, I met a fellow North American, one who had just arrived on this little Island I’ve come to call home.

To put it mildly, he was in a state of shock and abject horror at what his new life in England would have, and not have.

The first out of his mouth was warm water. Americans (and Canadians, where this chap came from) take it for granted that if you have hot water, then you can have warm water. It seems reasonable, doesn’t it? Not in England, where this country is designed to produce hot and cold water out of separate taps (or faucets, as they call it), and never the twain shall meet.

Want to wash your face with warm water? Turn on both taps, put the stopper in over the drain, fill up your sink and then you can have warm water. Here is what some people still think is wonderful:

It’s perverse, but there’s nothing you can do about it – most houses have this pre-historic design, and even many brand new houses will have it.

What’s even more confusing is that the British clearly understand the concept of warm water – they do have showers, after all, and those showers produce warm water. That said, showers are a bit of a foreign concept to them. Baths are often preferred, and showers are hideously under-pressured. Water flow resembles eight mice peeing on you in unison. Our Canadian friend mentioned the shower pressure, too. Hell, if Seinfeld could have an episode about water pressure, we’re entitled to grump a bit, no? As Kramer said, “If I don’t have a good shower I am not myself. I feel weak and ineffectual. I’m not Kramer.”

After covering the lack of warm water and shower pressure, the UK’s love of radiators was next mentioned, to round off the trifecta of plumbing complaints Americans usually have.

This was followed by complaints about lack of customer service, awful tumble driers (if there are any), public transport, the bizarre quasi-requirement to carry a copy of a utility bill or bank statement with you everywhere, and the cleanliness of shops.

But what I took away from this exchange was not a reminder of the UK’s annoyances, but rather a compelling example of just how far I have come. He sounded like me when I first arrived, and listening to him made me suddenly realize that I am completely at home here and accept the bizarre ways English do things as completely normal. Given long enough and you’ll get used to anything – and I guess I have. England has become normal, home, even comfortable.

It’s something I’ve been grappling with for a while. Who knows where I’ll be in 10 or 20 years, but for the time being, this place is home and I’m staying indefinitely.

The incredible bit was due to the great group of friends I was with and the fact that Stockholm is full of delicious restaurants, beautiful women, and is set on picturesque islands and peninsulas, separated by [...]]]> I went to Stockholm, Sweden for a long weekend with friends. The trip was, in two words, incredible and expensive.

The incredible bit was due to the great group of friends I was with and the fact that Stockholm is full of delicious restaurants, beautiful women, and is set on picturesque islands and peninsulas, separated by canals, lakes, and the open sea.

As for expensive, I would guess that a serious cocaine habit would be much cheaper than Stockholm, and we were even staying in youth hostels to keep the price down! Money flowed out of our wallets at an incredible rate, and returning to London made us feel wealthy, as many things in London were about half the price.

I took a few pictures I was really happy with. Click for full size.

Here’s a select personal history:

In 2005, [...]]]> I generally think of myself as a lucky, lucky guy. So I can’t really complain when odd things befall me, but they do make me laugh, and they also make my friends say, “Tell me when you are flying out of London, so I can NOT book a flight then.”

Here’s a select personal history:

In 2005, Gate Gourmet, the catering company for BA, fired 600+ staff by literally shouting the dismissal through a megaphone to picketing strikers. In response, BA ground crew went on strike in sympathy for Gate Gourmet workers. I had boarded the plane, the gate had been pulled back, but minutes before ground crew had reversed the plane (which apparently can’t go in reverse itself without damaging the terminal), the strike began. So I sat on the plane 7 hours, eventually disembarked to the same airport, and spent 5 days in London without luggage waiting to fly home. I still wear the shoes I bought on BA’s dime, as I only had flip-flops with me.

In 2006, politicians needing a distraction from their own misdeeds claimed that a bunch of half-wits without passports or tickets were going to imminently blow up a plane, which is why you can no longer carry a water bottle onto a plane. You can of course carry contact lens solution, which means our planes are safe unless Osama bin Whatsit starts wearing contacts. Anyway, I was en route from the island of Corsica to New York City, with an 8 hour stopover in London which turned into 4 days. At least I had my luggage this time.

In 2010, a volcano (of all things) shuts down British airspace for the longest period of time in aviation history. All UK flights have been grounded since Thursday (today is Monday) and I don’t know when I’ll fly, as the damn volcano is still exploding. Comically, the Germans think the UK restrictions, which extend to their airspace, are a bunch of nonsense, and have been flying empty planes around to prove this. My guess is that some bureaucrat has realized that if he authorizes flights, and people die, he gets fired, so said bureaucrat is staying on the safe side. That said, the risk is legitimately real, as volcano ash turns to molten glass inside jet engines, and cars in my street are covered with a fine layer of ash.

I response, I’m holding a Stranded in London party this afternoon.