Evidence

Some of you have doubted the fact that I am able to accomplish an independent study course - much less STATS 221 as independent study. I am here to set your ill-at-ease minds to rest, and prove to you that I have, in fact, opened my course and I am looking.

Even though I would rather:

• Pluck out EVERY hair on my body with tweezers
• Eat egg whites and celery
• Jump from a burning building into a pile of broken glass
• Shovel manure
  
• Cut off my toes - and NOT for the benefit of science
• Peel off my fingernails
• And any number of other measure of torture

I have started!

"You haven't told me yet," said Lady Nuttall, "what it is your fiancé does for a living."

"He's a statistician," replied Lamia, with an annoying sense of being on the defensive.

Lady Nuttall was obviously taken aback. It had not occurred to her that statisticians entered into normal social relationships. The species, she would have surmised, was perpetuated in some collateral manner, like mules.

"But, it's a very interesting profession," said Lamia warmly.

"I don't doubt it," said the lady, who obviously doubted it very much.

-The Dreaded Lesson Manual

I have it on good authority that we should trust the aristocracy - especially when they are right. (Meaning, not only is Stats NOT interesting...it is also torture, tedious, horrible and any other word you can possibly throw at it that is negative!)

For those of you wondering, though, (As I know a great many of you are) Stats is defined as:

Statistics is the science of collecting, organizing, and interpreting numerical facts—which we call data. We are bombarded by data in our everyday life. Most of us associate "statistics" with the bits of datum that appear in news reports: baseball batting averages, imported car sales, the latest poll of the president's popularity, and the average high temperature for today's date. Advertisements often claim that data show the superiority of the advertiser's product. All sides in public debates about economics, education, and social policy argue from data. Yet the usefulness of statistics goes far beyond these everyday examples.

In a completely unrelated note - Check out Ray LaMontagne and Landon Pigg...they are seriously so WONDERFUL to listen to and have an 98.7% rate of making me happy, with a zero margin of error.

Ray...



Or Landon...