Close Enough...Or is it?

I’ll tell you upfront that I am going to make up a lot of this Blog Posting but I will still make my Brilliant Point...Or will I?

I was in Starbucks today (I told you I was going to make things up). You knew I was making things up as soon as I said, “I was in Starbuck today”. I don’t know for sure if there are people in Starbucks today because I am not allowed to go to Starbucks to see if there is anyone in Starbucks because I can’t leave my house to go to Starbucks.

The above paragraph really sidetracked me. I’m going to start over...

I was in Starbucks today spewing germs at everyone within Spewing Distance of my Spewing Germ-Infested Mouth. I was surfing the Internet on my Filthy Germ-Infested iPhone and, since I am who I am, I noticed that a Prestigious Institute of Higher Education had spent a lot of time publishing Useless Information.

I immediately thought of you, my Dear Readers, and said to myself, “Self, I just know that my Dear Readers, who are seekers of Useful Information about publishers of Useless Information, are just waiting to get this Useless Information from me”.

Now that I have your undivided attention...

The unnamed Prestigious Institute of Higher Education has been compiling information about the Coronavirus for us to worry about because they are concerned that we do not have enough information about Coronavirus to worry about.  

In the article the Prestigious Institute of Higher Education said, “Our data imply that, by April 1 between 48,000 and 81,000 people had been infected in Santa Clara County”.

Allow me to give you a more precise quote that Prestigious Institute of Higher Education should have published, “Our data imply that, by April 1 between 48,000 and 48,500 people had been infected in Santa Clara County”.

Does the Prestigious Institute of Higher Education really think that a range between 48,000 and 81,000 is a precise enough range to get anyone’s attention? That’s a spread of 33,000! I think that any survey worth its salt (whatever that means) could have come up with that imprecise a number without bothering to do a survey!

They could have gone to the nearest English Pub (actually they could have gone to a Hungarian Pub or a Brazilian Pub) drank a bunch of beers, thrown darts at a dart board and come up with this kind of spread. This is known in the Survey World as a Wild-Ass Guess.

I wonder how the Survey Compilers at this Prestigious Institute of Higher Education would like a text message from the President of their Prestigious Institute of Higher Education that read as follows...

We appreciate all you do for our Prestigious Institute of Higher Education. To show how much we appreciate all your hard work, we have revised our payroll brackets and you are hereby advised that you next paycheck will be somewhere between $48,000 and $81,000. Have a nice day.

Would I kid u?

Smartfella