Monday, February 22, 2021

The Reality Distortion Field Comes to Biel/Bienne

"Hey, I'm a reasonable guy. But I've just experienced some very unreasonable things."

Jack Burton as played by Kurt Russell - Big Trouble in Little China

Courtesy of the FH
Many business journalists and psychologies have mused about what many early employees at Apple Computer referred to as the Reality Distortion Field that seemed to envelope Steve Jobs. Well, it would seem that this is not exclusive to the computer business in Silicon Valley. According to the FHS, everything is "Jim Dandy" and trending upwards! And in other news, Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy have all signed on as new Hublot brand ambassadors...

Per those bold prognosticators in Biel/Bienne (just don't ask them for a weather report, or you will be wearing your swimming trunks and sun screen during a blizzard), here is the "happy" analysis -

"Swiss watch exports suffered from a negative base effect and one business day fewer in January, posting an 11.0% fall, to 1.6 billion francs. The result for the month will nonetheless have only a limited effect on the upward trend seen since last summer and a return to significant growth is expected over the next few months."
I can only assume that they can't understand their own graph, or that the words significant and growth possibly don't actually mean what they are implying. Now as the math department at Oberlin High School will attest, numeracy was not my strong suit, but I am fairly certain that when the graph line on the chart keeps heading south, it in fact means that you are NOT improving, but rather doing quite the opposite, and upward trend typically means that the graph line would be heading, well, upward.

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