Would You Believe?

HHMMMM...what should we talk about today?   Are you at work while you are reading blogs this morning? Are you looking sufficiently busy?  If so, you might be the subject of a new Gallup poll.

While my ever-growing skepticism keeps me from always buying into anything the Gallup people tell me, I sort-of, kind-of believe they might of gotten some of it right this time.  Frankly after they came out with a poll last year saying that three out of 10 Americans hated filing taxes, I lost  my faith in them.  I am pretty sure that 10 out of 10 Americans hate filing taxes.


Thought Number One:  The Results Are In: Lots of People Hate Their Jobs

But they..the Gallup people, that is...may be redeeming themselves by doing a survey that tells us that 70 percent of people that work, hate their jobs.  The fact that they clarified the survey was for "those that work" gives credence to the thoroughness of the poll, don't you think?

Looking From Both Sides Now

It occurred to me while filling out my most recent juror qualification form, perhaps question #6 is a PERCEPTION on my part.  What if I am certifiably crazy  but I only think I am a sane person?

Do we really see ourselves as we are?  Are our opinions of ourselves or the world around us anything close to being accurate?

This week I have noticed on a number of occasions that perhaps, my point of view might be....OK...more than might...strikingly different than those around me.

Polls, Studies and Other Fairy Tales

Thought Number One .. Do these Polls Have It Right Or Wrong?

Do you happen to live in St. Louis, Missouri? If you do, you might have placed NUMBER ONE on a recent poll by Men's Health magazine. Of course, it is possible that you wouldn't want to be #1 as this particular list. That would mean you live in the city that has the worst drivers in America.

 Perhaps, you think that Men's Health got it wrong and the worst drivers are where you live.  OK, you still have a fighting chance at the title.   According to Travel + Leisure magazine, that honor goes to Miami, Florida.   Still not where you live???   No worries... you  have yet another shot at the prize (?)....You could have been the winner by living in Washington DC if you listen to Allstate Insurance's Best Driver Report (or worst depending on which end of the list you are on).

So what is the take away from all of this?????


YOU CAN'T TRUST A POLL, STUDY OR SURVEY...

Or maybe... another take-away is that there are a lot of really crappy drivers in  a lot of cities and no one can figure out who is the worst of the worst.

Thought Number Two:  A Lot of Disparity In the Numbers

To examine the differences between the polls dealing with America's worst drivers, I looked to see how my city's ranking fared.

The Allstate's Best Driver Report has Kansas City, Kansas listed as 37th best in a field on 100 for being safe drivers and Kansas City, Missouri as being the 22nd on the list.  So according to Allstate, we're bad drivers but clearly not the worst.

Then we get (nearly) vindicated by  Travel + Leisure.  They have Kansas City ranked as the second SAFEST city in America with only Portland, Oregon beating us out.  Yay us!!!

But wait...not so fast in taking our bows.... Men's Health has us as number 95th out of 100 on the WORST list.  There seems to be 5 other cities that have drivers that are worse than Kansas Citians. 

In all fairness to the various poll takers, perhaps the reason we are both 2nd from the top of the best drivers and fifth from the bottom of the worst drivers is that people are horribly confused about which state's DMV to check with.  There is an never-ending confusion on where we are and what state we are in.

First of all to locate us....we are in the middle...nearly the exact middle of  the United States. 

I did find it interesting as I looked at the cities listed on these various polls, most cities had a state listed behind it.  For example on all the lists Dallas, was listed as Dallas, Texas.  (BTW...for those of you that live in Dallas, your city did very well and ranked high for being the worst drivers in America.  You were #2 on the Men's Health Poll.  So close...but not quite the winner.  Better luck next year.) But conspicuously, there was not a state listed behind Kansas City.  I think given the fact that people were probably arguing back and forth..."it's Missouri....no it's Kansas" they opted not to take a chance and get it wrong.


I have to give praise where it's due though.  Allstate not only figured out that KC has a presence in two states but even ranked both sides of the city as noted above.  (Missouri 22 and Kansas 37.....as this was listing cities with safe drivers.....number one being the safest and 100 being Washington DC)

Maybe in the future I will confine my bad driving to the Missouri side of town, so I can try to help even up the score.

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Our Lives by the Numbers

Thought I would jot down a quick post so you all know I am still among the living.  The dearth of my posts most likely will continue into the middle of next week. 

In the last week or so,  I was traveling for 4 days, being down with a nasty cold 4 days and generally being aggravated about some things which I will be bitching about in a post next week.

This week our grown son is visiting and I don't want to be sitting for extended periods of time in front of the computer.  It's not that I don't love you all, blogees but I rarely get to see my youngest and want to devote my time to him.  

Which brings me to today's post.  This is going to be an example of plagiarism at its finest.  I happened upon a website that has a lot of interesting graphs.  As you might remember in some of my past posts, my own graphs that I created to quantify the important **cough cough** aspects of our lives have appeared from time to time.  I am a very visual person and love to see the black and white of all things.  Of course, this makes no sense as I am known to disagree, analyze, dispute, ridicule and overall, find fault with every poll, survey and opinion that was ever put forth.  Still, there is nothing better than a colorful graph to try to entice me to think a certain way.

So thanks to a friend that recognizes my adoration for "life by the numbers" and   GraphJam for making those numbers so creatively visual,  here are a few "expert"  generate graphs of life as we know it.

So...my friends, until I get back on schedule have a great day!!!

Studies, Surveys and Polls

Two Thoughts for Tuesday   

Thought Number One....If we are to believe in polls, studies and surveys, we need visuals.


Call me a naysayer....a doubter...a cynic but I am constantly doubting the results of SURVEYS, POLLS and STUDIES.  I like to think of them as modern fairy tales at best or devious attempts to push an agenda at their worst.  A day hardly goes by without some new  study being done to give us some sort of insight to the "real" state of things.  Of course the fact, that the numbers never seem to support whatever our perceptions are regarding the subject cause me a bit of pause.

Well....that was true until I saw this poll.  It seems that the results are entirely what I would have thought as accurate. 
Still, with 60,000 participants, the Parade/OMG poll asked respondents to vote for which celebrity annoys them the most.  The fact that they only shared the top six was a bit of a  disappointment but here are the:

Winners.....drum rolllll, please....The WINNERS ARE!!!!

1. Kim Kardashian 29%
2. Charlie Sheen 27%
3. Snooki 21%
4. Lindsay Lohan 16%
5. Donald Trump 5%
6. Brad Womack 1%

While I don't question the accuracy of their survey, I do think if they want us to take it seriously it is IMPERATIVE that they give us a graph.  What is a poll without a graph of some sort?  If the Parade/OMG wanted to get my attention....it needed to look like this.

 Another example to really bring my 1st thought home....here is another poll that asked older Americans if they thought the level of their happiness depended on their mental health.   The title of the study was:

STANDARD OF LIVING, HEALTH KEY TO EMOTIONAL WELLBEING AFTER 65


This poll was done by the Gallup Poll people

To understand this poll you have to read all the disclosures such as "how to define" emotional health.

Emotionally well-off Americans are individuals whose scores on the Gallup-Healthways Emotional Health Index are above 90, out of a maximum of 100. The Emotional Health Index is based on a comprehensive measure of emotional wellbeing asking individuals whether they felt "a lot of" each of the following emotions the day before the survey: smiling/laughing, learning/doing something interesting, being treated with respect, enjoyment, happiness, worry, sadness, anger, and stress. In addition, the survey asks people whether they have ever been diagnosed with depression.

So to summarize this poll.....Out of those that were surveyed that weren't totally NUTS...39 percent said they were satisfied, 16 percent aren't nuts but  are not happy and the other 55 percent are MISSING.

Feel free to try to figure out the missing at Your Emotional Wellbeing at the Gallup Poll.


My Second Thought for Today....Because I believe in polls (hhahahahahaha)  I will start doing my own totally accurate, you will believe anything, and it must be true because there is a visual, SURVEY


I have surveyed 15 of my dearest friends to answer the following question (for those of you that are finding it incredulous that I have 15 dear friends, you will just have to take my word for it...if it would help I will send you a graph)


The Question is DO YOU THINK THAT WE WILL ALL BE ABLE TO RETIRE WHEN WE ARE STILL ABLE TO FEED OURSELVES AND LIVE OUT OUR LIVES IN CONTENTED BLISS?

The Good for the Day... I experience all the emotions listed on the emotional wellbeing disclosure, especially the stress so therefore I must be OK...right????

The Bad....those missing pollsters are MIA


The Weird...the myriad of subjects that people do polls and surveys about.










 









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