CHANCES:


That leaving for the airport 2 ½ hours before your flight will get you to your gate at the airport:

With 2 hours to spare – 50%
Too late – 50%

CHANCES:

That if you have groceries in your right hand your car keys will be in your right side pocket -54%

That both will be on your left side – 45%

That your car keys will be in the pocket on the side of your free hand – 1%

That rather than shift the bags,  you’ll look like a spastic geek as you try to unsuccessfully get into your pants pocket reaching across with the opposite hand – 88%

That you will be successful with this maneuver – 2%

That you will try the same maneuver next time – 50%

CHANCES:

That you’ll never learn, will you? - 40%

That you will learn, but by then it won’t matter – 60%

CHANCES:

That you put your pants on one leg at a time – 99.9993%

That you’re in Cirque de Soleil - .0007%

CHANCES:
That you’ll listen to your gut – 55%

That you’ll listen to your heart – 26%

That you’ll listen to anyone who points out that listening to different body parts is a sure sign that you’re going nuts and you should seek professional help – 8%

CHANCES:
That you get to take off from work on your birthday - 29%

That this post is me taking off - 88%

CHANCES:

That you’ll jump out of bed in the morning ready to start the day – 7%

That you’ll jump out of bed in the morning with a calf cramp – 74%

CHANCES:
That a letter will get there – 99.8%

That an e-mail will get there – 99.8%

That the .02% chance of it not getting there is a large enough probability for you to blame it on a delivery failure when you forgot to send something – 92%

CHANCES:

That if you had a hammer, you’d hammer in the morning – 50%

That you’d hammer in the evening – 50%

That you’d hammer all over this land - .001%

Without getting arrested - .00000001%

CHANCES:

That the contractor will show up when they say – 38%
That they’ll do the job right the first time – 28%
That the job will cost what they said initially - .2%
That the job will be done in less than twice the time they initially said – 40%
That the level of frustration of dealing with all this is going to reach a point where you scream – 96%
That it will be a family member that you scream at instead of the contractor – 84%
That the project leads to therapy sessions – 39%
That it leads to divorce – 38%
That in the divorce settlement you end up living in a new house – 50%
That that house needs some renovation – 92%
That you’ll hire the same contractor – 77%
That if you do hire someone else he’ll be worse – 50%

CHANCES:

That you have a nagging suspicion those nutritional supplements you’re taking aren’t doing anything for you – 72%
That they aren’t – 70%
That you’ll still recommend them to other people and tell them how much of a difference they make - 81%

CHANCES:

That you stand facing the shower head when taking a shower – 50%

That you stand with your back to the shower head – 50%

That you can't understand how so many people are facing the wrong direction - 99%

CHANCES:

That your leg will fall asleep -19%

That if it does it’s because your leg had been up all night partying when it should have been sleeping – 34%

CHANCES:

That you’ll spend 45 seconds waving your hands in front of the motion detector on an automatic paper towel dispenser in a public restroom – 61%

That you’ll end up on the air dryer – 60%

That it will shut off before your hands are actually dry – 70%

That you’ll wipe them on your pants – 91%

CHANCES:

That you’ll have a bizarre dream on any given night – 19%

That you’ll remember the bizarre dream in the morning – 6%

That you’ll try to explain it to someone – 3%

That you’ll sound ridiculous or bore the other person when you try to tell it – 98%

That the other 2% will act interested because they are your therapist – 100%

CHANCES:

That you’ll have a flat tire – 12%

That it won’t be repairable – 74%

That in deciding on a new tire you’ll make the right decision between the tire with the squiggly pattern and the one with the geometric pattern – 50%

That you’ll just say, “Give me a black one” – 82%

That if you don’t get the road hazard protection you’ll get another flat within a year – 46%

That if you do get the road hazard protection you’ll never use it – 88%

CHANCES:

That you've had an affair with Herman Cain - 46%

CHANCES:

That you can get the job done in:

One fell swoop – 2%

Two fell swoops – 4%

A bunch of fell swoops – 18%

Just a few swoops if they aren’t the fell kind – 76%

CHANCES:

That if you order the delicacy of blowfish in Japan the poison in the fish will kill you – 9%

That anyone around the table is going to ask for a taste – 2%

That, if you die, the waiter will still come by to ask “Is everything OK?” – 40 %

That you’d leave a 20% tip when there is a poisoning death at the table – 7%

That you’ll leave something, but 15% or less – 80%

CHANCES:

That it will rain or snow if the forecast for precipitation is:

20% - 5%

30% - 90%

50% - 50%

80% - 100%

100% - 50%

CHANCES:

That you’ll go bald – 69% (guys only)

That you’ll do something desperate like a comb-over or implants or join a hair club to pretend you’ve still got hair – 74%

That women will tell you that you’re just as attractive without hair or that they find bald men sexy – 19%

That those women are lying – 99.7%

CHANCES:

That if you are below the age of 23 you will use the word “like” in every sentence you utter - 93%

That you will use it 5 times or more per sentence – 26%

That your parents are able to control themselves and not slap you when they hear you talk – 50%

CHANCES:

That there is someone on the ab machine you wanted to use – 44%

That they are still on it after you’ve gone through two more machines – 42%

That someone else jumps on it while you are on a third machine – 87%

That finally, after you’ve done all the other machines and started to walk out the door, it frees up, but you are too tired to go back - 93%

CHANCES:

That you’ll get there on time – 52%,

At the rate you’re going? – 32%

CHANCES:

That you’ll be able to burn off as many calories, the day after Thanksgiving as you consumed on Thanksgiving – 1%

That you’ll try – 30%

That while trying you’ll injure yourself – 53%

That this will lead to weeks of inactivity and weight gain that won’t come off until a few weeks after death – 44%

That knowledge of that likelihood will stop you from overeating on Thanksgiving - .02%

CHANCES:

That you put the turkey in the fridge to defrost in time – 39%

That instead, you’ll be putting the Turkey in the bathtub Wed. night – 46%

That after the bath it will need a blow dry – 27%

CHANCES:

That after setting the alarm and locking the house, you’ll have to go back in for something you forgot:
(Number of times per attempt to leave)
0 – 4%
1 – 67%
2 – 24%
3 – 2.%
That after 3 returns, you just say f**k it and stay home – 88%

CHANCES:

That they won’t be any more specific than “between 8 and 5” for your appliance repairman – 93%

That he gets to your house at 4:48  - 56%

That he maybe could have called at some point during the day to at least let you know it would be closer to the end of the day so you could have gotten out of the house for an hour – 2%

That when he gets there he doesn’t have your part – 58%

CHANCES:

That you screwed up:

Somehow – 53%

Somewhere – 40%

Somewhat – 9%

CHANCES:

That there will be a slow moving line and only two cashiers working at the 24 hr. Wal-Mart's checkout (by time):
8:00 AM - 100%
2:00 PM - 100%
11:00 PM - 100%
3:30 AM - 99.8%
Any other time - 100%

CHANCES:

That you’ll have a song stuck in your head all day – 14%

That it will be a good song – 3%

That you’ll still like at the end of the day - .009%

CHANCES:

That you left your headlights on – 8%

That someone will tell you that you left them on – 83%

That they turn off automatically – 65%

That you’ll sound like a jerk telling the person, who was only trying to help, that they turn off automatically – 96%

CHANCES:

That your candidate won yesterday – 48%
That any old schmuck would do better than whoever won – 52%
That any old schmuck won – 91%

CHANCES:

That you’ll find exactly the right word when you need it – 12%

That finding the exact right word will prove….damn…what’s the word? – 88%

CHANCES:

That you sprang forward instead of falling back – 1%

That you remembered to change your car clock too – 79%

That you almost had a heart attack on the way to work when you looked at your unchanged car clock – 12%

That even springing forward you were an hour late – 8%

CHANCES:

That the windshield wipers will streak after just one scrape over a frosted windshield – 47%

That if there is just one spot that streaks it will be right in your line of vision – 86%

CHANCES:

That you will misplace your cellphone – 86%

That you will be able to find it somewhere in the house when you call it – 61%

That when you call it someone walking down the street will wonder why the pile of leaves they are walking past is ringing – 35%

CHANCES:

That the neighbor or teacher you thought was 90 when you were a kid is still alive 40 years later – 63%

That she still isn’t 90 – 88%

That you look just as bad as a 45 year old as she did back then – 50%

That kids aren’t good judges of age – 99.8%

CHANCES:

That the dry cleaner will tell you that the stain will come out – 64%

That the stain will come out – 6%

That it will 98% come out – 70%

That the vague shadow of the remaining 2% will keep you from ever wearing it – 93%

CHANCES:

That you bought enough candy – 47%

That you’ll run out of candy – 53%

That you bought enough candy and wouldn’t have run out if you hadn’t been dipping into it for the past 2 weeks – 76%

That you didn’t realize everyone else in the house had been dipping into it too – 24%

CHANCES:

That there would be a Halloween. snowstorm that would cancel school – 2%

That there would have been a Halloween snowstorm that would have canceled

school when you were a kid – 0%

CHANCES:

That last nights World Series game was the best ever – 61%

That you went to sleep after Texas went up by three runs in the 7^th – 86%

That you’ll make a promise to watch game 7 to completion no matter what to make up for it – 75%

That game 7 will be the worst game in World Series history and include a 2 hour 20 minute rain delay and you'll be angry you stayed up to the end just to watch your team lose– 30%

CHANCES:

That when you turn on the radio it will be during an ad – 96%

That when you turn on public radio it will be during a fund raiser – 97%

That if you give to the fund raiser they’ll shut up – 0%

CHANCES:

That you remembered to take your pills today – 68%

That you can’t remember if you remembered to take your pills today – 49%

That the symptoms of not taking enough are worse than the side effects of taking too many – 50%

That if you gave your pills to a professional athlete he took them – 41%

CHANCES:

It was the best of times – 12%

It was the worst of times – 87%

It was the New York Times – 1%

CHANCES:

That your child got his/her college application in before the deadline – 88%

That it was on the day of the deadline – 44%

That you are much more happy about your child leaving for college than you were before the application process – 99.59%

CHANCES:

That there actually is a good way to lose an eye - .0001%

CHANCES:

That the grass is greener on the other side – 96%

That the grass is bluer on the other side – 2%

That the grass is bluer on the other side if you live in Kentucky or across from the Boise State football stadium – 99.7%

CHANCES:

That even though you thought you heard what your wife said, you didn’t really – 60%

That you’ll hear it again – 98%

That you swear you’ll try to do better next time – 80%

That you will actually do any better – 12%

CHANCES:

That your bicycle will get stolen if you don’t lock it, even if you’re “just running in for a second.” – 41%

That your unicycle will get stolen if you don’t lock it - .006%

That if your unicycle does get stolen, some clown did it – 99.8%

CHANCES:

That when you are going through an old photo album you will come across a picture of you wearing the same clothing that you presently have on – 39%

What This Blog is For

I remember my father taking me to my first baseball game. I was 9 years old and quite excited and I wanted to know everything that was going to happen before we got there. I peppered my father with a thousand questions: Will there be a lot of people? Will Luis Tiant play? Can we get a foul ball? Can we get a hot dog? What if they are out of hot dogs? What’s in a hot dog?....

My Dad dutifully answered my questions until he either got tired of them or was stumped, at which point he would utter one of his favorite catch-all phrases, “You pays your money, you takes your chances.”

After years of hearing this repeated wisdom I came to understand two things – First, my father had trouble with the English language, and second, there are no sure things in life.

We are always taking chances in life. Not just major, calculated path-of-life altering chances, but daily. Leaving the house is taking a risk. It’s probably more of a risk if you live in Baghdad. Or if you’re a NASCAR driver.  If you’re a NASCAR driver in Baghdad, well, my advice would be to stay in bed.

Of course, staying in bed has its risks too. Bed bugs, bed sores or even the possibility of inhaling a pillow feather and having it pierce your esophagus and becoming permanently lodged there so that you forever speak with a strange trill, are all risks of rolling over when that alarm rings. The question becomes – What is the greater risk? What are my chances of anything happening as I go about my daily routine?

That’s where What Are The Chances comes in handy. It acts as a sort of destiny calculator which determines the percentages for potential reactions to the everyday actions you take.  These may be life or death situations or they may be routine. The goal is not avoiding all danger, but knowing with clear aforethought, what you are getting into when you walk out that door. Or sit at your desk. Or sleep. Everything in life is a risk and I'll try to give you an idea of where anything you do will lead.

I have tried my best to present these stats in an objective way. Yet, I caution you to view these and all statistics with a jaundiced eye. We sometimes take surveys at face value without realizing that we are looking at them from the wrong angle. For example, a commonly known statistic is that most automobile accidents occur within five miles of home. My immediate reaction to this information would be to stay the hell away from home.

But statistics are incomplete pictures. The above stat could be a logical result of the fact that the five mile radius around home is where most people spend most of their time, thus allowing for more chance of an accident. Or, it could mean that most bad drivers start at home and rarely make it outside that five mile barrier without getting into a collision. If that’s you, then maybe the statistic should be that most automobile accidents occur within five miles of Bob. (Assuming your name is Bob.) So what we really learn from the fact that most accidents occur within five miles of home is to stay the hell away from Bob.

What you learn from the calculations presented here is up to you. If not exactly answers, let them provide some guidance. Let them offer some precautions and help you get a handle on your expectations. Just remember that odds are only probabilities. Anything can and will happen. As my father said, you pays your money, you takes your chances. And chances are, if you knew what was in it, you wouldn’t eat the hot dog.