Daily Archives: 24/12/2005

More fat fingered fun (olympic standard)

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Loved the story that London won the 2012 olympics ’cause of a button pushing error – another example of fat finger syndrome after I posted about one just ten days ago:

“A leading Olympic official has suggested that London may have won the right to stage the 2012 Games only because one of the 104 members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) pressed the wrong button in the third-round vote.

Alex Gilady, the Israeli who is one of the most influential members of the IOC, claimed that the mistake helped Paris, rather than Madrid, to reach the final round against London. Madrid had been widely regarded as the biggest threat to London in a straight fight.

It is believed that the blunder was committed by Lambis Nikolaou, of Greece, who protested publicly at the microphone after the secret ballot in Singapore on July 6 that he had not had time to register his vote. In fact, an examination of the poll showed that all the eligible IOC members had voted in that round.” (The Times, 22 Dec 05).

As I was going to St. Ives..

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On the way to St Ives for Xmas spotted this steam train at Bodmin Parkway, fantastic (the steam train’s on the right, btw).

And talking of St Ives, you may have heard of the following rhyme: “As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives. Every wife had seven sacks, every sack had seven cats, every cat had seven kitts. Kitts, cats, sacks, wives, how many were going to St. Ives?” Upon being presented with this conundrum, most readers begin furiously adding and multiplying numbers in order to calculate the total quantity of objects mentioned. However, the problem is a trick question. Since the man and his wives, sacks, etc. were met by the narrator on the way to St. Ives, they were in fact leaving–not going to–St. Ives. The number going to St. Ives is therefore “at least one” (the narrator), but might be more since the problem doesn’t mention if the narrator is alone.” (Mathworld)