When kids and kittens do it, it’s cute
Originally published at Firefly the Great. Please leave any comments there.
Anyone who has an indoor/outdoor cat knows this situation well, especially in the winter: the cat begs to be let outside with that irresistible blend of cuteness and obnoxiousness. You relent. The cat steps outside for maybe ten seconds and immediately puts on its most forlorn expression of “Oh, I’m a poor little kitten left all alone in the freezing cold”
He didn’t want to go out that door. He wanted to go out into the door where it’s warm and sunny.
And eventually he finds that door, somewhere around March.
It occurred to me today that gambling is nothing more than the human equivalent of that search: countless trials consisting of an endless manipulation of irrelevant variables in search of the inevitable and completely random one that produces a win.
But when cats do it, it’s cute.
It’s like last year’s Academy Awards. The girl from Little Miss Sunshine bailing out Will Smith’s kid when he flubbed his lines: cute. Leonardo DiCaprio bailing out Al Gore when he flubbed his lines: kind of sad.
Blackjack players? You’re not cute.