Sunday, August 06, 2006

StyleyGeek goes to party: gets cold

Abstract:

In this paper the author will argue that parties held during winter when the outside temperature is less than minus two degrees (28 F) should not be held outdoors. The addition of a small brazier can improve matters, but if there is only enough wood to last an hour or two, and/or so many guests that only a tenth of them can fit huddled around the brazier at any given time, the brazier's presence may lower rather than improve morale.

Allowing access to an inside room is thoughtful behaviour on the part of the hosts, but it should be noted that leaving the windows and French doors wide open all night is likely to bring the room down to the same temperature as the outside area.

In conclusion, the author explains that while she enjoyed the pizza and is still recovering from the extremely alcoholic punch*, it took her 45 minutes upon her return home to stop shivering and return to something approximating a normal human body temperature.

__________
* "So what's in this punch, then?"
"Well, it started as pina colada, but the bowl was only about a third full, so we added the rest of everything we had in the liquor cabinet, and other people have been pouring in some of whatever they brought with them."

2 Comments:

Unknown said...

In re: to cold party, we have the following comments.

First, a brazier is not an english word. Look it up. It doesn't exist except insofar as it relates to last names.

Second, this study is severely flawed by a lack of a comparison or control group. Further we wonder if people were randomly assigned to the party or not. And if so, how was it determined who would eat pizza and punch? Did all partiers do both? This is a huge glaring flaw and will severely limit your ability to publish this.

Third, the author claims she "enjoyed" the pizza and the punch, but this has not been operationalized. Exactly what measure was used to determine this variable of "enjoyment"?

Finally, it is unclear the N of the parties. How many parties were sampled? Clearly if the author wishes to publish this, she must sample more parties, more pizza, and more punch before any conclusions will be taken as evidentiary.

StyleyGeek said...

I demand a second, more anonymous reviewer.

This one was clearly biased by her (a) own academic background (control groups? Bah! Who needs rigour?) (b) American heritage (brazier) and (c) obvious desire (with less obvious motivation) to turn the author into a fat alcoholic (ref. final comment).