- How many Connect Four game pieces can be missing without affecting the outcome? (ht: Adriana LLeras-Muney)
- I want reverse autocorrect: if I receive a nonsense message on my phone I want to be able to highlight any word and get a list of the most likely typos that would have been autocorrected into that word.
- I have never seen a Singaporean restaurant in the United States. I have never seen Laksa in the United States. I don’t understand this.
- When a plumber or other fixit guy comes, you will almost always want to call him back a few days later to make some minor adjustments, or fix something they forgot to, or to ask them some questions. But the second visit will cost you. So when they are there the first time, steal one of their tools. Then call them back a few days later and tell them they left something behind and they can come pick it up.
Cheap Talk
A blog about economics, politics and the random interests of forty-something professors
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12 comments
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October 16, 2012 at 11:35 pm
Evan
I don’t understand the Laksa thing either. It’s all over the place in Australia, and findable, with a little effort, in Vancouver. I will admit I haven’t spent much time in the US, so my sample size there is small. Laksa is great, and I marginally prefer it Malaysian rather than Singaporean style.
October 17, 2012 at 1:22 am
Anonymous
On 3, there’s plenty of Chinese and Indian food, but Malaysian food is severely underrepresented in the US. I’m guessing that’s what you mean by Singaporean.
Similarly with Filipino food.
October 17, 2012 at 1:28 am
Troy
No. 4 is a variant of the Costanza Leave-Behind (S08E08).
October 17, 2012 at 8:47 am
Roger Williams
Singaporean is similar to Malaysian. Which you should be able to find in most of the big cities.
Singapore is a small country/city (about 3m of the population of 5m were actually born there), so finding a Singaporean restaurant in the US is about as likely as finding say a Finnish restaurant.
October 17, 2012 at 8:48 am
exiledantipodean
Just had Laksa on the weekend at Noodles Etc at 57th and Kenwood in Hyde Park. Short walk from Booth if you were visiting there!
October 17, 2012 at 9:47 am
E
For Connect Four, the answer changes depending on whether you mean for all paths of play or for some solution concept (e.g. SPE, EFR). If the latter, you would have to factor the missing pieces into the game and recompute the solution.
@Troy: I had the exact same thought.
October 17, 2012 at 9:58 am
jamesoswald
3. There’s a good Malaysian restaurant in DC. I can’t imagine that Singaporean is much different.
4. They still might charge you if you asked them to do work, especially if they know game theory.
October 17, 2012 at 11:27 am
jeff
I prefer the Singaporean (Katong) Laksa.
October 17, 2012 at 5:26 pm
soxsail
A Yelp search of entire US shows just this one place:
http://www.yelp.com/biz/kopitiam-cafe-milpitas#query:katong%20laksa
October 17, 2012 at 11:04 pm
JayT
Penang Garden in China Town in San Francisco bills itself as a Singaporean restaurant, and they serve Latsa. It’s not the greatest place, but it’s not bad either.
I havven’t looked around too much for Singaporean food here, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there were others in SF. A lot of the Chinese restaurants have Singaporean dishes.
October 18, 2012 at 12:41 pm
anggarrgoon
It used to be possible to get laksa in one of the restaurants in the Porter Exchange north of Harvard Square.
October 18, 2012 at 7:40 pm
Gavin
Singaporean food is not Malaysian food.
http://breadetbutter.wordpress.com/2010/05/04/what-is-malaysian-food/