Social networking dilemma: cyber-war or peace

I was reading an article from Scientific American about how small friendship triangles, when multiplied, can potentially cause a network of peace or one of war and hostility.

Consider a relationship triangle. Arthur and Carl don’t like each other. But Bill is friendly with them both. Bill will probably try to convince Arthur and Carl to get along. But Arthur and Carl are telling Bill that the other guy’s no good. You don’t need to be a math whiz to see that, as time goes on, either everyone will be friends or Bill is going to have to pick a side.
-Karen Hopkin (Scientific American)

Think about this for a moment. It’s essentially having mutual friend, but not befriending the person who also like the same person you like (hence mutual.) It’s a friendship triangle (the triangle representing three people) – like explained above – but with one week edge. The edge of the triangle represents a relationship between two people. Two of the three edges are well functioning but one is not. So either the mutual friend amends the weak “edge” and everybody is happy, or the mutual friend cannot do so and the entire triangle collapses. Imagine this triangle, but multiplied. If the vast majority of triangles with one weak can sort things out, that would be beneficial. It could potentially promote new, well-functioning triangles. This could lead to peace among networks. But what if things play out opposite? What if the majority of triangles collapse? Potentially the once mutual friend is now not friends with anyone in the triangle. With more collapsing triangle-like friendships could lead to a network disaster. What do you think will happen?

The Embarrassing Public Washroom Encounter

One of the things I find funny is when other people embarrass themselves (involuntarily of course). I'm not proud of it but when it does happy, and it's not just me, it tickles my funny nerve.

We all know this but we don't really talk about it that much. We all know it happens, we try to make it discreet but we all know what just happened. What in the world am I talking about?

You know you are waiting outside a public washroom waiting for the next available washroom or stall. We pull the handle of the door but it's locked so we know that someone is in there. You wait a while and then try the door again, just to make sure. A little while after the poor man/women who was in the stall/private washroom opens the door. You exchange looks for a moment. You can tell they are embarrassed my the amount of time they took to use the facilities. Their cheeks turn red, the walk off quickly, something like that.

Then you open the door and you smell some god-awfull stench that makes you want to hurl. You turn around and you can still see that man/women briskly walking away and they look over their shoulder to see if you are looking at them with a puzzled look on your face. They may even start to walk even faster.

We all know this happens every once in the while but the worst part is (if they work in your department in the office) when it's just the two of you walking down the. That awkward feeling that tickles your spine.

OK, so I may be exaggerating a bit but we all know this happens. If it happens that YOU are the one who gave the restroom a new scent take this advice: get over it.

It's not the end of the world. Like I said, many people don't bring it up after it happened...Except for me who just had to write this post on embarrassment. It's just one of the many things that crack me up from time to time.

What makes you chuckle? And why?