Monthly Archives: November 2014

A Thanksgiving Story – including UFO’s, Foreclosures, a Derelict Website, and Questionably-Placed Commas…

by in Environment, Fiction | 5 Comments

It was the Internet, and perhaps a small grammatical misinterpretation that resulted in the entire world’s downfall to the designs of a predatory lender. It seemed that for years, bored ambassadors and politicians had been killing time at work on the pages of a derelict social website for writers of rhetoric, policy debates, and political speeches. And it was while endlessly flaming upon the website’s pages that they had discovered an advertising link to one of those too-good-to-be-true offers, a short-term loan service of a magnitude that offered to plug the holes in a nation’s, or perhaps even the entire planet’s fiscal problems.

The temptation for the world’s leaders to borrow their way out of financial difficulties during the economic downturn of the early third millennium had proven difficult to resist. And as one Secretary of State for a nation hosting the world’s single largest military had noted, the maintenance of peace through Mutual Assured Destruction wasn’t cheap. At first, the Russian and Chinese leaders had objected, if only slightly. But even they relented after receiving several large, back-room real-estate deals.

And so, the Secretary General of the United Nations pressed “send” to an on-line application, and a loan-contract arrived via special courier the very next day. Of course, the contract was in some inscrutable form of financial legalese. A team including some of the world’s best financial experts and attorneys spent several weeks poring through the documents, finally concluding that it was entirely incomprehensible — but that it looked like a good deal. After all, it was just a small loan, a few tens-of-trillions to tide things over for a couple of years. Unfortunately, however, a mysterious comma-shaped mark in the interest-rate section was misinterpreted as a typographical error when it was in fact it was a foreign grammatical reference to a logarithm.

—

The spacecraft traveled slowly out of the east, leaving a trail of dark smoke that coagulated into a sooty grime settling toward the sea below. Strangely unaccompanied by the usual show of power that had come to be expected from the nation over whose territory it so openly intruded, its unchallenged shadow leisurely belched black fumes across the breadth of New York’s Long Island. Gradually, it descended, as the eyes of an utterly insolvent nation turned upward to take in this astonishing sight.

Legs extended from the bottom of the craft as it crossed the East River and began to descend more steeply, coming into clear view of the assembling crowds below. The craft’s blackened undercarriage seemed to be scraped and dented in places, with exposed plumbing and a loose piece of metal flapping in the air as it expelled an oily cloud. Forward motion slowed, then stopped, and its destination became clear. A sound something like a cross between a washing-machine’s spin cycle and a noise variously compared to, “a rattling bag of spanners,” or, “skeletons wankin’ in a sardine tin,” filled the air as the giant machine slowed and moved toward the United Nations complex.

The craft touched down in the middle of the central plaza fountain, unceremoniously knocking over the bronze, Single Form sculpture as a swirling plume of soot and fumes billowed onto the Library Building windows. The loud whirling-rattle wound down as the craft settled onto its feet, and a loose piece of metal fell unceremoniously from the ship’s hull, splashing into the now blackened water. A choking cloud obscured the scene as nearby onlookers scrambled to avoid the apparently toxic fumes with varying degrees of success.

Several minutes passed as the smoke cleared. And then, a hatch on the side of the ship suddenly popped out and swung open. A collection of loose objects fell from the opening into the fountain, some floating on the oily water. Then, the hatch quickly slammed closed as a large ramp opened toward the tall, glass-wrapped Secretariat building. Several, small cylindrical objects rolled haphazardly down the ramp, making empty metallic sounds as they dropped onto the driveway. This was followed by the rhythmic clanking of footsteps as a large humanoid robot navigated itself stiffly down the ramp. Moving into full view of the crowds of anxious onlookers who had gathered around the spectacle, the robot looked suspiciously like “Gort,” a character from a 1951 movie.

The silvery humanoid shuffled stiffly toward the front entrance of the Secretariat building, positioning itself next to the door where it proceeded to spray a large patch of yellow onto the glass before inscribing it with a pattern using an energy-beam emanating from its single eye. Subsequently, the robot turned around and moved back to the edge of the steps, where it stood fixed and motionless while the ramp of the spacecraft lifted back into a closed position. The whirling-rattle restarted, gradually increasing to a deafening clatter as an immense plume of asphyxiating, greasy black smoke billowed over gasping onlookers and on across the boulevard. Then, the craft slowly climbed over the General Assembly building, coating it too in a black grime before turning back toward the east.

It would be a long while before the settling cloud of noxious fumes dispersed enough to allow a few brave souls to walk past the apparently inert robot and see what had been left on the glass. What they found was a large, yellow splatter that had etched upon its surface the same words over and over, repeated in the text, kanji, glyphs, and various chicken-scratches of all 6,428 languages of the planet Earth. It read, “By order of the Galactic Resources Economic Exchange Department: Notice of Foreclosure and Eviction – All residents are hereby directed to vacate this planet within 7-days of delivery of this notice. Public auction to be conducted at this location at noon local time one solar-day thereafter.“Featured image

Humans had not, perhaps, presented themselves as the best custodians of the little blue sphere known as “Earth”. But now it was no longer theirs upon which to wrest their petty grievances. The auction would take 16-milliseconds, accepting over thirty-million bids before determining a winner. And humanity, as it turned out, had not been so bad when compared to the heavily-leveraged intergalactic consortium of mining investors who were the new landlords. Those who would follow in the sulfurous light of a smoke-filtered sun would look back to the “glory days.” Those times when humans merely fought and stole from one another, and vexed nature — before the mountains had been pushed aside, before the poles were melted and the seas emptied — those times were recalled with splendor. And to have lived in them, for that I am thankful.

Countersteering

by in Boundary Behavior, Ride, Risk | 11 Comments

As a big, empty home in a Seattle suburb turned into a 140 square-foot cottage with an outdoor communal kitchen in ChiangMai, Thailand; likewise, the magnificent “garage queen” was replaced by a more utilitarian, used Kawasaki KL250. A “dual-purpose” bike, it was more suited to the rain-soaked, potholed roads and crazy urban traffic in Thailand. But even with a lowered Featured imagesuspension and most of the seat-cushioning pulled out from under the upholstery, stoplights were a tip-toe affair. And to my chagrin, I quickly discovered that 12-year old Thai schoolgirls riding double on 50cc mopeds could out-pace me through stop-and-go traffic. But for two years, it would be my only personal transportation.

My first experience controlling a motorcycle wasn’t long after my 15th birthday. The Honda 400-Four belonged to the older brother of a friend. He rode up on the machine just as we were leaving her home, and I made no secret of my fascination. And perhaps his interest in me tempered whatever doubts he might have had about another’s leg placed over it’s seat. But my reluctant admirer turned out to be a fairly good instructor — front brake, slipping the clutch and creeping forward, stopping. Probably an hour of dopamine-induced attention, and I was riding in slow, sinuous arcs around the large, suburban cul-de-sac.

That evening I asked my parents if I could get a motorcycle. My father, a physician, simply grunted before walking away. My mom was a little more to the point. “No.”  But as riding a motorcycle demands, I would push back against this turn of forces.  Just short of three-years later, a 1979 Honda CB400T2 appeared in front of my parents’ home. And within two months, it would be exchanged for a Honda VF500 “Interceptor,” a sport-bike that would be my first motorcycle to necessitate the removal of seat padding to keep both feet on the ground at stoplights. But the brilliant red, white and blue machine didn’t spend much time sitting still.

The VF500 soon traveled off to college with me, to southern California. It was a motorcyclist’s paradise, and I joined with a group of riders who frequented Ortega Highway, a winding stretch of asphalt between San Juan Capistrano and Lake Elsinore.  At the Lookout Roadhouse, a café that overlooked the half-dry lake, we would eat lunch while watching skydivers temp fate above. And then we would defy gravity in a race back to reality.

The Interceptor stayed late into my sophomore year before departing my company in the San Gabriel Mountains while attempting to keep up with a far more accomplished rider. It was an amateurish mistake. The pieces of the machine went home in the back of a friend’s pickup. The surgery to wire the pieces of my right shoulder back together left me finishing a lower-division learning how to write with my left hand. I swore off the infernal machines.

The scars were still red when I discovered that riding is a potent addiction. The fix was a brand new Kawasaki ZZR600, a 100-horsepower sport-bike, and my first with a seat low enough to actually get both of my boot heels on the ground. It was my first truly high-horsepower motorcycle, and to this day I have only traveled faster in a land vehicle while riding a Shinkansen, or Japanese “Bullet-Train.” Checking data on the motorcycle, my insurance agent commented that their average life-span was about 6-months. It would be some two-years later when I would remind her of that comment while insuring the Ducati 900 “Super Sport” with a cracked frame that I had just acquired in a swap for the ZZR.

The Ducati was truly terrifying, and I was passionately in love with it — which might have explained why my boyfriend at the time left it spread in pieces across his garage floor for several months while he re-welded the frame. But that summer, I took my first long, motorcycle road-trip piloting the Ducati. After our first leg, traveling the California coast from Newport Beach to my family’s home near San Francisco, my parents seemed somehow less than entirely pleased at our arrival.

Despite it’s checkered life, fraught with electrical problems and a rattling race-clutch that required the vice-like grip of a mountain gorilla, my relationship with the Super Sport significantly outlasted that with my boyfriend. But in 1994, Ducati introduced the “916,” and a respectful love was overwhelmed by sheer, irrational lust. Regardless, selling for the price of a nice car, it irreconcilably conflicted with a grad-student budget. But the following year, I would pay cash to ride a brand new 916 off a showroom floor.

Unfortunately, I was also no longer living in sunny Southern California, and the beautiful, bright red trophy promptly found a throne in one corner of the garage of my new home — in rain-soaked Seattle. Like an overdressed royal, it mostly sat while I waited for a clear day to brave riding the local city streets or soggy roads to nowhere in particular. And so, occasional moments of prurient stares notwithstanding, it wasn’t a difficult decision to sell the 916 four-years later when the situation motivated the move abroad that would result in the little KL250.

Motorcycles are counter-steered; at speed, one pushes the bars against the direction of a turn.  So perhaps I shouldn’t have been surprised by the irony that I probably rode more miles and received more pleasure from the little 250 than any motorcycle I’ve ever owned. A kayaker’s dry-pack bungeed onto the passenger seat, a spare fuel filter, and a couple of Sigg bottles of reserve fuel, and there was little beyond reach. Dropped onto its side more times than I’d like to admit, I quickly learned how to get it back upright on a muddy road. And a few clogged fuel-filters notwithstanding, it never failed to take me where I wanted.

There have been several other motorcycles since, including a storied little Honda CG125 in Cambodia, and a few more experiments with bits of Italian exotica. But since losing the youthful immortality that would result in some surgical-steel body parts propelled to a ZZR’s red-lined, 6th-gear top speed on an empty freeway between San Diego and Riverside, I’ve found more love for the art and functionality of my motorcycles than for mere horsepower.

The custom-built 650 I usually ride these days doesn’t threaten to punish me with a high-side for a moment of over-exuberance, and both of my boot-heels can find the ground at intersections. More often than not, it will have a set of luggage slung over the back, and it suits the mountain roads around my home in the States just fine. But those nights when I have dreams about a motorcycle, they will usually involve the journeys of a little 250 winding through the rainforest toward a remote border… at least until I’m jarred awake as I roll onto my shoulder.

—

Hard Wet Snow

by in Altitude, Fear, Fiction, Snow | 3 Comments

**With apologies to David for my unqualified reinterpretation of a rather more romantic vision.  I can offer only that they call it “Sierra Cement” out here for a reason…Featured imageThe sunlight blazed upon her abruptly naked sightedness as she slid dazed by the concussion. Pain from the impact produced an all but senseless fog, a halo aggravating the headache she felt from squinting at each blinding reflection as it glinted in discordant flashes off the passing ice. An almost wild-like displeasure radiated from her burning eyes. Snow goggles slid away, stolen by the power of gravity. She winced at their crash-smashing against several jagged exposed rocks. They looked to her, shattered it seemed, daring her to join them. She tried to; tried to get herself edged back onto the wet-ice covered world around her. Become one with the loosened skis pointed down the slope. Become one with the too-wide profile skis skating without regard for where they were pointed. Her breath froze in trepidation. She stared into the breach and gasped. The DIN-settings would still be regretted when the wreckage was through hurtling down the whiteness confounding them.

Heavy Metal Physics

by in Boundary Behavior, Music, Numbers, Science | Leave a comment

Last summer, as one of my all-time favorite bands toured the US, I arranged to catch them live during a conveniently timed visit to my mom’s home in the same town where they would be performing. The band, Boris, is generally considered “experimental metal,” but plays with a range of sounds that defy easy classification to a genre.  However, I’ve heard the expression, “incredibly loud,” used as a common descriptor for their performances.  The trio’s lead guitarist (and occasional, rather subdued vocalist), “Wata,” is known for, among other things, her use of intense audio feedback as a central component to some of her parts.

Featured imageThe venue was at a small bar, and I had a choice of watching the band play from either the stage floor, or from a few feet farther back at a rail that divided off the legal drinking area. Beer in hand, I stationed myself on the bar side of the rail, and squeezed in a pair of musician’s earplugs as the band-members emerged . The ensuing, thoroughly awe-inspiring performance ranged from hypnotic drones of literally eyeball-rattling doom-metal and a couple of more-or-less restrained pieces, to a J-Pop bit, a round of “thrash” metal, and some hardcore punk. And it was during those punk moments that the stage front crowd spontaneously formed into a small “mosh-pit.”

For those not familiar with heavy metal and punk rock music crowds, a mosh-pit is a collection of people who practice “slamdancing.” This is a form of adrenaline-fueled movement that includes significant physical contact — essentially flailing bodies slamming into each other as members of the crowd begin moving in an erratic frenzy.  The “pit” is simply a location within a crowd where the bulk of the slamdancing takes place.

I was actually a little surprised, though I’ve seen mosh-pits form at music performances many times before.  And it wasn’t the behavior of the moshers that seemed so unusual, which is typically something like an overexcited football gathering, but without the fans of an opposing team with whom to fight. Rather, what surprised me in this case is that I’d only seen mosh-pits form within such small crowds in the proximity of rather more unrestrained punk rock bands.

When moshing emerges spontaneously during metal performances, it’s usually in the kinds of larger venues (that I long ago resolved to avoid) where the behavior is encouraged by the anonymity of an expansive crowd, and might also be drug or alcohol fueled. These are the kinds of phenomena that have acquired the notoriety of evolving into the aptly named “wall of death” (which I personally believe is a collective human warfare behavior).  And it’s why moshing is openly discouraged by many performers, especially in such venues. This caused me to wonder whether there are any rules to describe the mechanisms of mosh-pits and their development as an emergent, human behavior. And, as it turns out, there are!

This paper from the Laboratory of Atomic and Solid State Physics and Department of Physics at Cornell University, attempts to quantify some parameters for mosh-pit behavior as derived from computer simulations. Feel free to laugh here should you feel so inclined (I’ll admit to some smiles). But personally, I can fully understand how addressing the fluid dynamics of countless, highly-energized, interacting particles would present an open invitation for someone to apply a little descriptive physics. Consequently, I think this actually represents a fairly inspired, if not entertaining work .

So what inscrutable mysteries were uncovered regarding the otherwise apparently random motions of auditorily and hormonally over-stimulated crowds? As it turns out, the program’s simulated, “soft particle” humans, called “MASHers,” showed a range of behaviors that aligned with some observable, real-world phenomena. From small groups appearing to behave like a heated gas (random motion under pressure), to the emergence of flocking behaviors seen in a phenomenon known as “circle pits,” their computer models appeared to align well with real-world observations. The simulations also showed some limitations to the ability of a crowd to sustain the energy necessary to keep the effect going with certain levels of physical activity.

Who would have guessed… Not that it’s so surprising that physics also applies to heavy metal, or even that the behavior of a bunch of metal-heads can be modeled as the interactions between a collection of incognizant particles. What amazes me most is actually that the authors of this paper figured out a way to use such an investigation as a graduate physics project.  For me, loud music has always been a socially marginal form of recreation for which I needed to make excuses to others.  But all these years, I could have been conducting research.

_____

A short-form version of the article can be viewed at arXiv, Collective Motion of Moshers at Heavy Metal Concerts, here: http://arxiv.org/pdf/1302.1886v1.pdf
And a more complete background is also available at the project leader, Itai Cohen’s, Cornell University page here:
http://cohengroup.lassp.cornell.edu/research.php?project=10017

“Sixty-Symbols” has a 10-minute clip where Physics Professor Philip Moriarty of the University of Nottingham discusses this research and its significance.  (Love his accent!)

Nadja

by in Loneliness, Love, Mystery | 6 Comments

“Who am I?”

Mystery stokes the fire of imaginings. Late at night, when the hearth grows weak and crimson shadows paint vision’s hazy canvas, a mind’s eye calls new forms. Rustling motions concealed within the darkness whisper my name, and I respond in heartbeats. Magic is conceived, and a spirit caught within its secrets.

We read another’s story, yet perceive a meaning with our own essence. A mind fills in the impenetrable spaces with illusion, and an apparition becomes the lover of a creative soul. It is to sleep in reality and dream perfection in a narrative never told, to fall in love with delusion, and to desire this affair with the darkness. But the sun will always rise.

Featured image

“Who is she?” A drawing by “Nadja,” on pg 123 of the 1960 English-language edition.

For ten days in 1926, the French surrealist artist, André Breton would fall in love with a mystery. But as their meetings revealed the reality of her identity, Breton chose to distance himself from a physical form and recede into contemplations on a mental apparition born of absence. Two years later, he would immortalize this icon of his affections in the obscure and haunting 1928 novel, “Nadja.” According to Breton, this mysterious woman chose the name for herself, “…because in Russian it’s the beginning of the word hope, and because it’s only the beginning…” And Breton would leave anything more of her actual identity a mystery, if indeed she ever existed at all outside of the obsession of his imaginings. But reality is not so easily ignored.

She was “Léona Camile Ghislaine D.,” a name not revealed until 2002 when a receipt bearing it and that of André Breton, along with the signature, “Nadja,” was discovered in the records of a Paris hotel. A Dutch researcher, Hester Albach, would then uncover her family name, “Delcourt,” and discover the true history of “Nadja.”  Originally from Lille, in northern France, she would give birth to a daughter at age 17, probably conceived in a relationship with a British officer during World War I. Her family then sent her to Paris under the care of a guardian, where she worked in theater and as a dancer, and occasionally as a prostitute or by selling cocaine.

Within months of meeting Breton, Nadja would be arrested by police after suffering severe hallucinations, and interned in a mental institution.  Medical records showed that she would spend the rest of her life in various psychiatric hospitals.  Breton continued to keep in contact with her while she was institutionalized. However, he never revealed the contents of some 20 letters she wrote to him during this time. And to this day, they remain unpublished. Upon her death thirteen-years later at the age of 38, the Delcourt family burned all of Breton’s letters to Nadja, as well as Nadja’s letters to her daughter. Much about this enigmatic woman and her relationship with Breton thus remains a mystery, the missing pieces to be filled with one’s own imaginings, just as Breton intended.

“Who am I?“… The first words in Breton’s novel. A faint light reveals just enough to create the minimalism of a water color, and the viewer is left to fill the balance and give it beauty. We must create a reality for ourselves, and ponder that which Breton consciously chose to leave unknown. He would give little insight to the truth of his own conflicted image of this woman, caught between the perfect mystery he imagined and the unacknowledged existence that he knew; his last words to the reader, “Beauty will be CONVULSIVE or will not be at all.”

A final note: It is in French, but Jacques Rigaut relays the tragic story of Nadja as told to Hester Albach after discovering her unmarked grave, as well as a photograph of this enigmatic woman.

A Million Dollar Future?

by in Hmmm... | Leave a comment

A recent conversation with a high school girl whom I’ve been helping with AP classes and preparations for the ACT included the comment that I sincerely believe she could make herself into a millionaire. This might have sounded like a doubtful statement to many Americans. But for the first in an immigrant family to even consider attending a college, this wasn’t perhaps such an intrinsically outlandish message.

This is a compact but diverse community. In one block, multiple families may crowd into single apartments in order to make ends meet. But a few streets away, the 8 acre estate of a local inventor and philanthropist recently sold for more than $25-million. And on the other side of town, one of America’s wealthiest men spent $58-million just to assemble the properties for a new, 18,000 square foot home. So regardless of one’s economic standing, extraordinary wealth maintains a perceptible proximity.

The United States is not a poor country. According to the Credit Suisse Global Wealth Data Book, the average American has a net worth of over $300,000. This places the US squarely among the world’s highest averaging countries, after only Switzerland, Australia, and Norway. But to any American who’s stepped much beyond the automatic gate of his estate (or the security door of her apartment), this clearly doesn’t represent a realistic perspective of individual wealth in this country.

Line America’s adult population (all 240-million, or so) in order by personal net-assets, and the numbers tell a rather different story. Those at the middle of the line will have a net worth of $44,900. This ranks the median assets for individual Americans near the bottom of the world’s major, industrialized economies. To put this in perspective, America is still an extraordinarily wealthy country, but its wealth is concentrated somewhere off to one side of our line.

Walking in the direction of greater wealth until we reach those with net-assets meeting that average of $300,000, well over 80% of our imaginary line will be behind us. And by $500,000, it will be about 90%. Yet, the combined wealth of all 216-million people at our backs will account for only some 25% of America’s total wealth. This means that three-quarters of American wealth is concentrated in just 10% of its adult citizenry.

Even continuing up this line to include 99% of its members, to a point where each person has about $4-million, combined assets would only account for just over 60% of the United State’s total wealth. This is where the expression, “The 1%,” originates. This last one-hundredth of Americans hold about 40% of all US wealth. But it doesn’t actually end there…

Continue to 99.9% of the line and we reach those with a net-worth of about $20-million. Regardless, 21% of the nation’s wealth still lies beyond.  Even at 99.99%, the last 0.01%, or one ten-thousandth of the US population, still hold some 11% of the entire nation’s wealth. These are the “ultra rich,” those with a net worth exceeding $100-million. And when we get up to those with over $1-billion, fewer than 500 people will be left in the line. Yet, they still account for some 2% of the United State’s entire net worth.

University of California Berkeley economists, Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman, also assert that the 0.01%’s relative share of American wealth has tripled over the last three decades. The result is that when compared to the rest of the world, the United States has by far the most significant proportion of “super-rich” and billionaires. So just how has wealth become so concentrated in the United States?

The influence of money on government policy certainly can’t be ignored, and the movement of wealth between nations also plays a tremendous role in the accumulation of capital among large corporations and the super-wealthy. Individual wealth also reaches a point where it can more easily grow through investments, but this isn’t any surprise.  And simple mathematics assures that any difference among a population will skew an average away from a median.

However, comparing US median individual assets to number-one ranked Australia ($219,500) reveals much about why America ranks so low in wealth among the middle-income. Australians have a higher rate of actual ownership, including homes, along with far lower rates of debt. Conversely, middle-income Americans tend to cash-out equity, either to leverage into speculative profits or in pursuit of a life-style. But in the last decade, credit-leveraged US property values suffered steep declines, causing mortgage debt to siphon massive amounts of wealth from the median toward those from whom it was borrowed.

To borrow is to gamble against the future — and middle-income Americans (as well as many wealthy) tend to place poor bets. And when the debt is Featured imageinvested in items that depreciate, such as clothing or a new car, then wealth is sent elsewhere, regardless.

Depending upon perspective, greed has a funny way of being interpreted. Everyone would like to strike it rich.  But when someone else claims the spoils, it’s an “injustice.” Regardless, barring its use to light cigars (or to wage war), a nation’s wealth doesn’t just disappear. Rather, it moves within the ebb and flow of assets such as property, or the paper that makes it collateral to debt. Today’s Robber Barons don’t hold a candle to their historical namesakes, but they do know how to load the dice. So can a high school student of modest means in today’s economy also learn how to shift her own odds?

Whatever we might think of those in whom wealth becomes concentrated, the majority are self-made. Nearly seven-in-ten American billionaires built their own fortunes. Certainly, good-circumstance can play a role in such stories, but we can also skew the odds for ourselves. Opra Winfrey, John Paul Dejoria, and Howard Schultz are all examples of billionaires who started from the bottom of America’s socioeconomic ladder. Even Larry Ellison, America’s third wealthiest individual and the builder of that 18,000 square foot estate, rose from an adoptive, middle-income home to start what would become Oracle Corporation with two partners and a total investment of $2,000. And these are among just those last 500 in our line.

Conversely, there are many examples of others who rapidly burned through many millions in lottery winnings or a vast inheritance. Like tossing a match into an accumulation of fuel, it’s a simple task to cash-out. Whether or not we want to admit it to ourselves, there is an aspect of personal choice and self-discipline involved in the building and the maintenance of wealth.

And that said, the young woman who inspired my words here has always shown the self-discipline of someone who understands her own potential. I know that commitment alone could put her into at least the top ten-percent of whatever endeavor she chooses to pursue — granted that it may not be to accumulate financial riches. But even the the poorest among that segment of American wealth are already half-way to a million-dollars, so I’d say that the odds on this particular bet would appear to be pretty good.