Meeting while Driving

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understandinguncertainty.org was produced by the Winton programme for the public understanding of risk based in the Statistical Laboratory in the University of Cambridge. The aim was to help improve the way that uncertainty and risk are discussed in society, and show how probability and statistics can be both useful and entertaining.

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My brother was driving from Idaho to Portland Oregon (350miles, 6.5 hrs) on the same day I was going to be driving from Roseburg Oregon to Idaho (540 miles , 9 hrs-to our parent's place). The day before I jokingly quipped "Meet you at Starbuck's", roughly at the halfway point for him. We did not mention when we would be leaving our respective places and had no real intention of meeting. I ended up making some odd choices of where to get gas, etc. from where I would normally stop. As I stopped at a light in front of Starbucks in the town roughly in the middle for my brother, he was stopped on the other side of the light! We met for coffee after all.
Total votes: 210
Date submitted:Sun, 15 Jan 2012 21:03:24 +0000Coincidence ID:4893