Food for Thought: Army Half Marathon

The run began with quite a number of rather nice looking girls, their bodies well-toned from frequent training (jogging). So i thought it would be nice to jog with them for the entire distance. But it appears that there is a difference in the capacity for exertion between a blob of fats (me) and a bunch of muscles (them). I was soon left behind. Hmm... i kind of like the phrase "left behind" alot. That single phrase, of itself, holds so much meaning for/to me.

Falling back from somewhere close to the front to somewhere in the middle, i then found out that the girls in the middle, while not as goegeous as the girls in the front, were still pretty gorgeous. So if i couldn't keep up with the best, i could still make do with those in the middle, no? But fate has decreed that blobs of fat have to run last and that i had to take my place in the back of the column of runners.

PS: Ladies in the run, you're all gorgeous, "gorgeous" in this case is just my metaphorical analogy for something else.

I'll shall digress.

I quote myself from the post about my meeting with the poly guys: "And then we came to be talking about women and their desire to find boyfriends as some kind of shelf life (pardon the objectivity). It seems when their shelf life approaches close to expiry, they become more desperate in looking for a partner. But when the girl reaches like thirty plus (cyber nudge to a couple friends) their interest begins to dampen and diminishing returns results."

When the guys said something like that, i went like, "Huh? I'm approaching thirty liao wor..". The guys then reassured me, "Wong, don't worry, that applies to girls only. For guys, our value is only begining to rise."



I shall digress from my digression; I actually detest being called by my surname. I'm not in NS (National Service, conscription), where my identity consists of only rank and surname. I have a given name, and although it is pretty insignificant in the bigger perspective, i like to be called by my name, even if it gets mispronounced by almost everyone else. Or atleast address me as Sensei : p Imagine the frustration when my brother picks up the phone and the person asks, "May i speak with Wong?". Maybe, just maybe my brothers and father have a different surname from me... doh!

I shall point out that more valuable does not equate more desirable. Taps made of peanuts are more valuable, but no one wants them. It doesn't take much to realise the supply demand equation does not quite match. If girls are becoming less interested as time goes on, then demand for guys diminishes with time.



What does this mean?



As you can see, the intersection of demand and value represents the optimal value and demand, in which most pairing off into couples would occur.

So even if the value of guys is increasing, the lack of demand would inevitably push the pricing down to follow the maximum limits of both demand and value.



Taking the scenario further, assuming that this is a non-zero competitive game, which realistically is the case, then it would mean that at the later stages of life, only the more valuable guys gets hitched. Why would anyone pay for an inferior product when you could get a superior product at the same price?

What is omitted from the graphs however, is the value of the other gender. In which, the army half marathon analogy would be more adequate. In out culture, where the males are expected to be the active, while the females take on a passive role, the best girls, the cream of the crop (pardon the objectivity), would be quickly snapped up by those who could keep up with them.

What this means is that the "left behind" guys, not only have their value pushed down by decreasing demand, but also has fewer choices to choose from as more girls (same generation group) gets hitched. And likely there won't be many of the best girls getting "left behind".

And it would appear, that the struggle to not join the ranks of those not interested in the run, would also be a bid against time, to not be left behind.