In a remote mountainous pasture, a farmer named Bud was keeping an eye on his herd when, unexpectedly, a brand-new BMW emerged from a cloud of dust, heading in his direction.
The driver, a young man dressed in a Brioni suit, Gucci shoes, RayBan sunglasses, and a YSL tie, leaned out of the window and inquired, “If I accurately tell you how many cows and calves are in your herd, will you give me a calf?”
Bud glanced at the man, clearly a yuppie, then turned his attention to his peacefully grazing herd and replied calmly, “Sure, why not?”
The young yuppie parked his car, pulled out his Dell notebook computer, connected it to his Cingular RAZR V3 cell phone, and navigated to a NASA page online, calling up a GPS satellite to pinpoint his location. He then relayed that information to another NASA satellite, which took an ultra-high-resolution photograph of the area.
Next, the young man imported the digital image into Adobe Photoshop and sent it off to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany.
Within moments, he received an email on his Palm Pilot confirming that the image had been processed and the data stored. With an ODBC connected Excel spreadsheet on his Blackberry, he accessed an MS-SQL database and, after a few minutes, obtained a response.
Ultimately, he printed a full-color, 150-page report using his high-tech, miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and turned to Bud, stating, “You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves.”
“That’s correct. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves,” Bud replied.
He observed the young man pick one of the animals, chuckling as the yuppie stuffed it into the trunk of his car.
Then Bud said to him, “Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you return my calf?”
The young man pondered for a moment and answered, “Okay, why not?”
“You’re a Member of Parliament for the Australian Government,” Bud declared.
“Wow! That’s right,” the yuppie replied, “but how did you figure that out?”
“No guesswork involved,” the farmer responded. “You showed up here without being called; you expect to be compensated for an answer I already knew to a question I never asked. You employed millions of dollars worth of equipment to prove how much smarter you are than me, yet you lack any understanding of how working people earn a living—or about cows, for that matter.
This is a flock of sheep… now give me back my dog.