A team of esteemed international mathematicians have struggled to pinpoint the exact numerical value for the Australian definition of “a few”, privately conceding that the equation is too difficult to solve. The experienced team claim they spent months trying to solve the riddle, but now feel no closer to solving it than when they began late last year.
Speaking exclusively to The Watsonia Bugle, the group’s spokesperson, Professor Graeme Wandsworth, said he’d never encountered such a broad application of a numerical value in over three decades of working with numbers. He said, “It was totally confounding. We started with the common understanding that ‘a couple’ means two, ‘a few’ means three, and ‘some’ means four or more, but by the time we’d surveyed our control group of 1,000 Australian people, we almost had as many different answers as we had participants.”
Professor Wandsworth confirmed that most of the confusion came about when alcohol was involved. He said, “Not only was it impossible to pinpoint one numerical value, we were barely able to prove an estimate for the term. In all of the interviews that we conducted, the term ‘a few’ could be used to describe both not many and too much. The results were staggering.”
Long-time Watsonia resident, and enthusiastic binge drinker, Darren Blundell, conceded that he felt for the group of esteemed mathematicians. He said, “Yeah man, I get it. The whole thing is a bit of head fuck, haha. Like, sometimes I’ll say ‘I’ve only had a few’ when trying to talk down how many beers I’ve actually had. But then I’ll also say ‘Well, we’d had a few’ when I’m trying to give reasons for why I’ve carried on like a drunken lunatic. To borrow the words of them maths dudes: it’s an inexact science, haha.”
The Watsonia Bugle 