Nim and What To Do about It
by Zube (zube@stat.colostate.edu)
Created:  Sep 25, 2010
Updated:  Sep 28, 2010
http://www.stat.colostate.edu/~zube/nim.txt

Nim is a simple game involving picking up items from a pile.  The
details are unimportant save for one:  Nim is often set up so that if
you pick up first, you are certain to lose the game.

I have often thought that Life plays Nim with me.  

For example, I often have the choice of searching for a close parking
spot or directly parking farther away and walking a bit.  If there are
close parking spots, then it makes sense for me to search for one, but
if there are none, I should park farther away and not waste my time.

What often happens is that by deciding to go first, I lose.  If I
search for a close spot, there won't be one, but if I park far away,
I'll see many free spots as I walk in.  Perhaps this is just another
example of Sod's Law, but it has bothered me for many years.

I had a small eureka moment several years ago in a slightly different
context.  Daily, it seemed, the Universe would place me behind the
Current Reigning Champion of Painfully Slow and Breathtakingly Bad
Driving.  Then it hit me:  no matter how annoying this person might be,
he cannot be annoying in two places at once; he has to pick a direction
to go and I can always pick another.  It sounds stupidly simple, but it
was a revelation to me:  I no longer had to get upset because of some
other person's thoughtlessness or carelessness.  I could choose a
different path.

I recently had a similar moment regarding Nim.

If the Universe plays Nim with me, I'll play Nim with it and it will
pick up first.

Yesterday, I had a letter to mail.  The far away parking spaces are
near the post office.  Aha!  I'll search for a close parking space and
if I find one, I win.  If I don't, I'll park far away but mail the
letter, so I win, but I win because I was simultaneously playing a
different game.

Many years ago, Pepperment Patty asked Charlie Brown what the secret of
living was and he sagely replied "to own a convertible and a lake."

"If the sun is shining, you can ride around in your convertible and be
happy ... if it starts to rain, it won't spoil your day because you can
just say, 'Oh, well, the rain will fill up my lake!'"

and later:

"If your lake is drying up, you can say, 'Oh, well, this is nice weather
for riding in a convertible ....'"

I've known about this particular comic strip since I was a knee-high 
to a grasshopper, but its full wisdom had not reached me until now.

Or in Nim terms: make the Universe pick up first.