Brown Motion

When I was growing up in India I remember being gifted an odd piece of cloth by an older relative. That oft came with instructions to use it as a input for what would become a shirt or trouser. Thus the onus to convert raw material to finished good was left on the giftee. The giftor merely showed up with a certain rectangle of their choosing in terms of color or fabric and divined that the gifted gleefully accept this gesture of generosity. I found this proces retarded and somehow arbitrary. What if I needed was a good bicycle or a pair of socks instead? The idea of gift cards for generic stores was yet to reach Indian shores. Today one could get a gift card to appear politically correct and hand it to the giftee and let the have free rein on whether to buy tobacco, guns or a shirt with the funds. Of course certin smart elders just handed me cash. I respect that. For one they believed that I knew what cash was and how it could be used. Also it left me to choose the outcome o...