The current record-setting census of thriving Redmond downtown storefronts continues to be celebrated. It is accompanied by a high joy-quotient for shoppers, according to Dr. Brent Woodley, Acting Dean and Dean of Acting at Upper Metolius State College of Engineering and Poetry.

“We mustn’t stop here,” announced Woodley last week. “Sitting on laurels almost always kills them, and the aroma of dead laurels would discourage 14.2% of available shoppers, according to our research.”

Asked about that research, Woodley noted that the Statistics Department at the local school of mostly higher education uses the BSID model: “Broad-Spectrum, In-Depth,” he said. This reporter then asked how many Redmond citizens he considered a viable sample for interviews. “It depends on which coffee shop we centralize for our interrogative forays into the gold mine of opinion,” he opined. “Some shops seat more than others. Professor Saul Pine, who heads not only the Statistics Department but also the in-house Janitorial Advisory Board, uses a scientific process to determine which shop to use for his monthly downtown Redmond shopper surveys.”

Your reporter found Pine in his office. He sat at his desk, a door that formerly closed off the UMSCEP janitor closet. It was supported by two 55-gallon drums, now empty of their Industrial-Strength Fabuloso.

“Yes, random,” he said. “Very important in statistics. If you don’t start with random, you’ll never find a pattern. Which would mean that we’d be out of assignments to give our students. And I’d be out of work!” He looked up at the fluorescent light fixture, hanging from knotted pieces of shoelaces, and pointed out that it flickered randomly. “It keeps me in the zone,” he said. “And that glowing blue thingy here on my desk, down at the bowling alley they’d put shoes on it after your bowled in ’em. It keeps me in the ozone.”

He slapped his head, both sides, both palms, apologized for getting off topic, and returned to random samples.

“First I have the students make about 20 latte cups out of cardboard from refrigerator boxes, mostly from Wilson’s Furniture. These are about five feet tall and a student fits loosely inside, Knot Tite. Each cup gets named after a local coffee shop. Each cup can hold one student. This whole exercise gives them a lot of experience in math, geometry, and duct tape. They get credit in other classes besides stats.

“We take the cups to the gym, place them randomly around the basketball court and one student climbs into each cup.”

This reporter wondered what could possibly be next.

“Last year we spend our entire janitorial budget on a new buffer. Our old one, Jimmy, was worn out, plain and simple.” He took me into the garage next door. “Meet Warren: a KellerMatic RoboRoomba 2000. Rechargeable batteries. Beauty, ain’t he? So: Back to the gym of giant latte cups. What we do is, we take it onto the gym floor and place it in the middle. Turn it on and run like crazy for the bleachers.

The KellerMatic spins and dips and hums and bends and digs in and jerks around like a drop of water in a hot Griswold Number 4314 Dutch Brothers Oven. In about 30 minutes, we have a winner, one latte cup left standing. Everybody climbs out of the busted-up cups and high-fives the selection, who usually doesn’t have to go to urgent care like some of the others. And that, sir, is random.”

This reporter wondered if they went to the winning coffee shop to celebrate, at least those who could still walk.

“Oh no, we have boba tea and yogurt,” he said. “Unless we get served an inJunction by someone who thinks we’re mistreating our KellerMatic.”