Happy Pi Day!!!

I almost forgot!!!

Happy π Day everyone!!!!

I would post a bunch of lame π jokes, but I'll spare everyone!

The Jelly Bean Proportion...

So its nearing Easter time and time for fun colorful easter candy at my desk. My favorite candy to get is Brach's Spiced Jelly Bird Eggs. Really I like these for one reason: the purple clove-flavored Jelly Beans - they're awesome! Sadly it seems everytime I get a bag there seems to be only about 5 purple - very dissapointing. So today - during an hour break, I decided to investigate this with the two unopened bags of Jelly Beans in my drawer. With the help of one of my coworks I sorted and counted the JellyBeans. With some help from Excel, the findings were:

Bag 1 Bag 2

Freq Rel Freq Freq Rel Freq

Black 24 13.48% 34 18.99%

Green 25 14.04% 25 13.97%

White 36 20.22% 29 16.20%

Red 30 16.85% 29 16.20%

Purple 8 4.49% 7 3.91%

Pink 26 14.61% 24 13.41%

Orange 29 16.29% 31 17.32%

178 179

I was right! The purple were way disproportionately low in proportion compared to the other colors. I'm considering writing to Branch's and complaining. Maybe I'll wait til I have a few more bags to add to my sample size first, and have my Statistics students run some z-test for me ^^. Perhaps I spend to much time during the day doing math ><

Silly things to do when bored at work...

So I'm sitting there with my student, gazing at my tissue box while she is working out a math problem. The box is left over from the holiday season, purchased by my boss at discount pricing. The box is shiny blue and features a showman scene in white fuzz which is glued to the surface. In the scene a child is holding a stick arm to the side of he snowman, presumably about to put the arm on. I mused to myself that it would be fun to think of the child and taking away the arm instead of putting it on.

With this in mind I turned to my student and said "Look, the child stoled the arm off the poor snowman!" My student takes a look and replies "Oh thats horrible!" Hehe, gullible student! And that gave me a greatly amusing idea, so i grabbed some lined paper and a thumb tack and got to work....

Before:

After (both sides):

And some phones just wont die

I'm always amused by students cell phones. Most student bring in nifty new ones that have more features then they will ever learn to use, other bring in old beat up ones, usually because they lost/had stolen/broke their new shiny one. Such was the case today - Meredith brought it the most impressively beat up phone I have seen to date. The front screen is shattered, the paint peeling, the front over screen is missing, the antenna comes off and the back cover that protects the battery is missing. Yet by some mysterious determination to survive as a usable phone, the poor thing has held together. Now that is impressive, particularly to me since my 3 month old phone which has never taken any damage or misuse only works about ever other day ><.

Papers, Mennonites, and a Tickle Monster

I truly hate papers. I simply cannot make myself do them in a timely manner. Why is that? Why do the darn things have to be so painful? I have a twenty page paper to finish, and it seemed like i had so much time to do it, even this week, i was suppose to have nearly this whole week, where did it all go? I foresee a few all nighters coming up in Morgan world. Ah well, sucks for me.

My cat is currently making a racket on the other desk. There is a hairbrush sitting on the desk, bristles up, Ciara (or is it Gelfling? black cat and not a lot of light) is attacking the brush by forcefully rubbing her head on the bristles, which is causing the brush to bang against the monitor. Is this a sign that i do not brush them enough? Probably. Sometime the cats will knock the brush onto the floor and have a heyday with it. They go for full body brushing. If I didn't know they were all fixed, I'd think they gone into heat. Silly cats.

My brother Mike's kids are so incredibly cute. I wish i saw them more often, both Mac and Makayla recognize the rest of my family with no trouble, but sometimes are unsure of me. Or perhaps I am just a tall scary woman who wears strange dark clothes? Naw, the only small children I remember really frightening with my mere presence was a couple of young Mennonite girls, in their pink home spun dresses at the Win-co. They took one look at me and hid behind their mothers skirts. I thought perhaps i should feel bad for some reason, but truthfully it was just too amusing. I think the height helped, their mom was petite (and wearing light lavender!)

Anyways, back to my niece and nephew. Both m&m's loose their hesitation after I toss them up in the air a few times. After this i graduate from strange distant relative to human carnival ride and am therefore much more interesting. However, one must be careful under what situations one introduces new play to the kiddies. A couple of weekends ago we were all at my Uncle Jack's memorial services. It was a touching affair, lots of wonderful people there, and while it was somber, as is expected of such things, it was also warm and loving, and full of stories of fond memories. Of course much of this unique atmosphere was lost on the beasties (of which there are quite a few in our family right now). And since the veteran's hall where the service took place is not a location to run around and have fun, the children were sent out into the halls for their running and giggling after the food was served.

It was out in the hallways that I came across Makayla, sitting patiently against the wall near the men's bathroom, her hands tucked under her white tights clad knees. Apparently she had been chasing her two older boy cousins, and the escaped her by running in the men's bathroom. When i was about halfway down the hallway, she noticed me and grinned. On a whim, i struck the menacing monster pose, arms up and out to grab, foot dragging in a lame gait, and heavy slobbering breathing. Makayla pulled her knees to her chest and squealed!

"Do you know what I am?! *harrgghhhhh....harrrrggggghhhh!* I asked with a toss of my head and waving of my arms.

"What!?!" She responds in an excited, high pitched voice.

"A TICKLE MONSTER!!!" I exclaim right as i reached her and frantically start tickling her.

Makayla screams in delight! Then she takes off down the hall screaming and giggling and i chase her through the hallway, around the building. After the second circle of this, I'd had enough running in my nice shoes for one day, and stopped. The boys had come out of the bathroom, and now that i had Makayla on the run, I told them to take over and be the tickle monsters. They could chase her on their young legs with sneakers on their feet. I went to go talk to my sister and cousin for bit.

About half an hour later, i walked back into the veterans hall where the service had been held. It was still full of family and friends, all talking quietly in groups, some looking at the photo displays of my uncles life. In the center of the room my mother and father were standing talking to some old family friends and military veterans who had known both my dad and my uncle. Makayla was also there, wedged between my mom and dads legs, tugging on their hands and jackets, but generally being quiet and well behaved. Then she noticed me in the doorway, and her face broke into a grin that i could see from across the room.

She screamed.

"A TICKLE MONSTER!!!! Aaaaahhhhhh!!!!" and she ran screaming from the room.

Which sent all eyes searching for the cause of the excitement. I was easily picked out as i was the only one on that far side of the room.

So what does one do after they have walked into a somber room full of people and caused children to scream and flee by their mere presence?

Look sheepish, shrug and wave.

And next time wait to introduce the tickle monster at Christmas.