Thursday, August 14, 2008

F-R-E-A-K, Freak

So I've determined that three people read my blog at any given post. Three you ask? You think three whole people read your piddly diddly little blog? Yes. Three and I'm ignoring you last question it hurts my feelers. Fine so how did you determine three people read your blog? Is your reply *accompanied with an eye roll*. Well it seems that of late I get about three comments per post. Thus it can be determined from the aforementioned findings that three people read any given post. So for you three readings you get a special treat today. You get to hear my deepest darkest secret.

Oh boy, here I go. I'm a freak. This was what I realized a few moments ago. Yes I'm a full blown freak-oid. No, I'm not a fruitcake a freak. And not the kind of freak you see on the street, I don't have multicolored hair, I don't have any piercings or tat's. I don't collect cans from trash bins, and I don't push a shopping cart any further than a grocery store parking lot. And, I have never walked down the street which a group of people dressed in various colors of skin tight, spandex, metalic full body suits.

(Remember She's All That with the dreamy Freddy Prince Jr. and
beautiful Rachel Leigh Cook, who I was always envious of because she was so tiny
and petite. Well at the dance the nerds come as DNA dressed tyvek
(they wear these at work, it's okay if you don't get the
reference) resembling white suites. Then when the long hair pretty one
(wow all sorts of labeling tonight huh?) dances with the jerk (more labeling, I'm very rude as well as a freak) she gets out of her DNA chain (now this is very unlikely, if i remember correcting DNA is held together by hydrogen bonds which are quite strong and I doubt that even the popular boy asking you to dance will break a hydrogen bond [ahhh! revelation popular sounds like polar and polar bonds are not as strong as hydrogen bonds so this scene is chemical illogical). So when she removes her white tyvek suit she has a blue skin tight suite on (luckily she is quite skinny). Imagine that suit more pastel in various colors AND best of all metallic.) This parentbetical side note was so long it deserved its own block quotation style thing.

I kid you not. Brett and I saw a group of people in metallic skin tight suites. But I'm going to let that one slide since it was the same weekend as the arts festival and I pray and hope that they were dressed up solely for the arts festival. NOTE!!!! I'm not calling any of these people listed freaks. I'm not calling them anything because that would not be politically correct, which I always am. But me... I am a freak. Okay this is difficult for me....

I LOVE NUMBERS
Go a head get me a shirt that says I heart *symbol not word* #'s! I've never so blatantly admitted before but I do, I love numbers. Now some of you may have known this already and if so you can applaud me for leaving my denial stage, I only have what 12 more steps?
So you must be wondering what finally brought on this realization. We'll it's been a few months/15 some odd years in the coming. I'm going to take 'the show you climactic confusing ending and then go back and show you the morbid events leading up to my horrific admission of guilt to number loving' approach.
So at work numbers are often used. While I do very little number manipulation (i.e math) I still use numbers daily, nay, hourly, nay minutely! (NO not secondly.) All samples that come to me are on what is called a Chain of Custody. And what do ya know, these chains are numbered! When I first started working the chain numbers were in the mid to upper 40,000 range. I have to include this chain number for every sample I run. I found joy when ever there was a pattern to the chain number. For example I enjoy chain 49909 because well... just look at all those 9's. Or perhaps 49876 because of the descending of the numbers. A few weeks back the chain numbers passed 50,000. I got chain 49998 and 50002 but I was saddened that I never saw chain 50000. Also samples themselves are often number depending on what type of sample it is. Many of the samples I've been running lately are given area numbers. Which are basically AREA####. I am tickled pink when there is a pattern in the area number. For example for quite a while I anticipated the sample AREA6666. Today I got to run the sample AREA6868 and tomorrow I'll likely to get to run a sample AREA6886. Every time I get twitterpated knowing that these patterns are awaiting me. Oh and I also enjoy when they numbers are fun to type on the key pad and the right of the key board. For example 50852 is all on the middle row. I know, you are thinking, wow she is crazy! And I will not deny it nor be offended if you tell me so. But this is how it all started.
My first number memory was a failure. In kindergarden I skipped fifteen. I don't know how this happened. I have nothing against fifteen. Actually I kind of like the number it is 3*5 (aka 3x5). But in my five year old mind the number was no where to be found. 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17. Oh what the world would be missing out on if there was no 15. I would have gotten my license at who knows what age, polishing off a dozen donuts and then washing it down with three more would result in how many donuts consumes? infinity. What day would tomorrow be, today is the 14th. There would just be a black whole between 14 and 16 sucking everything into it. Not good, except maybe a black whole of donuts... mmm.
Well this was not the end of numbers for me. No 'mam, siree. I'm not quitter so I took numbers by the horns and learned 'em.
And oh boy did I learn 'em good. Within a few I was doing numbers for fun, long division and multiplication to be exact NO CALCULATOR! Yes you heard me! I did long division/multiplication for fun... Oh dear this is disturbing me. While I go deal with the fact that while other kids were getting high off of sugar cereal and playing four square I was doing long division... I need a moment before I can face this head on... I'm sorry I didn't think I'd get this emotional.
Okay I'm back. Actually I didn't have time to finish my post so I feigned tears and excused myself. But I'm back now. So back to my blissful numerical childhood days. So my mom has a wood shop and upstairs she had a chalkboard. I LOVED writing on chalkboards (still do actually). Now during this time my mom had hired one of her best friends/the mom of my best friend, Amy, to weave rush chair seats. Amy happened to do her work just outside the room where the chalkboard was. So I convinced her to play with my while she worked. So I brought her an old math textbook that was laying around the house, had her give me long division and multiplication problems to solve, and then she would check them on a calculator. NO JOKE! I found this fun. I know what you're thinking, NO! I don't still do this. This is not what Brett and I do on Friday nights. I think back to these math play times with Amy and think wow... I needed to get out and find friends my own age. True friends my own age probably would have beat me up and made me realize my sheer nerdiness. But a small part of me thinks... I want to write on a chalk board again.
I know you are all fearful right now that your kids will be as nerdy as I was but I want to reassure you this was the peak of my math/number loving days. The following anecdotes will not horrify you as the previous on did.
Now in sixth grade (which was still at the elementary school for us) I reached the epitome of cool. Two words people... Fraction fairy tales. So before each new seconds in math class we'd all take a pretest. If we got a high enough score on the pretest we would be allowed to go in the hallway during math and work on alternate assignments. Big surprise, I rarely had to sit through math class. One assignment we had was to write a fraction fairy tale. The basis of this assignment was to assign each character a simplified fraction. And then we wrote the fairy tale out. Every time the character's name was used a non-reduced fraction was used instead. Then when we presented the class had to reduce the fraction and decide which character went in the blank. Confuse? I'll illustrate.

1/2 Cinderella
3/4 Prince Charming
1/5 Fairy Godmother
Before the ball 50/100 didn't have anything to wear. Luck would have it that 20/40 had a 20/100 she didn't know about. 25/50's 2/10 arrived and magiced her a beautiful gown. After a reminder from her 8/40 to be home by midnight (curfews are a bummer huh?) 16/32 was off to the ball. At the ball 90/180
met 12/16 . They danced and talked all night. To 4/8's chagrin 15/20 had nothing beyond his good looks and kingdom so she was home by 10:00 and finished filling out her college applications. 150/300 went on to school and
although she never ruled a kingdom she found self satisfaction and married a
nerdy brainiac from the computer engineering department (those boys are
odd). (That is how The 2/4 story goes right?) (Please forgive math errors this was just to give you an idea of it.)(Oh and this story was written with no help from a calculator!)
See how much of a nerd I truely was. I've grown though, I've learned. I now know how to hide my affair with numbers rational and irrational alike. Because of this the last 8 years or so since sixth grade has not been marred by geeky outbursts of math fun. Although pi day is still a holiday for me I now keep my love for numbers deep down in the corner recesses of my heart.
So everyone. Congrats. The three of you are lucky. You know I'm a nerdite. But please keep this dirty little secret to yourself, please don't ruin my burgeoning social life. (Ha, ha This last part is a joke. I have no social life, just my husband. I like it that way though.)

4 comments:

Mattsmom said...

F.R.E.A.K.

I am SERIOUSLY going to die. The laughter ensuing is LITERALLY killing me. Craig and I were wondering how you and Brett ended up together...but then we realized that you must be similar to a chlorine ion...which is negatively charged, and Brett is Sodium (positively charged)...and you two just couldn't help but end up together...resulting in salt...and where would the world be without salt. You know salt of the earth and all. Salt is wonderful.

Oh dear...I just realized that Sodium is explosive...which for a Marshall male is VERY accurate...but Chlorine is poisonous...which I in no way think you are...although Chlorine will also bleach things...and white is a symbol of purity...and you are...well...anyway.

Okay...All I can really say is that you guys are so opposite that it baffles the mind...but you are a perfect fit together. So there must be something to that "opposites attract thing"!

Numbers are cool. I don't think you are crazy. A little zany maybe...but certainly not crazy!

Yasmeen said...

(freak) :) :) :)
I like numbers, too. You're allowed to have a social life...if you want...

Mattsmom said...

I just have to say. Craig's softball number (aka the one printed on the back of his softball team shirt this summer) was 3.14. Does that make him even nerdier that you?

Margaret said...

I think it puts him in the same league... maybe a tie.. He'd beat me if it was 3.141592653589793. Then again he'd have to be very wide to fit all that.