October 15, 2009 – 7:21 PM
Autumn has arrived here in Chicagoland. Like anyone with a taste for caramel apples, corn on the cob, and gambling, I kicked off the fall by attending the Johnny Appleseed Festival in Crystal Lake.
My favorite event in the festival was certainly the “Great Ball Race.” Brink Street was transformed into a speedway, with hundreds of plastic balls racing down the hill from start to finish. In the end, Ball #59 earned $1000 for its owner, and I was left to ponder how to best rig the race to my advantage next year.
October 1, 2009 – 1:49 PM
Suppose that you are concerned about your test average in your biology class. Imagine that you have received scores of 91, 92, and 95. One test remains, and you want to be sure that your overall test average is greater than 90. What must you score on the final test?
September 3, 2009 – 10:40 PM
Imagine that you are standing across the table from Ehab Shoukry. As the reigning air-hockey champion of the world, he is likely to destroy you. All you can hope to do is limit the damage—perhaps your best strategy is to defend your goal.
August 27, 2009 – 8:01 PM
One recent summer day, Mike and Nick found themselves at an ice cream stand with time on their hands. Each wanted a sundae, and after a casual challenge was put forward by Mike, it was understood that Nick would indeed like to “make things a little more interesting.”
Please know: neither Nick nor Mike is interested in gambling; rather it is the study of probability that fascinates them, and they are both SAT and ACT Math enthusiasts.
As March reaches its end, an already math-crazed nation is set to lose all reason. On the 14th of the month, geometry classes everywhere staged wild Π-Day celebrations. A day later, we were all reminded of the joy of reckoning dates by nones and ides, thanks to the year’s most famous specimen. So much excitement has made everyone mad.
February 29, 2008 – 1:18 PM
My friend has ridden this wonderful planet around the sun thirty-six times; nevertheless, today the calendar displays her birthday for just the ninth time since the day she was born.