Tuesday, June 06, 2006

This Morning

Everybody has little routines that start their days. Some people sing in the shower, or on their way to work. Some people (all right, a lot of people) stop at Starbucks every morning. Other people begin their day with meditation and prayer.

I, myself, do all of those things, though not necessarily every day. But something that I do find myself doing that I am finding is apparently part of my morning routine takes place when I actually get into the building that I work in.

Well, the elevator actually.

Nearly every morning I enter the elevator with a couple of other people who work on different floors than I do. From this, comes my routine.

As we are all going up, I try to find mathematical ways to link the numbers of the floors together. I understand that this makes me nerdy beyond reasonable comprehension.

For instance, I work on the eighth floor. If someone were to get on going to the second floor and another person were to get on going to the fourth floor, I would be a happy camper, because it's obvious that 2 x 4 = 8.

It gets a little bit more complex if more than three or four different floors are selected, but sometimes even three can be troublesome. For instance, this morning, someone was going to 2, the gf and I were going to 8, and someone else was going to 16. Great! 8 x 2 = 16! Success! It's a joyous way to start the morning.

However, when the guy got off on 2, someone else got in and he wanted to go to the 13th floor. Now, children, there is not really a good way that 8, 13, and 16 go together. If you need further proof of this, please consult my other blog, achelpswithconversationalmath.blogspot.com. Now, if the new guy would have gone to floor twelve, I would have been happy, because then all the floors would be multiples of four, but no, he decided that he had to be difficult.

Some of you will inevitably ask the question, "I get what you're saying, AC, but I don't see how you can count this as part of your morning routine."

My answer? I would agree with you except for the fact that this happening or not happening affects my mood. It affects it very slightly, but it affects it nonetheless. If, for instance, the gf and I are the only ones in the elevator, and there is therefore only one floor selected, I find myself disappointed that I don't get to play my little game. Conversely, if there are too many people on the elevator, so that there is not an easily definable answer to my little game, I leave the elevator frustrated, and I'm sure I take it out on my customers.

Like this morning, I am miffed and had to write about it.

Do any of you play any little nerd games with yourself like I do?

3 comments:

:: mandy :: said...

I always walk within squares, or lines, on sidewalks or other pedestrian area. I'll make a giant leap to avoid walking on the cracks. I always, always did this when walking from the Admin building to the lower campus at the school. The parking lot there has squares. I loved it.

Analyst Catalyst said...

I also always used to take care not to walk on cracks, but it was more due to the playground urban legend that if I were step on a crack, I would break my mother's back, and as she fed and clothed me, this seemed disingenuous.

I glad you have fun too!

Analyst Catalyst said...

That's nice work, and I am ashamed to admit that I used to do the same.

Gosh! Perhaps I am the biggest nerd!