First, let me apologize for missing a couple weeks of blogging. Two Mondays ago we spent the day visiting a college friend, and the rest of the week filled up quickly on me. Last week I was busy being a counselor for Bible camp and didn't have time to blog. So here we are. Hopefully I'll be regular for a while now.
Being a math major makes me sensitive to some things that most people likely never pay attention to, so this week I'm beginning what will probably become a recurring segment: "The Cranky Mathematician." Let's talk about roads. In Hancock County, where I live, roads are generally a mile apart. East-west roads are numbered, while north-south roads begin with successive letters of the alphabet (e.g. James, Kent, and Ladd are roads near Kanawha.). The east-west roads begin with 100th, followed by 110th, 120th, etc. Homes after 100th are numbered 10xx, homes after 110th are numbered 11xx, and so on. This system, while well organized, drives me absolutely bonkers. First, I think it would make more sense for the roads to be 10th, 11th, 12th, etc. or 1000th, 1100th, 1200th, etc. I can mostly let that go, but I cannot for the life of me figure out why the numbered roads essentially start with 10. The county line should really be 0, but I would be okay with 1st (or 10th under this system). Now you might think that the county wants all the home numbers to have four digits, but, going the other way, homes after A are numbered in the 100s, homes after B in the 200s, and so on. So why do the numbered roads essentially start with 10? I can't explain it. It makes no sense to me. I wouldn't be surprised if no one else in the county has ever both noticed and cared, but I think about this almost every time I run. Such is the curse of being a (sometimes cranky) mathematician.
Grace and peace,
BMH
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