Willow: It feels like we're going around in circles. Xander: Our circles are going around in circles. We got dizzy circles here.

'Sleeper'


Natter 41: Why Do I Click on ita's Links?!  

Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.


§ ita § - Dec 20, 2005 12:14:17 pm PST #3681 of 10002
Well not canonically, no, but this is transformative fiction.

I divide the little number by the big number and slide the decimal point over two.


DavidS - Dec 20, 2005 12:15:39 pm PST #3682 of 10002
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."

Other mothers, is there a point where the daycare crud sort of calms down to an occasional evil, instead of constant tide of snot and coughing?

Emmett was sick once a week for the first three months he was in his first daycare. It sucked. In his second daycare there was about a two month transition period until he got used to the new germpool.

They get sick a lot that first year or so. On the plus side, he hardly ever gets sick now. But it was a real grind that first year.


tommyrot - Dec 20, 2005 12:15:52 pm PST #3683 of 10002
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

You did get the bit where she said "math idiot," right?

Yeah.

Maybe if I explained in English:

what percentage 61.61 is of 205.37

61.61 is a fraction of 205.37. Percent means that it should be expressed as a fraction of 100. We'll let x stand for this unknown percent. These two fractions should be the same.

Of course, there's no getting 'round that algebra is now required.


tommyrot - Dec 20, 2005 12:17:17 pm PST #3684 of 10002
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

I divide the little number by the big number and slide the decimal point over two.

But you don't always know that you should do that. i.e. it might be a case where the % is greater than 100.

eta: for some hypothetical precentage problem.


Scrappy - Dec 20, 2005 12:17:37 pm PST #3685 of 10002
Life moves pretty fast. You don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

That's what I did, but I was attacked by sudden doubt.


§ ita § - Dec 20, 2005 12:21:24 pm PST #3686 of 10002
Well not canonically, no, but this is transformative fiction.

you don't always know that you should do that. i.e. it might be a case where the % is greater than 100.

Well, that can be a different question, can't it?

Basically, for avoiding math terms, if you need to know what percent A is of B, divide A by B and bump the dot.


sumi - Dec 20, 2005 12:23:36 pm PST #3687 of 10002
Art Crawl!!!

Okay, I just figure that 61 twice is about 122 - add another 61 and you're so close to 200 that it's probably about 30%.


Nutty - Dec 20, 2005 12:24:07 pm PST #3688 of 10002
"Mister Spock is on his fanny, sir. Reports heavy damage."

I just remember the trick where "61.61 is a portion of 205.37, the same way that ?? percent is a portion of 100." YOu draw that as the aforementioned equation:

61.61/205.37 = ??/100

And then you do the criss-cross trick! top-left and bottom-right go together, and bottom-left and top-right go together (this is much easier to draw than to describe) so you end up with this:

61.61 * 100 = 6161 = 205.37 * ??

And then you divide both sides by 205.37.

6161/205.37 = (205.37/205.37) *??

Since anything divided by itself is 1, you end up with:

6161/205.37 = ??

And then you just type it into a calculator and find out it is actually 29.9995%! Which rounds up to 30 in a way that only makes really nitpicky people cry.

I have to sit down and draw out each step of this process sometimes. (Not all the time.) I am also the sort who, when converting feet to inches, sometimes have to do the little hand-gesture, "larger-to-smaller, multiply. Smaller-to-larger, divide." It's like the Watusi, except you can do it sitting down.


Eddie - Dec 20, 2005 12:24:17 pm PST #3689 of 10002
Your tag here.

Can you tell it's almost tax time?


tommyrot - Dec 20, 2005 12:25:35 pm PST #3690 of 10002
Sir, it's not an offence to let your cat eat your bacon. Okay? And we don't arrest cats, I'm very sorry.

The cool thing about expressing such problems as a pair of fractions is that it works for all sorts of % problems.

Say you have 18 toasters. That's 57% of the number of toasters that you need. How many toasters do you need?

57% means 57/100. You have 18 out of a total of some unknown number. So,

57/100 = 18/x