Saturday, November 12, 2011

I'm a writer and designer, not a mathematician.

Based on my day count (ie, pulling out the calendar and just counting them out), I really should be posting 63 Days of Martie. I think. See, I've introduced the Element of Doubt now, and I am a tad flustered. A minor point, but I'd certainly prefer to post the correct number.

For the record, I'm killer at algebra--until a number is introduced, then I fall apart. I get calculus jokes, until you throw a number in. This has utterly mystified more than one of my teachers over the years.  I credit this to synaesthesia. Numbers have genders, personalities, smells, back stories, etc, and they do NOT behave in my head the way arithmetic demands that they do. Even number lines occasionally throw me: 4 really *doesn't* want to stand next to 5, and no one wants anything at all to do with 9. Don't get me started on the twisted relationship between 6 and 7, and 5 is an even number.

See what I mean? Well, probably you don't, but that's why numbers get scrambled in my brain, even if I'm only counting out.

The majority of synaesthetics have a very good, sometimes extraordinary, grasp of mathematics. A few of us, primarily women, are utter shite at math but express ourselves extraordinarily well in language and art. My GRE verbal and math scores had such a wide gap (99th percentile verbal, 31st math) that the admissions committee had to have a long discussion about admitting me. They did admit me (that 99th on the subject test helped A Lot), and I have the MA to prove it, but even thinking about the statistics course I had to take 20+ years later still makes my palms sweat.

All I know is, according to timeanddate.com, there are 49 days and (as of right now) 8 hours, 7 minutes left in 2011. So whatever that shakes out to, that's what we're doing! ;D

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