Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Huge Math Victory Leads to Free Frozen Yogurt
That's right, folks. Today's big story is one of triumph: it's about a girl who thought she was really bad at math her whole life just to find out, in one high-stakes, telling moment, that she's actually pretty stinkin' awesome at it.
Our heroine was out for a night on the town to celebrate the brightening light at the end of the tunnel known as "a semester of graduate school." She entered her favorite frozen yogurt joint, prepared to blissfully surrender 45 cents per ounce of the glorious substance. A sign caught her eye, which read, "Smoothies: Fill a cup 2/3 full with yogurt of your choice, and we will add juice of your choice and blend." Intrigued, she queried a roaming employee as to available flavors of said juice, who promptly went to see what sorts were available.
Upon returning, the lass regretfully informed our heroine that there was no more juice; she added, smilingly, that our heroine could receive her yogurt for but half of the asking price. Our heroine protested, as she had already determined to buy yogurt instead of a smoothie, anyway. However, the young yogurt peddler insisted, and our heroine was happy to relent.
There are so many flavors in a yogurt establishment such as this one: peanut butter, oreo, thin mint, cheesecake, fruit sorbets and at least 10 varieties besides. However, Thin Mint was quickly settled upon and our heroine advanced to the counter to pay, after securing a most generous portion of the Thin Mint cream.
At the counter, there was another sign which caught her eye. This one read, "Guess your yogurt's weight within .10 ounce and it's free!" Our heroine (who, remember, was never very sure of her aptitude for mathematics) creased her brow, tapped her foot, and felt the pressure of a growing line of customers waiting to pay for their yogurt. "Think, think, think!" she told herself. She knew that her yogurt generally cost somewhere around $5, and she knew the cost was .45 per ounce. The math seemed simple enough, but the growing line of customers made her feel flustered and frantic. And then, in a sudden burst of division skills, she knew the answer--or at least, a pretty good one. "9.5 ounces!" she wagered, expectantly.
The attendant's eyebrows raised as she weighed the yogurt and then said, "9.32 ounces. Not bad! I was gonna give it to you for half-off anyway, so I'm gonna give it to you for free."
Dun-duh-duh-DUN!! Triumph! Thank you, GRE prep class. Not only did you help me get into graduate school, you helped me get free yogurt. And for that, I will be forever grateful.
Note: Sorry for the weird writing style. As I mentioned, it is near the end of the semester, and taking longish breaks to use thesaurus.com and write ridiculous blog posts seems way more appealing than working on my final Stats memo.
Loved it! You deserved it.
ReplyDeletecammie! I found your blog =) I'm happy for you and your yogurt, love you girl!
ReplyDeleteWhen you have children, and the children say, "When am I EVER going to use this math?" You can help it appeal to them by connecting math prowess with free treats. This was a very, very fortuitous event.
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