Sine and cosine and other randomness

dishmoom.jpgThere was a kid in my high school class who I admired* in general but will remember forever because of a trig assignment. He was one of those smart kids who can somehow manage to seem cool rather than geeky. I, on the other hand, always just managed to be awkward and geeky. Anyway, the assignment was to take a number of sine equations (did I say that right, all of you who haven’t forgotten math?) with various parameters and graph them to see what the various parameters did to the curve. I mean we had to graph them using graph paper and a pencil and maybe a ruler or something, not a graphing calculator. I had a great time doing that assignment, watching various coefficients do neat things to the curve. I loved my graphs. They were beautiful! Until I got to class the next day. This other kid had taken it up a notch. He made the same blasted sine curve on every graph and CHANGED the SCALE of the X and Y axes!!! WOW! Why didn’t *I* think of that?

My life these days often makes me feel like I’m riding a sine curve. I have a lot to learn at work. There’s the big picture and all the little bits. I have experience in most of the little bits but pulling them all together and making them fit into the big picture can be challenging. So some days, I go home thinking, “I know it all!!! Yay for me, I’m so smart!” and then there are the days I think, “I am so dumb. Why am I here? All these people have been here for a long time and they know everything.” Up and down. Up and down. Yesterday I felt like the class dunce. Today I was on an upswing. I’m sure I’ll go in there tomorrow wondering what the *heck* I was thinking of today. I’ll get it. I make progress every day. People there are so nice and polite. And there just always are those dunce days. No matter what you’re doing. Raising kids. Writing. Taking classes. Whatever. Up and down.

Like the Landfill refrigimatator. Maybe that’s cosine. Isn’t that a kind of reverse sine? Math people? Anyway, back to the refrigimatator. You know the one. It currently has six (or whatever) electrofragmathermoglobulators in it. I think there are three thermostats built into the refrigimatator, one for the freezer and two for the rest. And then there are the ones that Mr. Fix-it added in. The whole dern thing vacillates wildly on some kind of sine curve of its own. This morning the ice cubes in the freezer were water. For the last few weeks, everything in the crispers was frozen. Ever try to chop up a frozen potato? Not. Frozen lettuce? Onion? Grape tomato? You don’t wanna know. Now, I don’t know exactly when this whole thing will actually be *fixed*. I mean, it’s been “fixed” a few times and then there was this morning. I had to go to work. It’s winter and this is Michigan and it was well below freezing outside today, so I threw whatever I could fit into a Trader Joe’s refrigerated bag and stuck it outside the back door. Uh, it was in the refrigerated bag to keep it from the varmints, not to keep it cold. And I went to work. And I didn’t know *what* the state of the refrigimatator would be when I got home today. And so it goes. Some things just have to work reliably in our first world society. Vee-hickles, refrigimatators and various laundry processing machines are among them. Sigh.

Oh, and by the way, I received a really weird piece of snail mail tonight. I am not creeped out by it but I would sure like to know who sent it. It’s ads for making quick money in a newspaper type format stuffed into an envelope with a Long Island, NY postmark on it, no return address. It’s addressed to me using my informal name, which is mis-spelled, with a short post-it note message attached to the ad of which about all I can read is “Anne, you gotta”. I think the rest says something like “do this” or whatever. W-r-i-t-e s-l-o-w-l-y, I’m blonde, fer kee-reist. 1) I don’t know anyone in New York except for the Shermans and they would *not* send me this. 2) I often complain about financial stuff on here. Heck, we’re like everyone else who earn an HONEST living in this country. We aren’t rich! We are okay though and I am happy (usually) with my financial “status” (or whatever the heck you want to call it). I am a small-town banker’s daughter and, like he was, I am *very* skeptical about get-rich-quick schemes. Send that stuff to someone else. Or, hey, don’t send it to anyone!

*No, I didn’t have a crush on him. I had enough ridiculous romantic drama going on in high school, fer kee-reist! Not that I want to think about *that* right now, thankye veddy much!

6 Responses to “Sine and cosine and other randomness”

  1. Valdemort Says:

    Sines and cosines are the same curve, except one is shifted along the x-axis by (pi/2). I think that’s right.

  2. jane Says:

    I think it’s time to invest in a new fridge. unfrozen ice (aka water) – what’s the point in that? you can’t make a drink with that!! and frozen lettuce and tomatoes? I believe that’s called ‘future mulch’ or else garbage.

  3. Pooh Says:

    Our refrigerator is in its dotage, too. I believe my birthday present will be a new fridge. (Hey, at least it wasn’t my Valentine’s Day present!) Time to bite the bullet. Think of how much more efficient the new models are compared to ours. I know that a fridge doesn’t have the geeky cool of two I-phones bought BEFORE the price dropped, but still they are COOL. Pun very definitely intended.

  4. kayak woman Says:

    Our fridge is actually not that old. March 1997. I know that because it’s the date that the ice storm killed our 31-year-old fridge. So our technology is really not that old. The problem (potentially) is that we bought a brand (GE) that is looked down in some circles (including the delivery guy) as being problematical. Why? Because that’s what fit in the space. I’m gonna give Mr. Fixit a little more time to, well, fixit. And then I’ll hit up Big George.

  5. Webmomster Says:

    yeah, go check out Whirlpool – I’ve had the best luck of all my home appliances with Whirlpools. I *dislike* my Frigidaire stove, BTW. Wish I’d gone with my gut on that and got a Whirlpool, too. Live ‘n learn.

  6. Webmomster Says:

    give us an update re the new “frog-o-stat” for your creaky ol’ frig when you return to La Landfill….