Mental Multiplication Tricks

It's been nice being able to go back to memrise.  After going to Nationals and using it as an opportunity for an internet fast, I had a lot of catching up to do.  I have caught up my reviews in French, literary dates, other historical dates,  capitals, number systems, and now the mental multiplication I had started.  I still have to catch up my reviews in Dutch and toki pona, but that is a separate story.

As much fun as it was trying to use the major memory system to try think of bizarre images to remember the facts "on sight" I think I'd rather invest in learning and practicing some mental tricks to do more of the math as computation and leave "sight facts" to the what remains.  So what should be easy to compute?   

Well, 11s for one easy case.  

Here's a grab bag of tricks, which covers 9s, 5, and supposedly any power of 2, but honestly trying to turn 14 X 32 into (14 X 2 X 2 X 2 X 2 X 2) is a little unwieldy, but the idea is a really good short-cut and allows me to think about using other powers as well.

Also, a wikibook offers the following fun trick: 

Let's say you are multiplying two numbers, just two two-digit numbers for now (though the rules could be adapted for others) which start with the same digit and the sum of their unit digits is 10. For example, 87×83 (sum of unit digits: 7+3=10). You multiply the first digit by one more than itself (8×9 = 72). Then multiply the second digits together (7×3 = 21). Then stick the first answer at the start of the second to get the answer (7221). A simple proof of how this works is given in the Wikipedia article on Swami Bharati Krishna Tirtha's Vedic mathematics. If the result from the multiplication of the unit digits is less than 10, simply add a zero in front of the number (i.e., 9 becomes 09). For example, 59×51 is equal to [5×6][9×1] which equals [30][09]. Thus 59×51 = 3009.

Lastly, on this research journey I found out about so-called Vedic Mathematics and the Trachenberg System. 

All can help me as I slowly (around 5 facts a day) work through the 100 X 100 times table.

Still a Weakling

The last two days I've been able to organize my time again with 25 minutes of some kind of intellectual play/work and then a few minutes of doing something physical that had to be done.  On the hour, I've been doing the hanging leg raises.

It's not really the leg raising that is killing me, but rather the hanging part.  Yup, I'm still pretty much a weakling . . .  but I have made progress and have faith that I will continue to.

Let's Go With Go

I am indeed starting off again in learning the game of Go.  My first textbook will be River Mountain Go.

It has this advice:

as you read this book, please play at least ten games of Go for every chapter you read. If you play one game of Go per day, spend about a week on each chapter. 

That's the kind of advice I like to hear; I want to play the game and enjoy my summer -- a real summer now that Nationals has ended.

Back from Nationals

This summer has so far really been about improving the lives of my students as I help them follow their goals and dreams.

Now I get to work more on my own self-improvement, which is less satisfying, frankly, at least in the short run.  I think I'll get out of this slightly empty feeling soon and start having more and more fun.

First up, I am going to do some more memory work, particularly with dates, but I might learn how to memorize a deck of cards in order.

Furthermore, I will now start to work in earnest at the million word challenge in Spanish.  I plan on building a rocket stove soon and ramp up experimentation on soups and sauces.  I have a vision of working soups and sauces outdoors during warm months and making bread indoors during the winter (heating the house while getting a useful bi-product).  That, and my garden, working out, and playing Go should be enough to keep me busy and happy until it is time for school again.

A Turn Back To Go?

While I haven't been blogging much, on account of the learning curve with learning Dvorak, I have been doing a lot of thinking and walking, and some meditating.  There have been many epiphanies, including the meta-epiphany that I can and should have my epiphanies about my craft of teaching, and that is as much of a challenge, and spiritual journey, as any.

In addition, on those long walks, my mind keeps going back to a need to make the spaces at school work for me better.  One idea is plants, another is a desktop sized waterfall, and yet another is the screaming need inside of me to declutter my classroom (naturally, I have started there, working on getting rid of much of what I inherited in the classroom), but lastly I see again and again in my mind's eye a Go board.

The game stands out as a representation of harmony in motion.  This is important because I don't have a window. and thus I have no portal to nature.  A Go game can represent that dynamism, I think. For it to really be beautiful, I will need to understand the game a bit better.  

For beauty's sake, the game of Go may be the next thing I work on.

Hanging Leg Raises (and Bridges)

I have been working on and off on the 1 set of 100 push ups since I began this my self-improvement journey in earnest.  But I'm still not close.  I think the biggest hang up is core strength, at least my abs are what hurts the first and the most when I am trying to get more push-ups in. I remember hearing Pavel Tsatsouline say that the best ways to be more functionally strong are grip strength and the core, so this prioritization makes sense on that level as well.

To work on both my pathetic grip strength and my core, I am going to the convict conditioning playbook and work hanging leg raises into my routine when I get back from Nationals (I leave tomorrow).  Also. I will start working on bridging.

Notes from a video:

• inhale on the negative
• exhale on the raise
• tightly pull in navel

Unlearning Qwerty

Today is the first day I have tried to type something on a qwerty keyboard and typed it wrong because of how it goes in Dvorak.

I'm unlearning qwerty and on my way to internalizing Dvorak.

Procrastination Chronicles #12 : Improvised Workout

On the path to greatness, there will be 100 overcomings.

I will chronicle my attempts to overcome procrastination.  My technique is to start small, really small.

My favorite post in the series is #3 Dealing with a Bunch of Crap.

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My diet and workouts have been stacked together thus:  5 days a week I do light exercise (walking or garden-work) and eat 1,200 calories (no breakfast, a very light lunch, and then a pretty substantial snack-and-dinner block), on the 6th day I do my weight training and then eat like crazy for two days.

Well, that's the plan, at least.  Yesterday I was eating a bunch before I worked out, which went against my protocol, then, when I thought was going to be able to work out stuff came up . . .  and kept coming up.

Then it became Sunday, which means it was time for family, starting with visiting my grandmother, and with that meant more offers of food.  What to do?

I am proud of my solution:  I improvised a workout.  I snuck away and did a set of push-ups.  Then I came and chatted a bit while watching tennis (the French Open final).  After a bit, I snuck away again and tried to work my arms by lifting the bed in the guest room, but noticed that in the stance I needed to be in my legs got the bulk of the workout, so I switched to a chair, but the necessary grip worked my abs.  Finally, I found a chair that I was able to lift using a row motion and thus got some decent reps for my biceps.  I wasn't able to figure anything (which after all wasn't mine to mess with) that I could use for a kettle bell swing motion, but other than that, it was a pretty good workout.  While grandma made lunch, I also did some air squats, bringing back memories of when I did them for an earlier fitness challenge.

The workout might not have been perfect, but at least it got done, which is one of the most powerful anti-procrastination tactics.  And maybe the workout helped work things in a new, helpful way.

I'm going to do some kettlebell swings now.

Dvorak Is Clicking

Today is the first day where typing in Dvorak is really starting to "click."  This clicking is not intellectual, but physical.

The last systematic error to go was the inversion of "y" and "f."  There are still others that happen, especially when I go quickly (alas like I right now as I am typing these words), but I am starting to feel the belief that I will learn Dvorak up to full proficiency.   Last week typing was a challenge, really a struggle.  Today, on the other hand, typing with Dvorak is merely slow.  I feel comfortable expressing myself with Dvorak.

Groceries

Writing in Dvorak has slowed my writing and my posts are certainly more terse than they would ordinarily -- so my apologies for that.  

I just got back from getting groceries.  I was bummed about spending $34, but then I realized that I had bought two weeks worth of stuff.  I am stretching my canned soup out by bringing some glass containers and eating it over two days -- 180 calories each day.  So that's lunch.

For dinners, most of the staples I need are still in the house from previous purchases.  That's a great thing about cooking from staples.  All I had to buy was some chicken and some more cheese and tortillas.

I should be covered in the food department until I buy supplies for Nationals.