Today is Pi day (which, of course, you wouldn't know unless you were a geek to begin with Pi=3.14..., today is 3/14. Get it?). Jared decided to organize an office Pi Party, in which people brought (of course) pies from home (or from the store, actually. People with engineering degrees aren't generally very domestic). The party took place at 3:14pm -- although Jared made an argument that it's more accurate to hold it at 1:59pm (3.14159...), but 3:14 was more convenient at the office. The management got so psyched about this (did you catch that? "psyched" about a Pi Party) that they got a gift certificate to Best Buy for the winner of the Pi contest. NO that's not a pie eating contest. That's a How Many Numbers of The Eternal Pi Can You Recite From Memory Contest. I, personally can recite three of them (3.14). Jared, on the other hand, won the contest with...
...can you guess how many digits?....
...91 digits of Pi!!!!!
Did I mention he did this from memory? If I were told I had to memorize and recite 91 digits of anything or I would be burned at the stake I'm pretty sure I would end up burned at the stake. Jared and his colleagues, on the other hand, thought it would be good fun to go through such a rigamarole. I thought he was an insane and geeky anomoly to go above, say, ten digits, but not so. The runners up: 2nd place got 71 digits. 3rd place got 104 digits, but made a mistake at #40.
Sheesh.
So in case you're wondering what the first 91 digits of pi are, here they are:
3.1415926535897932384626433832795028
841971693993751058209749445923078164
062862089986280348253
9 comments:
I love this post. That is so funny. My niece's birthday was yesterday...she is in fact a Pi baby!:) Congrats on the win Jared!
I can totally relate. When I was in High School, we had pi day because I organized it since I was the Mu Alpha Theta President. We had the same competition and I won with 113 digits. Can I do it now? Probably not. I suppose there are bigger geeks out there who can recite many more of the infinite number of digits. I think I got like 5 bucks for winning.....so, not nearly as cool as Jared's prize. But, I never do challenges for the money.
Jared, you are awesome. I am forwarding this post to David, and I can pretty much guarantee that we will discuss the issue with Anders at tomorrow evening's dinner. I suspect he'll take it as a challenge. :)
So, Ben and Diane, is that Ben (the brother of Jared and likely similarly geeky)or Diane (who often surprises me with her random talents) speaking?
Janeanchovy, if Anders takes it as a challenge, I will personally make him a pie if he beats Jared.
This is seriously scary that Jared can recite Pi to so many places. He failed to disclose this before he asked me for my blessing to propose to Skye. I had no opportunity to warn her. But I imagine the statute of limitations has run. By the way, an easy way to remember Pi's approximate, if you are a carpenter working with circumferences or areas of circles , is 22/7. It's close enough for most work.
That would be me......Diane. I don't think Ben ever makes comments and he wasn't as geeky in High School as he is now. But he is economics geeky so that's in a whole different class......but still geeky.
I'm a math teacher, and I only know five places.
There are many many reasons why I think Jared is an outstanding individual. This for example, would definitely be on the list... maybe this would be the 91st reason on the list.
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