Comparison of fractions – a Katya Tale

It happened this morning. Mrs. Porcupyn was trying to explain fractions to Katya.

Mrs. Porcupyn: Which is larger: 1 over 2 (or one half) or 1 over 8 (or one eighth)?
Katya: I don’t know.

Mrs. Porcupyn: OK, let me explain. If I divide a pizza into eight pieces, how big would each piece be?
Katya: One eighth.

Mrs. Porcupyn: If I divide a pizza into two pieces, how big would each piece be?
Katya: One half.

Mrs. Porcupyn: So, if I give one half to (big brother) Baab and one eighth to you, who would I be giving the bigger piece to?
Katya: Baab, (and continues without a pause) You ALWAYS give him the bigger piece!

To India and back in ten days (part 1) – a Katya Tale

Last year, we had made elaborate arrangements for travel to India. Baab and I would fly to India first – we would attend a 30th anniversary reunion of my Xth class passout buddies (KV HEC Ranchi) then take a train to Aurangabad. After spending 10 days with my parents, I would return via Mumbai. A week after my return, my father-in-law would come to Aurangabad and take Baab back with him to Bengaluru (where they live). A few days later, Katya and her mom would fly to Bengaluru where they would all spend a couple of weeks before travelling to Aurangabad. In the meantime, I would fly to Aurangabad and meet them there. We would return from Aurangabad to Orlando (together from Aurangabad to Munich, where we would take separate flights to Orlando – Baab and I via DC and Katya and mom via Toronto). Elaborate travel arrangements balanced on a dime, in chronological order of planning.

Ticket combo 1a (Baab and I) MCO-YUL-ZRH-BOM-DEL-IXR

Ticket combo 2a (Mine alone) BOM-FRA-MCO

Ticket combo 3a (Katya and mom): MCO-YUL-FRA-BLR

Ticket combo 2b: MCO-FRA-BOM

Ticket combo 1b: BOM-MUC-IAD-MCO

Ticket combo 3b: BOM-MUC-YYZ-MCO

And then it all got unhinged when my father was first admitted to the ICU, then passed away. As a result of that, we first postponed my return flight (ticket combo 2b), then cancelled it altogether, cancelled ticket combo 3b, and got a separate one-way return trip for me. Katya and mom got a whole new set of (last minute mucho moolah) tickets, which had to be coordinated with a separate one-way only ticket purchased  (also LMMM) for Baab, so all three of them could return together. Because we were all back before the origination date of ticket combo 3, so we thought it would be pretty easy to just cancel them. Think again. We learned that because of the specific class of tickets that we had purchased, there was no option to cancel the tickets. The only option we had was for them to use the tickets – on the same itinerary – within a year of ticket purchase, not travel!! Consequently, instead of travelling during the summer vacation this year, they had to complete the flight by March 1 (this is where our elaborate planning of last year got me).

Targeted by Target Photo Studio

I got an e-mail from Target Photo Studio with an early Happy Birthday greeting for Katya and some coupons. Unfortunately for us, the local Target closed down a few months back and so the nearest Target Photo Studio is nearly an hour away. So much for that.

That said, I have a suggestion for Target Photo Studio. It would have been a nice touch to have included Katya’s photo along with the e-mail instead of some generic model kid. After all, if they have the programming to use Katya’s name in the subject of the e-mail, surely they could also link to the latest Katya photo that they (hopefully) have saved in their archives?

The cookie is flat – a Katya tale

Inadvertently, Katya has come up with the title for Thomas Friedman’s next book. It happened yesterday …
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Katya has been under the weather the last couple of days (for that matter, Orlando has been under the weather the last couple of days; this morning, finally we got to say hello to the Sun after a two-day hiatus). As school is reopening on Monday, Mrs. Porcupyn and I decided that we might as well get her checked by the doctor to ensure she is fit to go to school.

After checking out Katya, the doctor gave me a prescription for her and added: “Make sure she is hydrated. no milk, only clear fluids; something flat like ginger ale or gatorade should be fine.”

I just double checked with her (the doctor) to verify that I understood what was allowed and what was not allowed. The overarching rules translated to No Dairy and No Soda.

As we were on our long drive back home, based on her next question, I realized that Katya had started feeling hungry: “Appa, can I have a cookie when we get home?”

Porcupyn: “Sure, Katya! But why do you want a cookie?”

Katya: “Didn’t you hear what the doctor said? She said that I should have something flat.”

Tagxedo

I have had the same image for quite some time now, and have thought about changing it a few times. Enter Tagxedo. I generated an image based on this blog, and am using it for the near future.

Dilemma for Katya – Barack Obama or Mitt Romney? [Tales of Katya]

On the way back home earlier today, Katya informed me that the class was conducting a mock vote for the President today. Well, she added, the teacher did not have time for the vote today, so maybe she would do it next Tuesday. “Next Tuesday?,” I asked. “No, I mean tomorrow,” she replied.

“Appa,” she asked, “who should I vote for? Mitt Romney or Barack Obama?”

“Well, ” I answered, diplomatically dodging the question, “you should ask your mother.”

Katya: “But who should I vote for? Who is the right person?”

I replied: “There is no one right person. If there were, why are they holding the election? They should just make the right person the President.”

It turned out that Baab’s class had also voted. So I asked Baab who he’d voted for. Barack Obama, was the answer. At that, Katya piped up, “Lexi and Amanda are voting for Romney.”

“How about Salma and Sieana?” I asked.

Katya: They are both voting for Barack Obama.

“What about Katya?” I shrewdly threw in, knowing that the answer might just be lurking there, waiting to come out.

Katya: “I am thinking of voting for Barack Obama as well, but Giovanni said that Obama says bad things.”

Now really curious, I blurted out, “What bad things has he said?”

Katya: “Well, Giovanni says that Barack Obama said that girls can kiss girls and boys can kiss boys.”

At this point, I started to get the impression that if we were to waterboard Giovanni, all the truth will come out about how Barack Obama wants the following gifts from Santa for Christmas:

mothers who can kill babies
doctors who can treat patients for free
a Cruella De’Vil who hands out Halloween candy
Cinderella can ride only a pumpkin, and
Beauty cannot kiss the beast!

[Edited to add]: Thank goodness Katya is older than this girl!

How you start does not matter …

… but how you finish definitely does. The game of limited overs cricket has gone through one complete rotation, one could say, since when West Indies lost to India in the 1983 World Cup. Yesterday, West Indies won the T20 World Cup. A format that is about as new as the one day format was back then, one key difference being that unlike the one-dayers back then when West Indies would be the overwhelming favourites, in T20 any team can win on a given day (or night).

And so it happened that the final game began yesterday, where though Sri Lanka started off as the favourites, there was always the possibility of West Indies winning. Or so it seemed until the game actually started.

Just like the West Indies of 1983 was by the time the Indian innings was completed (a score of 183 in 60 overs was hardly threatening), Sri Lanka was yesterday the overwhelming favourite to win by the time West Indies finished their innings at 137 off 20 overs. And even that total was achieved only off the back of a stupendous fightback by Marlon Samuels, after the team had reached a paltry 32 for 2 off 10 overs.

And why did Sri Lanka lose? Commentators, the Lanka captain Jayawardene and most others attribute it to pressure. Yes, there was pressure; however, the one aspect that no one appears to have honed in on was the lack of application at the top, and a cavalier, lackadaisical attitude while chasing what was, at best, a mildly competitive total on that pitch.

When you note that West Indies had scored ten runs less against the same team just about a week ago, and lost by nine wickets with about five overs to spare, you realize where that sense of overconfidence came from! Sri Lanka undoubtedly thought that this game would be a similar stroll in the park, given that the target was only about ten runs more.