The Mathematics Are Clearly Not Mathing

Humanity has accomplished some impressive things. We have split the atom, mapped the human genome, landed machines on Mars, photographed black holes, and created tiny computers powerful enough to access virtually all accumulated human knowledge while sitting on the toilet.

Yet there remain certain problems that science has apparently looked at and said: “No. We're not getting involved.” Two in particular deserve immediate federal funding. The first involves stickers. The second involves spaghetti. Neither obeys the known laws of nature.

The Sticker Problem

Every retail sticker has two possible adhesive settings:

1. Falls off before you get home.

2. Permanently bonded at the molecular level.

There is no middle ground. If the sticker contains vital information you actually need, perhaps assembly instructions or a serial number, it will detach itself somewhere between the cash register and your driveway and disappear forever. But if it's a price sticker attached directly to the front of a beautiful new picture frame? That thing was installed by Lockheed Martin.

You find a corner and gently lift it. At first, everything looks promising. The sticker starts to rise smoothly. You begin experiencing confidence.

“Oh, good. This one's going to come right---” RRRRRIP!! "Son of a...."

You are now holding approximately three percent of the sticker. The remaining ninety-seven percent is a permanent structural component of the picture frame.

Fine. You use your sharpest fingernail. This accomplishes nothing except separating the sticker into progressively thinner geological layers. Apparently price stickers have sedimentary rock formations: white paper, gray paper, mysterious translucent paper, then finally the adhesive layer, which appears capable of holding a Buick upside down from the ceiling.

You try warm water. Now you have wet paper. You try dish soap. Now you have clean wet paper. You try rubbing alcohol. Vegetable oil. A credit card. A razor blade. A hair dryer. At some point you realize you've assembled more specialized equipment to remove a $4.99 sticker than the surgeon who removed your appendix.

And eventually, you win. The sticker is gone. You proudly wipe the glass and hold it toward the light. Perfect. Then your thumb touches one tiny invisible spot... STICK. You freeze. There is still adhesive. You can't see it. But it's there. Waiting... Like a Klingon Bird-of-Prey, cloaked just beyond viewer range. (Hopefully the nerdier folks will subscribe now)

At this point you begin wondering whether you actually needed the picture frame. Maybe the photograph would look nice taped directly to the wall. Like, "Homeless Chic" or something...

The Mathematics of Leftovers

Cooking presents humanity with an entirely different mathematical problem. Food quantities are apparently determined not by measurements, but by your intentions.

Make spaghetti without thinking about tomorrow, and you’ll accidentally prepare enough pasta to cater a medium-sized Italian wedding. You look into the pot before cooking. “That doesn’t seem like much.” So you add another handful. Still looks a little light. One more. Ten minutes later, the noodles have expanded into a carbohydrate emergency. The colander is full. The pot is full. Somehow, spaghetti is touching parts of the kitchen that were never involved in preparation.

Everybody eats. Everybody has seconds. You fill three containers with leftovers. By the fourth day you’re calling relatives.

“Do you guys want some spaghetti?”
“No, we’re good.”
“Do you know anybody who does?”

But next Tuesday you deliberately decide to make enough for two meals. Same pot. Same pasta. This time you actually add extra. You are planning ahead. You are being responsible. Dinner ends. You walk into the kitchen expecting tomorrow’s meal. There are seven noodles left.

What happened? Did somebody invite a football team while you weren’t looking? Are they handing out samples on the rear patio?

Rice is worse. Dry rice has absolutely no relationship with cooked rice. You pour a little into the measuring cup. “That can’t possibly be enough.” You add some more. Thirty minutes later you lift the lid and discover you’ve apparently harvested six acres of Southeast Asia.

Mashed potatoes operate similarly. How many potatoes feed four people? Nobody knows. Four doesn’t look like enough. Six seems reasonable. Two are kind of small, so you add another two. Suddenly you’re standing over a mixing bowl containing enough mashed potatoes to supply a school cafeteria until Thursday. Then comes the strangest mathematical phenomenon of all: the Ceremonial Leftover.

This is the tiny amount of food remaining after dinner that isn’t enough to constitute another meal but feels morally unacceptable to throw away. Three spoonfuls of macaroni. Half a chicken breast. Seven green beans. One suspiciously small serving of mashed potatoes.

Nobody wants it. Nobody will ever eat it. Everybody in the house knows this. But you cannot throw it away tonight. That’s wasteful. So you carefully place it into a storage container and put it in the refrigerator. It must remain there for the required mourning period.

Day One: “That’s still good.”
Day Two: “Somebody might eat that.”
Day Three: “We should probably finish that.”
Day Four: “What is this?”
Day Five: “Good Lord. It's now a science project and should be thrown away before the Body Snatcher pods start accumulating in the crisper.”

Only now may the food complete its journey to the garbage can. Nothing has actually been saved. We merely provided it with five days of refrigerated hospice care.

And perhaps that’s the real lesson here. Mathematics works beautifully when applied to bridges, spacecraft, banking systems, and planetary motion. But bring mathematics into the average household and everything immediately falls apart.

A sticker requiring one gram of adhesive receives seventeen pounds. A handful of spaghetti feeds nine. Two handfuls feed three. Eight potatoes feed the United States Marine Corps. And three tablespoons of macaroni must spend four days in a plastic container before society permits its disposal.

Scientists may someday explain these phenomena. Until then, I have a $7 picture frame sitting on my table with one tiny sticky spot in the lower-left corner. I’ve been trying to remove it since Tuesday. At this point, I’m considering putting the spaghetti on it.

Maybe they’ll cancel each other out...