Happy Pi Day, Albert

Last Updated (Wednesday, 10 March 2010 15:24) Written by Raymond Nakamura

This year, different school boards have March Break at different times. But if you're looking for something to do on March 14, why not celebrate Pi Day, in honour of that splendid number (3.14...), the ancient ratio between the circumference and diameter of a circle with digits that keep going and going. It is also Albert Einstein's birthday, but he already gets enough publicity. At Science World, March Break (March 11-15) festivities will be a Pi-rate theme. Coincidence? Maybe.

Anyway, here are some things to do on pi day—

3. 

My favourite is strawberry rhubarb. Or maybe pumpkin. Or lemon meringue.

1 

Make a pi necklace.

You assign a bead type to each digit and string them according to the digits in pi.

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Read about pi. Life of Pi is interesting, although I'll warn you that it doesn't have many numbers in it. 

1 

Find your birthday in pi

You put your birth date in and the program finds a matching sequence of numbers.

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Find out where your name falls in pi.

The letters in your name is converted to a string of numbers which is sought in pi. Longer names are less likely to be found.

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Sing or rap about pi.

2 

Write some pi-inspired poetry. 

You could write down how to write about pi in various languages.

Use the haiku form to write about pi. Or write a piaku, using words with syllables that follow the digits of pi.

Or write a piaphrase, using words with letters following the digits of pi. Some people use this method to memorize pi for some number of digits.

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If you're really bored (as the web site says) memorize pi to some impressive amount of digits. No rounding off. If you get good, you can join a club for people who have memorized a hundred digits or more. The world record is over 60,000.

Pioneer Pi Day. Pin a tail on a Pinneped. Pinion pink pions. You won't be pilloried for being picayune. Let me know how it goes.