March 14 is Pi Day, as in 3.14 (etc.) In honor of that, I looked for some books for this fun post. When I searched for the 16th letter of the Greek alphabet, that is, "pi", this is the version I get: ∏. Not as pretty as others I've seen, but it will have to do.

∏: a Biography of the World's Most Mysterious Number, by Alfred S. Posamentier and Ingmar Lehmann was written for the general reader. Even so, the 'math stuff' went into my head, swirled around for a bit, and then left without leaving much of an understanding behind. However, I did enjoy the chapters on history, enthusiasts, and curiosities. :-) It seems celebrations are started at 1:59 (the next range numbers) and include hijinks, and, naturally, pie. There's a song (to the tune of "American Pie", by Don McLean) and some curious mnemonics for memorizing the first 25 numbers or so.

Sir Cumference and the Dragon of Pi: a Math Adventure, by Cindy Neuschwander and illustrated by Wayne Geehan is a clever story of Pi for children. Join Radius on his search for the answer to the riddle that will ... well, you'll just have to read the book to find out just what it will solve. ;-)

It seems my best memory of something to do with Pi is from an episode of Star Trek (the original series) "Wolf in the Fold" where Spock tells the computer to calculate to the last digit the value of Pi. As the computer pulls more power to solve this order, the crew is able to overcome the nasty entity that has invaded the Enterprise.

As I sign off today I am humming 'All My Life's a Circle' .... (Harry Chapin) ;-)

Reading Hermit With Dog