I'm good at them numbers and stuff

[purplemoose84]

Ok, so i work at the big orange box home improvement retail store (figure it out). More importantly I work in flooring. To work in flooring one must be able to do basic 3rd/4th grade math (ie. find the square footage and pricing ect length x width).

Now I must also point out I am currently the only one trained to be in flooring (super suckage). I had my two trainees with me at the desk so I could show them how to read measure (which can be complicated at times) and how to go over quotes with customers when I had a very ...southern and rural and older gentleman (read back woods redneck) come to the up the desk.

Me: me in my awesome goodness...
M- awesome sense of humor
W- tries really hard.
RNIC- redneck idiot customer

RNIC- (with a slow drawl) how ya'll doing... (doesnt wait for our responses).... look i got a room that's 16 foot wide by 8 foot 6 inches . I wanna get a cheap carpet to put in there. What's the cheapest carpet ya'll got and how much do I need?

Me- Well sir our carpets in stock are only 12 feet wide so you'll have to turn it.

RNIC- blank stare like I'm speaking greek

Me- Sir you could take the carpet and run the length down the 16' and not have a seam.

RNIC- face is srewed up while he thinks.... Ok how much will that cost with the cheapest carpet.

Me- *turn to my trainees and give a brief explanation about turning carpets and that we need to in this case figure up a 12'x16' carpet* Ok sir, you need a 192sf cut of carpet. Our least expensive instock is $104 and roll of pad will run about $115 and will cover 30sy. *I briefly explain to trainees about in stock carpet pad which we don't sell a whole lot of and the got them to fig the square yards into feet for practice* Ok sir and do you have tack strips?

RNIC- *faces screws up to think again searching for a tackstrip is* yeah i think I do.

Me- Ok well with tax you're looking about $XXX * the whole time I've been doing all the math stuff I've been cheating and using calculator because it's quicker than long hand. *

RNIC - Wow ya'll musta gone to college. You're sure good at them numbers and stuff...

Me- on the inside No sir I cheat and use a calculator.

the RNIC thanked me and left.... and then it went down hill...


M-* looks be sure customer left* no sir I didn't go to college... I just passed 4th grade math...

W- laughing repeats the RNIC's "numbers" line. you know he could at least make to 10 counting his fingers

Me- *slow drawl* well you know he could make up to 20. well not right now on account that he's got shoes on...

and then later that day while i was on the phone with hubby after i told him the story.

M- *looking very intently at his hands* ya know Moose he could probably make it up to 11... ya know how it is with those inbreeds.... heck maybe even 22...

I was laughing so hard I dropped the phone and had my husband asking me if i was okay b/c i couldnt breath!

[HYHYBT]

I'd have been confused by your telling me I had to turn the carpet as well, since it never would have occurred to me to try laying it the way it wasn't wide enough for, much less that you would assume that that was the way I wanted it.

[ShadowTiger]

A friend at work had this gem of a customer:

"Where are your American Flags?"

*He leads them to where they are*

"I need a flag 3x5."

*He takes one down for her*

"So this is 3x5?"

CW: Yes.

"What does 3x5 look like?"

CW: Well it's three feet by five feet.

"But what does it look like?"

CW: Okay, well, it's basically this big. *He takes steps on the floor tiles, which are exactly one foot apiece.*

"Okay, but how BIG is it?"

CW: It's three feet by five feet. O.o'

"I get it I get it, but how BIG IS IT."

CW: Um, in terms of what?

"You know, Big! BIG!"

CW: I just showed you. It's this big. *traces the floor tiles again.*

"..." *walks away*

[Plank]

Argh. I have a maths degree (well, joint honours maths and computer science) and people always seem to expect me to be able to do arithmetic straight off the top of my head (which i can a bit, on a good day). Its a bit like asking a chef for farming tips. Im great at algebra, calculus, chaos theory etc. if I have a chance to read up on it (been a while), but people just assume maths stops at /*-+

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Actually, it stops at - +.

I can actually figure out how much X I need for a project, but then I go ahead and overestimate, just in case. Takes me a while, but I can do it.

I think I understand the calculations here, but I don't understand how you could do it without a seam. I stared at your post a long time trying to get my head around it. I think I get the dimensions, it's just the seam bit that is throwing me.

[Gerrinson]

I think I understand the calculations here, but I don't understand how you could do it without a seam. I stared at your post a long time trying to get my head around it. I think I get the dimensions, it's just the seam bit that is throwing me.

Let me take a crack at explaining it. I've done carpentry, majored (briefly) in Architecture, and I do advanced physics and calculus for fun. <.< >.> Yes, I'm a geek.

The space the customer needs to cover is 16 feet long by 8 1/2 feet wide.

There are two ways to lay the carpeting - which comes in a width of 12 feet.

Option A: If you buy the carpeting at 12 feet by 8 1/2 feet, then you have an uncovered portion of floor that is 4 feet by 8 1/2 feet. At this point the customer would have to buy another section of carpet that is 12 feet by 4 feet and trim it to fit. This also leaves a seam in the middle of the room where the edges of the two separate pieces of carpet meet.

You would have purchased a total of two pieces of carpet, one 12 feet x 12 feet and the other 4 feet x 12 feet. Or, a total of 16 (12+4) feet long by 12 feet wide.

Option B: If you buy one piece of carpet that is 12 feet wide by 16 feet long, then you can trim it down lengthwise so that it is still 16 feet long but only 8 1/2 feet wide. This allows you to cover the whole room with a single piece of carpet with no seam in the room.

And in either case, you wind up buying 16 feet of carpet. Just one way is easier to install and looks better.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Oh! I got it! Thanks!

Man, that seems so obvious, now.

[MrsEclipse]

Well, maths is hard. You've got to do all the counting, remembering which order all the numbers are supposed to go in, and then you gotta remember that the area of any rectangle is length times width... I tell ya, it can really wear a person down!

[purplemoose84]

Let me take a crack at explaining it. I've done carpentry, majored (briefly) in Architecture, and I do advanced physics and calculus for fun. <.< >.> Yes, I'm a geek.

The space the customer needs to cover is 16 feet long by 8 1/2 feet wide.

There are two ways to lay the carpeting - which comes in a width of 12 feet.

Option A: If you buy the carpeting at 12 feet by 8 1/2 feet, then you have an uncovered portion of floor that is 4 feet by 8 1/2 feet. At this point the customer would have to buy another section of carpet that is 12 feet by 4 feet and trim it to fit. This also leaves a seam in the middle of the room where the edges of the two separate pieces of carpet meet.

You would have purchased a total of two pieces of carpet, one 12 feet x 12 feet and the other 4 feet x 12 feet. Or, a total of 16 (12+4) feet long by 12 feet wide.

Option B: If you buy one piece of carpet that is 12 feet wide by 16 feet long, then you can trim it down lengthwise so that it is still 16 feet long but only 8 1/2 feet wide. This allows you to cover the whole room with a single piece of carpet with no seam in the room.

And in either case, you wind up buying 16 feet of carpet. Just one way is easier to install and looks better.

I had though about trying to go into that much detail with the customer but it was easier to tell him he need to buy a 12'x16' cut of carpet ( i had drawn out a diagram to explain what you had explained but he just gave me the deer int he headlights look).... what scared / disturbed me was he was going to install it himself.

[Nurian]

My math is terrible. I'm lucky I know enough to figure out if I put in the right formula for Excel.

[dalesys]

The sheepherder's conundrum: finding the long side of a square blanket.

[Food Lady]

My math is terrible. I'm lucky I know enough to figure out if I put in the right formula for Excel.

I'm good at math but cannot figure out Excel

and I do advanced physics and calculus for fun

marry me

[EricKei]

And in either case, you wind up buying 16 feet of carpet. Just one way is easier to install and looks better.

Remind me to fly up to yer place and kidnap you next time I need carpet >_>

That, and you remind me of the admin of a (now-gone) board I used to frequent -- the guy was, for lack of a better term, a "supermath", AFAIK. As in, he works out pages of quadratic equations as a way to KILL boredom (rather than cause it). At one point, he was also playing with some sort of problems (the name escapes me -- it may have been "four-dimensional equations" but I'm not sure) which apparently can only be adequately represented on paper as a three-dimensional array of numbers and variables (hypercubes?). I got the gist of what he was talking about when he described them to me, but that's about it. He felt that they were a pleasant diversion o_O

I can DO math (up to Geometry/Analysis level), but you can't make me like it.

[Samaliel]

And in either case, you wind up buying 16 feet of carpet. Just one way is easier to install and looks better.

Actually, given the dimensions the guy provided, you could do it with only 12 feet of carpet. But you would end up with a lot of seams. And it might require a supercalculator to figure out how to cut it.

[wolfie]

Let me take a crack at explaining it. I've done carpentry, majored (briefly) in Architecture, and I do advanced physics and calculus for fun. <.< >.> Yes, I'm a geek.

The space the customer needs to cover is 16 feet long by 8 1/2 feet wide.

There are two ways to lay the carpeting - which comes in a width of 12 feet.

Option A: If you buy the carpeting at 12 feet by 8 1/2 feet, then you have an uncovered portion of floor that is 4 feet by 8 1/2 feet. At this point the customer would have to buy another section of carpet that is 12 feet by 4 feet and trim it to fit. This also leaves a seam in the middle of the room where the edges of the two separate pieces of carpet meet.

You would have purchased a total of two pieces of carpet, one 12 feet x 12 feet and the other 4 feet x 12 feet. Or, a total of 16 (12+4) feet long by 12 feet wide.

Actually, your 2 pieces would be 8 1/2 feet long, and 4 feet long, for a total of 12 1/2 (8 1/2 + 4) feet long by 12 feet wide, a savings of about 22 percent over a 16 foot long piece. On the other hand, not only do you have a seam down the middle, but the 2 pieces are laid with their "grain" at right angles, which will look ugly.