h a l f b a k e r yA riddle wrapped in a mystery inside a rich, flaky crust
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Take two scientific calculators and a friend. (Stop reading now if you lack either of those.)
Type in 15000 and = on both calculators. Set to ANS - 1.
Hit = hundreds of times. 14999, 14998, 14997, 14996.... all the way down! :D
The first person to hit zero (without cheating!) is the winner,
and the friend must cough up an equal number of pence/cents to whatever was on their display.
If you slip, you have to round up what was on your display to the next 1000 and start again from there.
I did this with a friend in a Physics lesson once, and won £5.53. It's extremely exciting, as you pound your finger like a hammer, knowing that one wrong move could cost you considerable amounts of cash.
For the more daring of you, start at 1.5 million and count down in hundreds. The loser has to sell all their worldly possessions! Then there's the 15 million version, the 150 million version, the 1.5 billion version...... I wonder if we could settle a few political problems with this game?
HP12C PUBLIC SERVICE MESSAGE
http://www.efmoody.com/hp12c.html
To quote the site..."Never, NEVER, NEVER GIVE MONEY TO ANYONE UNLESS THEY HAVE AND CAN EFFECTIVELY UTILIZE AN HP 12C CALCULATOR OR SIMILAR" [LoriZ, Oct 04 2004]
Calculator Games
http://www.amazon.c...9-0506227?vi=glance
[Shz, Oct 04 2004]
krelnik's halfbakery newbie idea posting FAQ
http://timfarley.ho...g.com/half_faq.html
[my face your, Oct 04 2004]
abacus vs. calculator bloodbath
http://www.tecsoc.o...tory/2001/nov12.htm
[thumbwax, Oct 04 2004]
see the "100m-1500m" entry
http://www.playgrou...om/perl/browse.pl?1
[hippo, Oct 04 2004]
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During moments of intense boredom, a friend of mine and I used to duke it out using his electronic stop watch. The object was to start and then immediately stop the thing in the shortest amount of time. His record of 5/100 of a second went unbeaten. |
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Nice. Do people really do this for money? |
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[waugs], I did a start/lap time in .02. |
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I did it in .00!! Then I realised I never started it. Oh well. The stopwatch thing is a totally different game. That's always quite good in Physics lessons. But Calculator Drag Racing takes a whole half hour (I think, from what I remember). Change the figures if you want a faster game/bigger jackpots. |
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Of calculator? sharp el-531LH. Has light buttons. I'm trying it out right now. Scored 183 in 30 seconds. Anyone wanna challenge? |
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This is obviously more common than I thought. |
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Galuk, is that using the same finger? (In my friend's case, it was his thumb. My personal best is 7/100ths, but I only did it once.) |
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Just did it again and scored 183 in 30. Exactly the same. I'm interested to find out what other people get. (The discussion is calculators, but talk stopclocks if it'll make you happy!) |
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My only calculator is the one that comes with MS Windows, so I'd probably break my keyboard if I tried to play this game on it. I'll leave you to it. |
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[waugs], that's using one finger on the start button and one on the lap button. I figure it's not as hard as doing a true start/stop, though. |
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You can play it on MS Windows Calculator too. Just don't hold down the equals button. Type 15000, =, -, 1, ENTER (on the numpad), ENTER, ENTER, ENTER, ENTER, ENTER, ENTER etc. |
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To settle some disputes, I know for a fact that a considerable number of stop/start watches only stop/start on certain numbers. The one I have at home number stops on 4, 6, or 11. Either that or my actions are perfect down to the nearest 1/100. |
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Why would anyone want to vote against this idea? It's not my fault your technology smells. |
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monkeyman, people will vote against ideas for any number of reasons. Primarily, though, it is because they don't like it. Subjectivity's inescapable, so don't sweat the 'bones. |
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Oh really? I was beginning to think that it was because you didn't appreciate newcomers! |
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Well, as with any community, there'll be people who don't like newcomers but such people are in the minority. If you're concerned with garnering croissants, take a look at krelnik's "newbie" guide (link) - it is an excellent observation of the way things work here and may provide you with some pointers. |
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Don't be discouraged, BoggleQuoits and Electro Wig show that you have the ability to post croissant-garnering ideas. Stick at it. |
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Cheers, [face]. UnaBubba, I'd say 8 cos I reckon most people will have forgotten about this by then. |
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If/when the halfbakery hits the golden anniversary - and someone posts this non-idea again, there'll be someone to refer to it. So, no - it won't be forgotten in a week. |
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As a child (after which I think I lost all interest in this sort of activity), my siblings and I would 'race' like this with a pocket calculator by pressing '+1' and '=' for a pre-determined amount of time. I doubt we were original in this sort of contest. Considering that the same calculator would count down in a similar fashion when using '-1' as the function applied to a given value, I'd imagine this to be widely and thoroughly baked.
However, I'm delighted to hear that you are enjoying your new pocket calculator. |
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... if not your physics lessons. |
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//I did this with a friend in a Physics lesson once, and won £5.53.//
Therefore.... Baked. |
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I thought that this idea was going to be about a school sports day event involving cross-dressing maths teachers. I would have voted for that. |
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For n=1 to 15000
let x=15000-n
print x
next n
end
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That’s cheating Ray – you used nitrous. |
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