No, not this Pie (unfortunately):

This Pi:

I thought I’d spend part of today trying to figure out why 3.14 is so important, other than its use in calculating the circumference of a circle — which doesn’t seem all that crucial to me unless you need to know how many inflated balloons will fit into your minivan. But then, I’m not a mathematician, so I really don’t care.

However, there are a few interesting facts about Pi that came up during my very brief research today, such as:

It is universal. Pi is the same everywhere in the universe. And I’m sure that all of the people on Alpha Centauri are relieved to know that.

It is irrational. Yeah, well . . . so am I. But Pi is an irrational number, meaning — according to my Google source — that it has an infinite number of digits that never repeat.

Wait . . . what? There are only, to my knowledge, ten digits: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9. So how can there be an endless stream of them without ever repeating? I’m going to need clarification on that one.

It is transcendental. That does not mean that it meditates — for those who are old enough to remember the 1950s transcendental meditation craze introduced by the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. What it does mean is that it’s not algebraic. Whatever.

It is ubiquitous. Well, so is Elon Musk. But Pi — unlike Elon, who is useless except as a creator of chaos — is used in many areas of math and science, including trigonometry, calculus and geometry.

And finally — and, to my mind, most significantly — Pi is . . .

A pop culture icon. In addition to appearing in documentaries and books, it once made a debut in the Star Trek episode, “The Wolf in the Fold.” Now, that’s important.

*. *. *

If the foregoing has you wondering why I’ve wasted an hour of my life writing about Pi, you’re not alone . . . I’ve been asking myself the same thing. Well, the answer is simple: I couldn’t find another news item I felt like discussing today. It was all, as usual, just too depressing.

And, as it turns out, this little detour into the realm of nothingness did bring back to mind one other fact about the number 3.14 — and that is, that minus the decimal point, it was the number of my apartment in Virginia for some 33 years.

I wonder: Does that make me universal, transcendent, ubiquitous, and iconic? Or simply irrational?

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
3/13/25