Figures for fun by Perelman Ya and others...

The past 2 weeks have been utmost boring.... It has got nothing to do with the world around me... At least the world around me gave enough triggers to be happy about... first it was Ganesha Chathurthi... on and off showers... beautiful scenaries were created which could have been photographed if I had a camera at hand... But that's all hind sight... To sum it up... the whole 2 weeks was just plain uneventful. However, I picked a nice little obsession with volleyball.. we play for at least 3 hours a day now... 5-8PM... I used to come home with swollen fingers during the early days... But now it is OK...

Also, during the week, I finished the book of puzzles - Figures for fun by Perelman Ya.I. It was a very good book to start with... but towards the end it became a drag... an interesting drag though. The book gives reveals some lesser known history of some of the famous puzzles like Sam Loyd's 15 Puzzle, the game of chess, the original Indian "Towers of Hanoi". For instance, I never knew that half of the 15 puzzle combinations can not be solved. After reading the book, I realized that the Internet is full of that info... How could I have missed it?? In the same breath, I also felt proud that the author had acknowledged the Indian origin of the chess and the problem definition of "Towers of Hanoi". However, felt a little perplexed as to how biased historians and rob a nation of the credit it deserves... Just take the "Hindu-Arabic" numeric system that we use... The name Arabic is there only because the ignorant Romans learnt it from Arabs. It should have been only "Hindu" numeric system. The Arabs were only the carriers that spread the knowledge around. I hear that in some books the numeric system is even referred to as Arabic system... what non-sense. Apart from the famous puzzles, this book also introduces various mechanisms of measurements with out instruments... and general awareness of some unbelievable numbers. All in all, a good read for any one who appreciate mathematics.

I have now started "Alice's Adventures in the wonderland" gone past 3 chapters... lets see how it unfolds....