Today Is...International Day of Mathematics

As it's the one day when all things Mathematical are celebrated, it is probably not the best day to admit that Mathematics and i have never had a very good relationship, i can't count the amount of times i failed Maths at school which has probably coloured my view that unless you are planning on becoming an engineer, architect, co-hosting Countdown or a Maths teacher, you can always get by with a basic knowledge of Maths.
When i cast my mind back to my school days, Michael J Fox was back in the future, Emilio Estevez was in the Breakfast club, Freddy Kruger was back in Elm Street and i was in Class 72 not listening to the Maths teacher tell us how important it was to learn the value of Pi.
Of course what the Maths teachers never told us was that unless we planned on sewing leather patches onto cardigans and becoming Maths teachers ourselves, 99.9% of us will never actually use Pi but that little gem is kept quiet because otherwise they will have to fill the time trying to explain long division or another thing i have managed to survive the decades since leaving school without ever contemplating using, calculus.
Anything more complicated than the basics stayed in my brain for as long as it took for the teacher to say them and i couldn't tell you Pi without googling it first and that's exactly what i would do if for some unfathomable reason i needed to know it.
I also spent a whole year making a clay jug and what practical use that is to a person in the world outside of secondary education i don't know unless you are unlucky enough to find yourself in a desert with only a lump of clay and a potters wheel and then you will be glad you didn't fake a period pain every Monday afternoon in that final year.
Never, since leaving school have i ever had to use Calculus or Pythagoras or been forced to scramble around in the dusty part of my brain for what pi is so as long as you have a working knowledge of the times tables, can divide, subtract and add and are able to find a percentage of something you will always get by and anyway that Mobile Phone you always have about your person will have a handy calculator app on it so don't fret.
Of course, as i mentioned earlier, this doesn't always apply especially if you are going into a career where maths is important such as co-hosting Countdown where you need a quick, mathematical brain to work out how to make 792 with four big numbers and two little ones.
Anyway, i was never any good at maths and it has never been a problem for me and it shouldn't be a problem for the majority of people but you kids should pay attention and listen to the Maths teacher because the chances of ever hearing anyone mention the word Pi again once you have left school is 3.14159265 or something.