this post was submitted on 22 Jul 2025
1148 points (98.6% liked)

Curated Tumblr

6009 readers
7 users here now

For preserving the least toxic and most culturally relevant Tumblr heritage posts.

Here are some OCR tools to assist you in transcribing posts:

Don't be mean. I promise to do my best to judge that fairly.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] shalafi@lemmy.world 6 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I'd say the ability to do basic arithmetic in your head is a lifelong boon for anyone.

At Lowe's we would load bags of mulch. Guy pulls up with a pickup and an order for 30, "OK, we're going to do 6 stacks of 5." Motherfuckers, customers and coworkers, would fuck it up every time. Need 72 bricks? 9 stacks of 6. Nope! Idiots would count every brick.

When I ran a reprographics shop I found myself embarrassed that I couldn't automatically total a few items, so I practiced until I could. The scion of the local big-time contractor came in and I figured his invoice in my head. He saw me pause for two seconds, "Dude. Why don't you just use a calculator." "Faster to do it in my head." "Yeah, but a calculator doesn't make mistakes." "I don't either. It's only adding a couple of small numbers." He walked away shaking his head at my foolishness.

[–] PolarKraken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Completely agree with you. But hilariously, 9 stacks of 6 bricks only accounts for 54 of them...please don't change it lmao

[–] shalafi@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)
[–] PolarKraken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 months ago

You're a real one!

[–] Genius@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Need 72 bricks? 9 stacks of 6.

"Yeah, but a calculator doesn't make mistakes." "I don't either

I kind of agree with that guy. I don't trust John Doe to do math in his head when I'm paying the math. I'd rather some guy I don't know use a calculator.

[–] shalafi@lemmy.world 2 points 2 months ago

We knew each other well. I knew almost every customer that walked in the door.

Second, the mistake will remain.