Teachers' Lounge

Out of the box thinking required

I heard this puzzler Saturday on Car Talk. Try it. Look at the following equation. Obviously, something's wrong.

76 = 24

Imagine that each digit is on a separate piece of paper - the 7, the 6, the 2, and the 4 are all on little pieces of paper. Therefore, you can rotate these digits if you wish. Also, the digits do not have to remain in a perfectly straight line. The only thing that you cannot change is the equals sign. You can't change it to a plus, or a does not equal, and you can't rotate it to make an 11. It must remain an equals sign.

Can you arrange everything so as to produce a valid equation?

Yesterday and today

Had to return two swamp cooler covers at Lowes Saturday. (I was informed Friday that covers do more harm than good.) Stopped by the Las Cruces Farmers/Craft market. I was first in line for a small bag of kettle corn dusted, no, smothered with red chile powder. Upon finishing my treat, I stepped into COAS and checked out the one dollar books. Walked out with Tracy Kidder's Among Schoolchildren. Read the first chapter, "September," and decided my dollar was well spent. While reading, I was reminded that I've been itching to again read Up the Down Staircase. I'd read it upon its release in 1965 and was utterly charmed by the insanities therein.

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The Prayer of Saint Francis

"O Lord, make me an instrument of Thy Peace!
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is discord, harmony;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light, and
Where there is sorrow, joy.
Oh Divine Master, grant that I may not
so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand; to be loved
as to love; for it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life."