Thursday, September 11, 2014

Hi and Lois watch


[Hi and Lois, September 11, 2014. Click for a larger view.]

Rotten kids, eh? Rotten arithmetic too. The problem with Dot and Ditto’s calculations: an eight-year-old will have lived through one or two leap years:

Let x = 365

4x + 1 = 1461

2(4x + 1) = 2922
Or if one was born after February 29 in a leap year:
4x + (4x +1) = 2921
Or if one was born before February 29 and leap year falls in the fourth year of one’s life:
(4x + 1) + 4x = 2921
I can think of three possible reasons for “2920”:
1. No Child Left Behind and the Common Core.

2. A cartoonist’s carelessness.

3. The absence of leap years from the Flagston world.
Which explanation do you think is most probable? Or have I missed one?

Related reading
All OCA Hi and Lois posts (Pinboard)

[I do like the falling leaves in today’s strip. Hi and Lois digs fall. I hope I got the arithmetic right.]

comments: 5

The Crow said...

I like the third reason. All worlds in cartoon-land operate by different sets of rules than ours.

How else did Mark Trail continue to look as hot, his hairline still in place (not to mention no grey)?

Or, how about Cherry's face and bosom(*)still pert and firm? (Bosom is the general term; breasts, the specific. Bosom one can only guess at, since it is covered - and singular; breasts are "in your face" naked reality, no need to guess.) That didn't happen in MY world!

That's why I went with number three. TMI?

Michael Leddy said...

TMI? IMHO, not really. We are all fighting gravity.

I just remembered this Hi and Lois calendar, which has months of twenty-eight days, max. And, of course, hands have four fingers.

Matthew Schmeer said...

Technically, it's much more than that! Dot & Ditto were 4 when the strip began on October 18, 1954. Let's just assume that they were born exactly four years earlier. This means they should be asking grandma for roughly $23,339, at least according to this date range calculation website:

http://www.timeanddate.com/date/duration.html#

But of course, since cartoon world time moves slower than real time, Dot & Ditto have only aged about 4 years in the approximately 64 years since the strip's debut.

Chris said...

Since the twins were supposedly four when the strip was started in 1954, that would make their true age 64 or so, but if the strip says they're just turning seven that suggests that one Hi and Lois year is equal to approximately 7,300 days. If so, 7 x 7,300 = $51,100. Per twin.

Michael Leddy said...

You can imagine my delight in seeing both these comments at once. Yes, I was pretty foolish in taking the twins at their word, esp. when I have a post somewhere noting Trixie’s advanced age.