Much to the chagrin of VA's basketball fans, the flashes of brilliance displayed in the quarterfinals of the Acadiana Classic prove to be a flash in the pan. The VAs incurred two losses in a row and finish fourth. However, lately, VA's girls' sports tended to perform better than boys' basketball since, while VA's girls' sports are still underfunded, their opponents tend to put less money into girls' sports.
As a quiz bowl practice ends, two weeks after the Acadiana Classic ends, the high school B-squad, now with Caleb playing, gets a briefing for the LQBA Winter Invitational South the following week:
"For the LQBA Winter Invitational South, no one will play all the games. Substitutions will be made as appropriate during or between games" Warren tells the five B-team players.
"On what basis will substitutions be made?" Pablo asks the coach.
"The matchup between opposing teams, as well as your own in-game performance"
We didn't use substitutions for years, with Audrey back into play, Caleb is back down to the B-team. For instance, if an opponent is weak, or weakest if the opponent is globally weak, in arts and literature, Nadine will be benched. But Pablo will be benched if the opponent is strong all-around, Warren keeps to himself when the training session ends.
Then, after the quiz bowl practice, Audrey and Nadine both invite him to do their math homework together.
"So we want to know when the power loss due to friction is the same as that of drag" Nadine then proceeds to ask a question to the other two. "Is mu a variable to solve for?"
"No, Nadine. Mu is held constant, kind of like your slope in a linear equation. On the other hand, drag is proportional to velocity, so we'd have D equal to C times V" Pablo explains to his teammate on the B-team.
"But how do these things relate to the power losses they cause?" a confused Nadine fumes against the lack of information on the problem statement.
"The power loss is simply force times velocity, in which case we can multiply both equations by V" Audrey, drawing upon her knowledge base, answers Nadine.
And then we'd have mu times V equal to C times V squared, Nadine proceeds to write down the rest of her solution, meaning the power loss of each is equal at either 0 or mu/C.
"This reminds me of car trips for some reason" Pablo comments on the solution.
"Speaking of car, I just got started learning to drive" Nadine tells him.
Since none of them are taking physics, they don't suspect that what the problem calls mu is actually weight-dependent, and C is partly a reflection of an object's geometry. And, once the problem ends...
Now that I am known as a quiz bowler across town, the parents of my football teammates in middle school or ninth grade kept asking me to tutor my football teammates, or their younger siblings, if any, and pay me to do so, Pablo is realizing that some of them have a lot of catching up to do in class. Especially if they want to keep playing next year, or play another sport. Natalie and the other regular tutors of the team must have a lot of tutoring requests by now, especially when finals are closing in...
Like, on Friday night, Finn's little sister asks him for help. However, her parents ask him to meet with her not at their home, but at Walmart.
"I wonder why you wanted me to meet with her here" Pablo asks her parents.
"It's about sales taxes. It would be more appropriate for her to learn about sales taxes when shopping than at home" Finn's father answers him before turning to their youngest daughter. "Pablo has arrived to help you about taxation"
Finn's little sister is several years younger than Pablo is, or, for that matter, her brother, and then shows him an item she would love to put on her wish list for Christmas.
"I'm Pablo, you probably heard about me from your brother, I apologize for not having asked your name earlier, because I only interacted with your brother at school and in football, never with you" Pablo asks her name.
"Olivia"
"First things first: how much does this cost?" he asks Olivia about a swimsuit's price.
Olivia pulls out a swimsuit that appears to fit her diminutive frame from the racking, with the price tag still attached.
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"Forty-four ninety-five" Olivia, a sixth grader, answers him.
"Good. However, if I may, to calculate taxes on a calculator or a cellphone, it would probably be simpler to use the multiplication button"
"Why use the multiplication button?"
The real reason has to do with composite interest, but Olivia is too young to even start learning about it; that's a pre-calculus topic as far as VA is concerned. These past few weeks made me tutor kids, and this is advanced stuff for elementary school. Probably paying me to babysit her, if you ask me, since her parents are busy with their own shopping, Pablo starts thinking about why he's even tutoring Olivia in pre-algebra.
"I'm a little lost. How am I to use the multiplication button to calculate taxes?" Olivia rolls her eyes.
"You first need to convert the percentage to a decimal number. Step one: move the decimal two spaces left; what's the sales tax rate here?"
"Four point forty-five percent?"
"That's only the state tax. You need to tack on an extra five percent for the parish tax"
"Nine point forty-five percent then..."
She whips out her cell phone, then is left wondering whether she wants to know how much she'd pay in taxes, or how much she'd pay overall.
"OK, so now I have zero point zero nine four five; what's next?"
"What do you want to know?"
"How much I'd be paying total"
"In that case, add one to that number, press multiply and then the parentheses to add all the prices of the items you want to buy that are taxed" Pablo explains to her. "Now you should have a better idea of how to calculate the total cost of a shopping basket"
Our teacher isn't the clearest in the world, Olivia realizes that she'd rather have a clear idea of how to do so before starting assignments on the topic. And she asks questions about what a shopping basket is, as well as what's exempt from sales taxes.
"That comes out to forty-nine dollars and twenty cents" Olivia gets an answer for the total cost of the swimsuit.
"If the swimsuit costs too much for you, what else would you have wanted that's cheaper?"
The pre-teen girl is brought to another area of the store, away from sporting items. By this point, they take note of the various prices of the items they feel they each need or want. While so many feel like girls would be swayed by stuff such as flowers or jewelry, I personally feel otherwise. I might still have time now, but I'd rather focus on what friends and family need. Yes, I am grateful for Audrey and my quiz bowl teammates, but my life has changed a lot since I started playing, he reflects upon the changes in his life when Dayton's parents recognize him in the electronics section:
"It seems like my son heard several times about how quiz bowl made you more distant from the rest of the football team!" the defensive tackle's father can't help but notice how rapid that has been.
"I mean, football lasts for only one-third of a school year. They are free to do whatever they want for the final two-thirds, even play quiz bowl! And it forces me to study, but at the same time parents of other football players have asked me to tutor their younger siblings lately!" Pablo explains himself. "For pay"
"I would never have, in my life as a VA fan, imagined football players to be study machines of the kind able to play quiz bowl!" Dayton's mother appears belatedly surprised by Pablo suddenly appearing on the town's intellectual radar, while Olivia slips past Dayton's parents.
"If you could please excuse me..." Pablo then looks for Olivia in the electronics section, and repeat the same process with her, but with a different item, again of her choice.
Olivia checks out various gadgets in the electronics section when Pablo was busy with the DT's parents, taking note of various prices. And later calculating the after-tax prices of each item.
But then se takes him across the store, making Pablo wonder if anything in the store could interest anyone he knows as Christmas gifts. And based on whether they need it, if so, on what level. Especially obvious when he goes into the pharmacy section, when the pre-teen girl checks out over-the-counter medications. Right next to her are painkillers. Painkillers? Damn it, Audrey, while she might need to use painkillers after basketball practices, or games, claims she drinks coffee as a painkiller! Pablo starts thinking.
"Let's review the various prices you noted, before and after tax" Pablo tells her when re-doing all her calculations by himself. "For now, I think I should go look for ground coffee. It's not all about you, or really not all about anyone in particular"
Pablo then takes Olivia into the grocery section, straight to the shelves where ground and instant coffee are stocked.
"Why did you take her back here?" Olivia's father asks Pablo about why he took her to the coffee shelf.
"There's another facet to taxation that I believe is important for her to learn. What's taxable and what's not" Pablo defends himself.
"The most important non-taxable items are groceries, motor vehicles and utilities" Olivia's dad adds to this discussion. "Do you think she has gotten better in dealing with sales taxes?"
"Yes, she is getting the hang of it"
Pablo is then handed a $20 bill and promptly puts it in his pocket, while looking for ground coffee to buy for his parents, according to their coffee tastes. And also his quiz bowl teammates on the B-team.
I can consider my gift to Finn given out. Dayton would be better served with powdered protein shakes than coffee though. Yet I don't think protein shakes, chocolates or coffee would be something I feel Audrey should get for Christmas; she helped me ease into this quiz bowl world populated by straight-A students, so I think I should give her something that lasts longer than a bag of coffee (or painkillers as she calls it), or even powdered protein shakes, he pauses to think about what to buy to other people in his life for Christmas with the tutoring money. But what could I possibly give her that doesn't break the bank, or that I could afford to obtain her before Christmas? I get it, people will ask for tutoring more next week or the week after that, however.
And then he spent an entire week's worth of tutoring sessions ($20 per hour being the going rate to get a quiz bowler to tutor younger children in town) to get these seven gifts, six bags of coffee and one canister of powdered protein shakes, as well as gift boxes or bags appropriate for these. Which, upon his return home, he promptly packs these items in, and keeps these in his bedroom.