Two Trains Leave Paris: Number Problems for Word People

By Taylor Frey, Mike Wesolowski, Samuel Evans and Patrick Torres

Entertaining word problems that let verbal types master the language of math!

Math is a universal language, but it’s also the least understood and most undervalued subject taught in school. Two Trains Leave Paris: Number Problems for Word People offers an opportunity to experience math like never before.

You must use the Pythagorean Theorem to figure out how far apart two ex-lovers are when they simultaneously realize that they cannot live without each other. You must use addition (and logic) to explore the ridiculous (and patriarchal!) wage gap. Throughout six math-themed chapters, readers will follow a series of characters as they apply for jobs, fall in love, get abducted by aliens, and experience many of life’s other big and small moments, all of which are dictated by—you guessed it—math!

With the help of humor, mathematical history, and how-to-solve sections, Two Trains Leave Paris asks readers to help its characters find growth in the most unexpected of places: word problems. And the answers are, of course, in the back.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: May 14, 2019
• ISBN: 9781683354956

Book preview

Chapter Zero

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Zero: A number that has sparked an incredible amount of debate around something that literally means nothing. Zero is the absence of a measurable quantity: life before Math, Adam before Eve, Rama Lama before Ding Dong. We can’t directly credit anyone with the invention of Zero, but it can be seen in the archives of ancient societies across the world, from the Maya to the Babylonians. Like dragons. And human sacrifice.

Zero is your safe place. If you leave Zero, you will find problems: math problems, emotional problems, existential problems . . . you name it. Moving away from Zero will complicate things, just like your life got more complicated when you left your mother’s womb. Once you’ve had one, Zero will never be enough, and once you’re at negative one, Zero will always seem like more than it is.

Do you wish to proceed past the mathematical womb that is this chapter? Please think deeply about this. Maybe you’re fine exactly where you are, and don’t need to think about the problems still to come, like Algebra, Geometry, Taxes, and Marriage. Feel free to stay in this chapter for a while, count on your fingers, go for a walk in the park, or sit and meditate on the concept of Zero.

If you do seek to complete the problems that lie within these pages, reading this chapter will give you a few tools to use. Here you will find practice problems that contain only the friendliest forms of Math: Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication, Division, and a few others.

Or just skip this section and start with the hard stuff right away. See if we care that you decided to skip a chapter we spent all this time on because you wanted to be a big shot.

PEMDAS

This shall be your lantern through the darkness. It is the order of operations, which tells you how to simplify a long expression like: 9 ÷ 3 + 2 (5 − 3)³ − 19

No matter how complicated the situation gets, PEMDAS will always be the order of operations.

In some schools, students are taught a trick to remember PEMDAS, something like Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally, which, like most American inventions, was designed to be both convenient and sexist. There goes Aunt Sally again, speaking her mind. Please excuse her. And don’t get too close! The doctor said she has hysteria.

PARENTHESES

That’s these: ( ) or [ ], (4) or [4]

Is the 4 being hugged? Or is it trapped in a little room?

EXPONENTS

Repeated multiplication of a certain amount, such as:

5³ = 5 * 5 * 5 = 125

7⁶ = 7 * 7 * 7 * 7 * 7 * 7 = 117,649

Exponents often result in large numbers,

but they are notated with tiny numbers.

MULTIPLICATION / DIVISION

Listed below are the many different ways to notate multiplication:

3 × 4 or 3 · 4 or 3 * 4 or 3(4)

And division:

8 ÷ 2 or 8/2 or

Why so many symbols, you ask?

Well, a long time ago, some guys didn’t agree, so they just decided to never agree. They’re dead now, but their traditions live on in boardrooms and houses of Congress and Twitter.

ADDITION / SUBTRACTION

These guys: + −

Seen on batteries, pregnancy tests, and our

report cards from high school Math:

Mike: A+

Taylor Marie: D−

YOUR TURN:

Simplify 9 ÷ 3 + 2 (5 − 3)³ − 19

First, do whatever is inside the PARENTHESES . . .

9 ÷ 3 + 2(2)³ − 19

Now the EXPONENT . . .

9 ÷ 3 + 2(8) − 19

Now the MULTIPLICATION and DIVISION . . .

3 + 16 − 19

And finally, the ADDITION and SUBTRACTION.

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That’s the name of this chapter.

Fractions, Decimals, and Percentages

Since people have an insatiable need to compare themselves to other things, these are used all the time. Fractions, decimals, and percentages are all different ways to express parts of a whole.

Example

1 out of 2 can be written as

.5

50%

If they all mean the same thing, why don’t we just use one way to represent it? Great question. Here’s a similar question: Why does Maroon 5 record an entire album when every song is the same? And why were they spending all their change on you at a payphone in 2012? Some questions don’t have answers—it’s best that you accept this early on.

Ready to try?

Go Ahead, Try

#1. Simplify the following expression. Show your work.

1 − 3 (2 − 1)⁷ + 8 ÷ 4

Answer: Did you get Zero again? That’s the name of this chapter.

#2. You have 5 fingers on your left hand, and 5 fingers on your right hand. How many fingers do you have?

Answer: That’s right, 10 fingers.

(By the way, different numbers can add up to the same sum. Let’s say you’ve got 4 fingers on your left hand, and 6 fingers over on your right hand . . .)

Mathematically speaking, these two images are equivalent. Do you agree?

#3. The first thing Taylor Marie ever wanted to be was an astronaut. In first grade, when she got her history book, she ripped out the pages about the moon landing and put them up on her wall. Her book was 475 pages long; she ripped out 6 pages. How many pages are left?

Answer: 475 − 6 = 469

The next day, her teacher asked the class, "What do you want to be when you grow up? Taylor Marie said, An astronaut! The teacher said, Well, an astronaut has to go to school for a long time and be very smart, and most astronauts are men who are good at Math." So Taylor Marie came home with one less dream than she went to school with. Subtraction.

#4. Mike has decided to multiply, and calls his math teacher to tell him he’s expecting his first child. Congratulations! or I’m so sorry, says the math teacher. Did you know that someone in the strange business of quantifying human lives once estimated the cost of raising a child through age 17 to be $233,610? Uh-oh, thinks Mike—the mother just called: She’s expecting triplets. What are Mike’s expected child-rearing expenses?

Answer: 233,610 * 3 = 700,830

More, if the children live beyond 17.

#5. You very much enjoyed ruling over the Kingdom of Targaryan, or whatever it is. You passed some good laws, fed the citizens, and for the most part kept the peace. Now the time has come for you to die and be reborn as a ladybug. Your final days are spent surrounded by your family, who sit by your side, singing songs and passive-aggressively arguing over your will. Hmmmm, seems like everyone wants a piece. In the end, you decide to dissolve your Kingdom of Targaryan, or whatever it is, and let the people govern themselves. The kingdom spans 9,000 acres, and you want to divide the land evenly among 1,500 households. How much land does each household get?

Answer: 9000 ÷ 1500 = 6 acres per household.

Well played—as everybody knows, all great political leaders are skilled in Math. Good work! You may die now.

#6. You took a math test and got 60 answers correct out of 100 total answers. How can you express your score as a percent, decimal, fraction, and person?

Answers:

Percent: 60%

Decimal: .6

Fraction: 60/100 (or or )

Person: act out socially, experience change in appetite, listen to Maroon 5

#7. Simplify the following:

A)

B)

C) Health care

D) Humanity’s relationship to the sun

Answers:

A)

B) 1 or

C) Provide as much health care as possible to as many people as possible at as little cost as possible.

D) It is bigger, stronger, hotter, and brighter than us. Thank you, Sun, thank you every day for not killing us dead.

Alas, your moment has come. You hear a voice saying something like Ma’am, you’re 10 centimeters dilated, it’s time to push. Now