Economics 101, A Novel: May 2021

Wednesday, May 5, 2021

Economics 101, a Novel, ch 2, The First Semester: pt 1 -- Talking about Missions

Previous: Letters Home
(Optional) Hexadecimal Time

Now, in the previous chapters, we saw how Bobbie and Karel and Dan and Kristie began to establish their friendship. We see a bit of how close they already felt from the letters they sent home.

And maybe we also got a bit of a sense of how it might have happened that Bobbie and Karel were still not married to each other when they went to the islands for their fieldwork.

So skipping ahead to the island story is probably not going to impede your understanding of the rest of the novel.

Not too much, anyway.

On the other hand, you might find their years at university interesting. It could almost be a separate novel, if a little thin on plot. And you might be interested in what kinds of experiences some young Ehyephoot students might have at a Church operated university.

There's information here. Let's see how it went.

During one of the study sessions during the first fall semester, Kristie started talking about missions. They had been talking about different ways to get teaching experience.

"Does church teaching count for teaching experience?" Kristie asked.

"Of course!" was Dan's reply.

Karel thought more needed to be said. "Well, yeah, it counts as informal experience. So what you learn from the experience can be useful in the classroom and in discussing teaching methods, and you might even refer to it in a job interview, but you can't use it to fill degree requirements. In church, we don't keep the kinds of records that schools and school districts and management can evaluate."

"No grades?" Kristie postulated.

"That would be one of the problems."

"Grades in Sunday School!" Bobbie said with a grin. "That sounds horrible."

All four chuckled, and Karel continued his explanation.

"That's the dichotomy. The value of what we do for God often can't be directly communicated to the institutions in the world around us. That's one of our sacrifices when we engage in church service."

Dan groused, "Valuable to the world ought to be valuable to the institutions in it."

Bobbie nodded in agreement.

"Even missions?" Kristie was thinking out loud. "I've been told it's okay to put our missions on our curriculum vitae."

Dan took a positive view. "We can definitely tell people about what we have done in church. Whether they accept it as meaningful to them or not is up to them."

"Exactly." Karel concurred.

Bobbie was not satisfied with leaving things at that. "We definitely shouldn't hide our missions or our church service. Jesus Himself said, 'Let your light so shine.'"

(Jesus? I could translate it Immanuel, I suppose. Or Joshua. It translates the same:

God is with us.
Or, God is our help, our salvation.

More carefully stated, the universe is not really out to get us, even if it can be dangerous and difficult, and even though some people in it think they are out to get you.)

Karel replied, "I didn't say anything about hiding anything. We just shouldn't expect that teaching Sunday School will fill student teaching requirements or things like that."

"It'd be nice if it did," Kristie said wistfully. She thought for a few moments more.

"Say, Dan, you said you went to the Prosperous Country and Eastern Realms Mission, right?"

(Somewhat comparable in reach and function to the post-WWII Swiss-Austrian mission in our world.)

"Right."

"So you spoke the languages of the Country of the Common People and of the People of the Spear?"

"Y también el idioma del Pais de los Conejos."

"¿Es Verdad?"

"Si, si."

And Dan and Kristie started talking about their missions in the language of the Country of the Conies.

(Permit me to borrow Spanish for effect here. I don't think the language of the Country of the Conies is not one you would recognize.)

Karel complained, "¡Yo no hablo el idioma Conejo!"

Everyone laughed.

"So," Bobbie asked, "Kristie went to the Conejo-Respira mission, but how do you speak Conejo, Dan?"

Prosperous Country? Eastern Realms? Country of the Common People? People of the Spear? Country of the Conies? The Wide Continent?

There are parallels in culture, history, and relative location. Sort of.

These were countries of their Old World, as compared to their UIS, one of the chief among the countries in their New World. The Prosperous Country took a neutral position in most of the fighting during the major wars on the Wide Continent in the pre-modern and modern eras of the Old World. The mission organization where Dan was assigned was one set up after the second such conflict to draw their entire world into the wars ended, and included that country and several countries around it

And I suppose it bears being more explicit -- the name of their Messiah/Christ does translate directly to Jesus, or Joshua/Yeshua: "God is (my/our) help/salvation." And it can even be understood, in the converse, as an assertion that the Parent God is not the enemy of the Children.

"I took some in high school, and the Mission pretty much was called on for all parts of the Wide Continent that didn't have regular Church organizations."

Bobby asked for confirmation -- "So you speak three languages besides ours."

"Yeah."

Kristie said, "I only speak the language of the Conies and the language of the Fishers." She sighed.

Then she asked, "Do you guys still feel like you have a testimony?"

Testimony. Witness. Some people confuse this kind of thing with a testimonial. I suppose there is a similarity.

But this testimony, or witness thing is basically a conviction or a strong belief.

Outside the religious sphere, a testimony might be compared to a mathematician's conviction that the concept of a unit vector has fundamental meaning. Less abstractly (although not a perfect parallel), it's similar to the confidence that we have that one plus one is two -- well, most of the time.

We may not be able to carefully define the contexts in which adding one to one gives two, and we may not properly understand the concept of a non-compressible unit vector, but we know that those contexts are important to us in our day-to-day lives. And we know we can use the concepts of adding and subtracting meaningfully in many places.

Likewise, a testimony is the kind of belief that gives people the confidence to do things under moral conviction, and especially to keep going when things get hard. It's the kind of belief that is expressed in faith and action.

Dan said, "Well, yeah!"

Karel asserted, "I haven't changed my mind, either."

Bobbie thought a moment. "I definitely have a testimony now, but it isn't the same one I had when I was a missionary."

"Oh?" Kristie prompted.

"When I first went out, I wasn't sure the atonement and the redemption would do me any good. I just went to be a nurse where they needed nurses."

"Well, that's a good reason to go." Dan was encouraging.

Karel nodded in agreement. "Important, saving reasons. How did you feel when you returned?"

"I was beginning to believe I had a place in the Gospel and the Church, that I could be saved, too. That's part of the reason I started saving up to work on the PhD."

"So your testimony is stronger now?" asked Kristie.

"I think so. How about you?"

"I'm not sure. I saw a lot of things that I didn't expect when I was a missionary."

Dan guessed at her thoughts. "So, were you disappointed in people who weren't perfect?"

"Yeah. I guess so. I just thought things would be so simple. Some of the elders behaved pretty badly."

Similarly to Mormons, Ehyephoot men who serve as missionaries are called the equivalent of "elders" -- even the young men. And women who serve as missionaries are called "sisters".

It can be a little confusing, since members of the church in general, in the consideration that all members of the human race are part of God's big family, are also called brothers and sisters, no matter what their other callings are.

Men seem to need the formal investiture of authority before they will get up the ambition to do good things. Women don't seem to need that so much. And men seem to have more need to perform set rituals, where women seem more to understand things more intuitively. It seems to be a general rule, although there is wide variation among individuals.

But it's the same metaphysical substance of faith, whether formal or not.

Dan looked down. "I made a few mistakes when I was a missionary." Then he looked up at Kristie. "And after, too. Don't hold it against them. Some of them will have changed their ways, anyway."

And Bobbie and Karel concurred.

Karel said, "I know if I'd had to be perfect, I wouldn't be here now."

"Thanks. I tried not to judge them, but it was hard."

"Hey," said Bobbie. "I find that, when I go to the temple, it's easier to forgive people. I've set a goal to go to the temple at least once a month during school. How about you guys?"

All four thought it was a good idea. None of them had classes the next Friday morning, so they decided to go together then. Several of the other students who were studying with them also decided to join in.

"Hey, I'm still stuck on this question." Chad was one of those other students. We'll introduce him a little better later. "Listening to you guys talk about missions and the temple isn't helping."

Several other students murmured in agreement.

"Sorry," Karel ducked his head, the other three also murmuring apologies.

Kristie leaned over the table to look at Chad's work. "How far have you gotten?"

Chad grimaced. "Well, not very. Not at all. 'Do I see common elements or underlying principles in the education systems practiced on the islands in this group?' What kind of question is that? Most of these have no system at all, but three have inherited systems from the countries that used to claim them as colonies. Different countries, different systems."

Karel and Bobbie exchanged glances.

"Well, I have to admit," Bobbie started, "on first read through the material, that's what I was thinking."

Dan added, "I just wrote something like that down and moved on. Might have more to think about it now, though. What did you come up with , Kristie?"

"From the descriptions we have, I think even where they adapted the former colonial rulers' systems, they adapted things to their own culture." She glanced over at Karel, who just nodded. "Anyone else notice anything special?"

That started a small discussion, and shortly Chad and a couple of other students who had been stuck were scribbling notes and moving ahead.

Table of Contents

Next: Beliefs and Attitudes

You can find the original first draft of the chapter this chapter was extracted from, and various approaches I have tried with it here: https://free-is-not-free.blogspot.com/2016/05/economics-101-novel-ch05-first-semester.html.

Economics 101, a Novel, ch 1 pt 4b -- Hexadecimal Clock Time

Previous: Letters Home

Table of Contents

It's not essential to the story to understand how Xhilr time compares to Earth time -- which is a good thing, because, as I've mentioned, the distances are relativistic, and what with biochemistry differences and such, comparison really isn't meaningful. So this chapter really isn't essential. (You can skip it if you're so inclined.)

But the sixteen-hour, well, sixteen chip, clock ...

I considered sweeping hexadecimal time under the rug along with a lot of other differences that would interfere with the flow of the story. But, well, I'm a geek.

Whether you divide the day into sixteen chippu or twenty-four hours, it doesn't change the thermodynamics -- the flow of consciousness through time. All that changes is where you set the markers and how many you set.

(Hey, there have been experiments in decimal time in recent history on our earth, for what that's worth. Not as popular as the other experiments in decimal metrics, somehow.)

So I could have just translated their hexadecimal time to 24/12 hour time, and it probably wouldn't have interfered too much with telling the story.

But, since I'm such a geek, I thought I should give you some more detail about how a hexadecimal clock translates to a twenty-four hour clock, in addition to the two clocks I keep showing you.

(You should note that the one on the right is not quite the clock Nystrom used as the clock of his tonal numbering system in our world. Close, but not quite.)

First, let's look at a chart of the relationship between days, hours, minutes, and seconds in the familiar 24-hour clock. This is stuff you know, although you usually don't think about it in this kind of detail. The detail isn't really important, it's just here for reference:

24-hour Day	Per-day	Per-hour	Per-minute	Per-second
Seconds	24×60² = 86400	60² = 3600	60	1
Minutes	24×60 = 1440	60	1	1/60
Hours	24	1	1/60	1/3600
Days	1	1/24	1/1440	1/86400

Now let's look at the hexadecimal clock vs. hexadecimal hour, etc. Again, nobody's going to test you on the numbers, they're just here for reference. But you might want to notice that these are all regular fractions in powers of sixteen. You'll also notice that the hexadecimal second is a tiny bit larger fraction of a day than the 24-hour clock second (1/65536 > 1/86400).

(And you might think about whether you'd want to use this kind of clock on Earth.):

16-hour Day	Per-day	Per- long hour	Per- long minute	Per- short minute	Per- hexadecimal second
Seconds	16⁴ = 65536	16³ = 4096	16² = 256	16	1
Short Minutes	16³ = 4096	16² = 256	16	1	1/16
Long Minutes	16² = 256	16	1	1/16	1/256
Long Hours	16	1	1/16	1/256	1/4096
Days	1	1/16	1/256	1/4096	1/65536

Comparing hexadecimal time units to their nearest twenty-four hour day units, we can write the following table of equivalences:

1 long hour (hexadecimal hour) is 90 minutes, or 1 1/2 hours
1 long minute is 5.625 minutes (5 5/8)
1 short minute is about 21.1 seconds (21.09375)
1 hexadecimal second is about 1.3 seconds (1.318359375)

------

If you want to see the actual math, here it is (with reductions and inverse factors for reference):

24 hours == 16 long hours (or 3:2) --
(2/3 lhr/hr)
1 1/2 hr/lhr × 60 min/hr
=> exactly 90 minutes per long hour
1440 minutes == 256 long minutes (or 45:8) --
(8/45 lmin/min)
45/8 min/lmin
=> exactly 5.625 minutes per long minute
1440 minutes == 4096 short minutes (or 45:128) --
(128/45 shmin/min)
45/128 min/shmin × 60 sec/min (45×15=675 => 675/32)
=> exactly 21.09375 seconds per short minute
86400 seconds == 65536 hexadecimal seconds (or 675:512)
(512/675 hexsec/sec)
675/512 sec/hexsec
=> exactly 1.318359375 seconds per hexadecimal second

A convenient aspect of pure hexadecimal time notation is that the fraction point can come anywhere, and the digits don't change:

8.8_hexclock, or 8:80_hex, is a half a hexadecimal hour past noon (12:45:00_24hr),
and 88_sixteen long minutes is 8.8_sixteen hexadecimal hours.
8.1_hexclock, or 8:10_hex, is a long minute past noon (12:05:37.5_24hr),
and 81_sixteen long minutes is 8.1_sixteen hexadecimal hours.
8.08_hexclock, or 8:08_hex, is half a long minute past noon (12:02:48.75_24hr),
and 808_sixteen short minutes is 80.8_sixteen long minutes.
8.01_hexclock, or 8:01_hex, is a short minute past noon (about 12:00:21.1_24hr),
and 801_sixteen short minutes is 8.01_sixteen hexadecimal hours.
8.008_hexclock, or 8:00:80_hex is half a short minute past noon (about 12:00:10.6_24hr).
8.001_hexclock, or 8:00:1_hex, is a hexadecimal second past noon (about 12:00:01.32_24hr).
8.0008_hexclock, or 8:00:08_hex is half a hexadecimal second past noon (about 12:00:00.66_24hr).
Etc.

You may find these factorizations useful in calculating the above:

24=(2³)(3)
60=(2²)(3)(5)
1440=(2⁵)(3²)(5)
(4096=2¹²)
1440:4096
(3²)(5):(2⁷)
45:128
86400=(2⁷)(3³)(5²)
65536=(2¹⁶)
86400:65536
(3³)(5²):(2⁹)
675:512

------

Now, for Bobbie and Karel,

A long hour, one sixteenth of a day, is a chip, the digit before the first delimiter in their equivalent of colon notation --
8: is noon to the long/hexadecimal hour, or to the chip.
A long minute, one sixteenth of a chip, is a gohb, the first digit after the first colon equivalent in their notation --
8:0 is noon, to the long minute, or gohb.
A short minute, one sixteenth of a gohb, is a bun, the second digit after the first colon equivalent --
8:00 is noon, to the short minute, or bun.
A hexadecimal second, one sixteenth of a bun, is a tic. This will be the first digit after the second colon --
8:00:0 is noon, to the hexadecimal second, or tic.
One sixteenth of a tic is a shæn, which is rarely written in non-technical use --
8:00:00 is noon, to the shæn.
One sixteenth of a shæn is ... oh, never mind, that's 1/256 of a hexadecimal second, and it sounds like a swear word in English. We won't need it. Not in this novel. I think.

But remember, a day on Xhilr is not a day on the Earth. Converting 24 hour time to hexadecimal time doesn't convert Earth time to Xhilr time. Nor does converting hexadecimal time to 24 hour time convert Xhilr time to ours.

I did try to calculate it out once using hyperfine transitions, but they apparently found rubidium and caesium too difficult to work with, using other elements for their atomic clocks -- which at once adds uncertainty to the math and raises questions about how meaningful it really is to try to compare time there with time here.

For what it's worth, I got a result of a bit more than 91 earth minutes to a chip. That makes their day a bit more than one percent longer than ours, which is an uncomfortable coincidence, making me even more suspicious of my results.

Even though it looks pretty close, it's light years away.

I have a tool for converting between the hexadecimal clock and the twenty-four hour clock, as long as you keep both measurements on the same planet.

I've written it in several languages, just for fun. I use whichever is convenient. These are all command line tools, just to keep things simple.

*****

The first version was written in the the arbitrary precision Basic Calculator tool, bc, that is part of most Unix and Unix-like OS distributions that include a command line:

----------


/* Q&D bc definitions for converting between hex and 24:60 time. 
** Joel Matthew Rees, May 2021, Amagasaki, Japan
** Copyright claimed, all rights reserved.
** Permission granted to use this source code for personal
** or small-group educational purposes.
*/

define intpart( f ) {
 auto oldscale, part;
 oldscale = scale;
 scale = 0;
 part = f / 1;
 scale = oldscale;
 return part; 
}

/* Keep it functional no matter what ibase is set to: */
k6 = 2 + 2 + 2;
k10 = 2 * 2 * 2 + 2;
k12 = ( 2 + 1 ) * 2 * 2;
k16 = 2 * 2 * 2 * 2;

k24 = 2 * k12;

k60 = k6 * k10;

k256 = k16 * k16;


m60perday = k24 * k60;
m256perday = k16 * k256;


define tohexmin( h, m ) {
 return ( ( h * k60 + m ) * m256perday ) / m60perday; 
}

kto16 = m256perday / m60perday;
kto16epsilon = m60perday/( k10 ^ ( scale - 1 ) )

define tohextime( h, m ) {
 auto hexminutes, hexhours, oldobase, xmino;
 hexminutes = tohexmin( h, m );
 hexhours = intpart( ( hexminutes + kto16epsilon ) / k256 );
 xmino = intpart( hexminutes - hexhours * k256 );
 oldobase = obase;
 obase = k16;
 print hexhours, ":", xmino, "\n";
 obase = oldobase;
 return hexminutes;
}


define to24min( xh, xm ) {
 return ( ( xh * k256 + xm ) * m60perday ) / m256perday 
}
kto24epsilon = m256perday/( k10 ^ ( scale - 1 ) )

kto24 = m60perday / m256perday; 

define to24time( xh, xm ) {
 auto minutes, hours, oldobase, mino;
 minutes = to24min( xh, xm );
 hours = intpart( ( minutes + kto24epsilon ) / k60 );
 mino = intpart( minutes - hours * k60 );
 oldobase = obase;
 obase = k10;
 print hours, ":", mino, "\n";
 obase = oldobase;
 return minutes
}

----------

Start up a bc session in your terminal window, with the library option (for scale):

bc -l

You should get a copyright notice. If it's a gnu bc, you should also get a license notice. After that you get a flashing cursor on a new line. Come back here, select the source and copy it. Go back to the terminal window and paste it in (probably using a right-click context menu). Or you can type it in if you want to focus on understanding the source code.

Then you can use tohextime() and to24time() as in the examples below. It's a little tricky. Making it more user friendly would make the algorithm harder to read in the source.

Note that the input uses a comma, per bc's function call syntax.

Note also that the output is a clock time in the appropriate base, with a colon separator, followed by a fractional time in the current output base.

Watch the use of ibase to switch back and forth between hexadecimal and decimal input, and the use of obase to get the hexadecimal fraction output:

tohextime(8,34)
5:B6
1462.04444444444444444444
ibase=16
to24time(5,B6)
8:33
513.98437500000000000000
ibase=5+5
obase=16
tohextime(8,34.0444444)
5:B6
5B6.2BBDBF6D7BCFDEE31
obase=10
ibase=16
to24time(5,B6.2BBDC)
8:34
514.04444296875000000000

As you can see in this example, even though bc is an arbitrary precision calculator, I have only carried the calculations out to the minutes and short/hexadecimal minutes. So it will sometimes be off one or two in the last column. You can use the fractional output to fudge that, as can also be seen in the example.

(The reason I use "ibase=5+5" to switch back to decimal is not obvious until you consider what "ibase=10" means when ibase is set to 16 -- or anything besides ten.)

*****

The next version I wrote was in Forth, because I have the gforth interpreter installed on my Android phone. It should work with no or minimal modification on a variety of Forth interpreters, including most 16-bit interpreters. It may be necessary to look up your interpreter's version of mixed-precision */MOD and /MOD .

I did this one in integer math, to keep it simpler and make it as portable as possible to other Forth interpreters and OSses:

----------

( Q&D Forth definitions for converting between hex time and 24:60 time. )
( Joel Matthew Rees, May 2021, Amagasaki, Japan )
( Copyright claimed, all rights reserved. )
( Permission granted to use this source code for personal )
( or small-group educational purposes. )

decimal

24 60 * constant m60perday
m60perday 2 / constant halfm60perday
16 256 * constant m256perday
m256perday 2 / constant halfm256perday

: to16min ( hours minutes --- hexminutes )
  swap 60 * + m256perday m60perday */mod 
  swap halfm60perday < 0= if 1+ then ;

( Note output order inverted from input. )
: to16time ( hours minutes --- hexminutes hexhours )
  to16min 256 /mod ;

: to60min ( hexhours hexminutes --- minutes )
  swap 256 * + m60perday m256perday */mod
  swap halfm256perday < 0= if 1+ then ;

( Note output order inverted from input. )
: to24time ( hexhours hexminutes --- minutes hours )
  to60min 60 /mod ;

----------

Again, you'll start up your Forth interpreter, either in a terminal session or as a terminal session. Then you'll select the source from above, copy it, and paste it into the terminal session, probably using the right-click context menu. Or, again, typing it in will give you a chance to familiarize yourself with the source code.

If your interpreter is case-sensitive and requires the built-in words to be upper case, and you don't want to type it in by hand, you can paste the source into a text editor, save it as something like "hextime.fs", and convert the source to upper-case easily with the Unix-like OS command-line tool tr:

tr [a-z] [A-Z] < hextime.fs > hextimeU.fs

Use it as follows, typing the hours or long hours, followed by the minutes, then the conversion function:

8 34 to16time . . 5 182  ok
8 34 to16time hex . . 5 B6  ok
5 B6 to24time decimal . . 8 34  ok
23 59 to16time hex . . F FD  ok
F FD to24time decimal . . 23 59  ok

Rather than directly storing the desired numeric conversion base in BASE, as

16 BASE !

5 5 + BASE !

you can use HEX to switch to hexadecimal base, and DECIMAL to switch to decimal. These are provided in Forth for basically for the same reason you used ibase=5+5 instead of ibase=10 to switch back to decimal in bc.

*****

The third version I wrote was in C, just because I was feeling frisky or something. It can be compiled with any ANSI standard C compiler (not C++), and linked to the standard C library. Apple's clang and the widely available gcc should work just fine.

For some versions of Small C, or for pre-ANSI C, certain modifications may be necessary, you'll probably know which.

I really should have factored it out more carefully, and tried harder to fix the errors in the final digit, but floating point C is just too easy to write like this:

----------

/* A q&d C program for converting between hexadecimal time and 24:60 time:
** Joel Matthew Rees, May 2021, Amagasaki, Japan
** Copyright claimed, all rights reserved.
** Permission granted to use this source code for personal
** or small-group educational purposes.
*/


#include <stdio.h>
#include <stddef.h>
#include <stdlib.h>


int main( int argc, char * argv[] )
{
   if ( argc < 2 
        || ( ( argv[ 1 ][ 0 ] == '-' ) && ( argv[ 1 ][ 1 ] == '?' ) ) )
   {
      printf( "usage: %s { <24hr-time> | -x <hextime> }\n", argv[ 0 ] );
      return EXIT_SUCCESS;
   }
   else if ( argv[ 1 ][ 0 ] == '-' && argv[ 1 ][ 1 ] == 'x' )
   { /* from hex time to 24 hour time */
      double dayfrac = 0.0;
      double minutes = 0.0;
      long time = 0;
      char * parse = NULL;

      if ( argc > 2 )
      {
         time = strtol( argv[ 2 ], &parse, 16 );
         if ( parse > argv[ 2 ] && * parse == ':' )
         {
            char * parse2 = NULL;

            dayfrac += time / 16.0;
            time = strtol( ++parse, &parse2, 16 );
            if ( parse2 > parse )
            {
               dayfrac += time / ( 16.0 * 256.0 );
            }
         }
      }
      dayfrac *= 24.0;
      time = (long) ( dayfrac + 1.0 / 120.0 );
      dayfrac -= time;
      minutes = dayfrac * 60.0;
      printf( "%ld:%02ld\n", time, (long) ( minutes + 0.5 ) );
      printf( "minutes: %g\n", minutes );
   }
   else 
   {
      double dayfrac = 0.0;
      double xminutes = 0.0;
      long time = 0;
      char * parse = NULL;

      if ( argc > 1 )
      {
         time = strtol( argv[ 1 ], &parse, 10 );
         if ( parse > argv[ 1 ] && * parse == ':' )
         {
            char * parse2 = NULL;

            dayfrac += time / 24.0;
            time = strtol( ++parse, &parse2, 10 );
            if ( parse2 > parse )
            {
               dayfrac += time / ( 24.0 * 60.0 );
            }
         }
      }
      dayfrac *= 16.0;
      time = (long) ( dayfrac + 1.0 / 512.0 );
      dayfrac -= time;
      xminutes = dayfrac * 256.0;
      printf( "%lX:%02lX\n", time, (long) ( xminutes + 0.5 ) );
      printf( "hexadecimal minutes (decimal): %g\n", xminutes );
   }
}

----------

Select the source and copy it, paste it into a text editor, save it as something like "hextime.c", and compile it with something like

$ cc -Wall -o hextime hextime.c

I parse the time from the command-line parameters, so use the colon in the clock time parameter when calling the program.

Use the -x option to convert from hexadecimal time to 24 hour time:

$ ./hextime 8:34
5:B6
hexadecimal minutes (decimal): 182.044
$ ./hextime -x 5:B6
8:34
minutes: 33.9844
$ ./hextime 17:00
B:55
hexadecimal minutes (decimal): 85.3333
$ ./hextime -x B:55
17:00
minutes: -0.117188
$ ./hextime 23:59
F:FD
hexadecimal minutes (decimal): 253.156
$ ./hextime -x F:FD
23:59
minutes: 58.9453

*****

Okay, here's a C program using integer math, just because I could. Some people say I waste my time, but it helps me gain confidence that the programs here are more-or-less correct.

Structurally, the calculations follow the Forth code, while the argument parsing follows the floating point C version.

It may also help you follow the formulae being used. If so, it was doubly worth it:

----------

/* A q&d C program for converting between hexadecimal time and 24:60 time
** using integer math:
** Joel Matthew Rees, May 2021, Amagasaki, Japan
** Copyright claimed, all rights reserved.
** Permission granted to use this source code for personal
** or small-group educational purposes.
*/


#include <stdio.h>
#include <stddef.h>
#include <stdlib.h>


#define M60perDAY 	( 24 * 60 )
#define HalfM60perDAY 	( M60perDAY / 2 )
#define M256perDAY	( 16 * 256 )
#define HalfM256perDAY	( M256perDAY / 2 )


long tohexminutes( long hours, long minutes )
{
   long dminutes = hours * 60 + minutes;
   long minprod = dminutes * M256perDAY;
   long xminutes = minprod / M60perDAY;
   long remainder = minprod % M60perDAY;
   if ( remainder >= HalfM60perDAY )
   {
      ++xminutes;
   }
   return xminutes;
}


long to60minutes( int xhours, int xminutes )
{
   long dminutes = xhours * 256 + xminutes;
   long minprod = dminutes * M60perDAY;
   long minutes = minprod / M256perDAY;
   long remainder = minprod % M256perDAY;
   if ( remainder >= HalfM256perDAY )
   {
      ++minutes;
   }
   return minutes;
}


int main( int argc, char * argv[] )
{
   if ( argc < 2 
        || ( ( argv[ 1 ][ 0 ] == '-' ) && ( argv[ 1 ][ 1 ] == '?' ) ) )
   {
      printf( "usage: %s { <24hr-time> | -x <hextime> }\n", argv[ 0 ] );
      return EXIT_SUCCESS;
   }
   else if ( argv[ 1 ][ 0 ] == '-' && argv[ 1 ][ 1 ] == 'x' )
   { /* from hex time to 24 hour time */
      long xhours = 0;
      long xminutes = 0;
      char * parse = NULL;
      long hours = 0;
      long minutes = 0;

      if ( argc > 2 )
      {
         xhours = strtol( argv[ 2 ], &parse, 16 );
         if ( parse > argv[ 2 ] && * parse == ':' )
         {
            char * parse2 = NULL;

            xminutes = strtol( ++parse, &parse2, 16 );
         }
      }
      minutes = to60minutes( xhours, xminutes );
      hours = minutes / 60;
      minutes %= 60;
      printf( "%ld:%02ld\n", hours, minutes );
   }
   else 
   {
      long hours = 0;
      long minutes = 0;
      char * parse = NULL;
      long xhours = 0;
      long xminutes = 0;

      if ( argc > 1 )
      {
         hours = strtol( argv[ 1 ], &parse, 10 );
         if ( parse > argv[ 1 ] && * parse == ':' )
         {
            char * parse2 = NULL;

            minutes = strtol( ++parse, &parse2, 10 );
         }
      }
      xminutes = tohexminutes( hours, minutes );
      xhours = xminutes / 256;
      xminutes %= 256;
      printf( "%lX:%02lX\n", xhours, xminutes );
   }
}

-----------

To use it, copy and paste it into a text editor document, save, compile, and run it in a similar fashion as the floating point C version, above.

*****

I have not thoroughly tested all the above, but they are accurate enough for my use in this story. If I needed accuracy to the seconds, it would be fairly straightforward to extend the accuracy that far on modern hardware, but would require implementing full 32-bit math on older 16-bit Forth interpreters. (Modern is 64-bit, but 32-bit Forths would have no problem.)

This is a service chapter -- a freebie.

We now return you to the story.

Table of Contents

Next: Talking about Missions

You can find more discussion of hexadecimal math in my Math and English blog, here: https://math-and-english.blogspot.com/2018/03/games-with-time-units.html.

Economics 101, a Novel, ch 1 pt 4a -- Letters Home

Previous: Going by Four

Table of Contents

Dear Mom,

(Dad, too, of course.)

I'm getting settled in, got my schedule arranged, getting started with classes.

The part time job at the hospital is going to work out okay, at least for this semester. I've told them I can't let it interfere with studies, and they seem to understand, as much as management can. The bank is set up okay, there's a decent store within walking distance, and I've got room in my money and time budgets for a little socializing.

I told you about my roommate Kristie already. She's going to be a good friend, just as I thought she would be. She's in my education topics class.

The rest of my roommates are okay, too. I can understand them, and they seem to understand me okay, so far.

The guy I met eight months ago in the department office is in a couple of my classes, including the education topics class. His name is Karel Pratt. You'll remember, Mom, from the newspaper article you showed me.

He's a bit of a klutz, but not as much a klutz as he seems at first. And he's sweet. It looks like knows how to take care of his responsibilities.

He has a friend, Dan Claymount, who is also a really nice guy. A bit more socially forward. They were teammates on the football squad here about five years ago. Both of them are pretty decent looking. And Dan's in the education topics class, too. All four of us in that class. Fun stuff, huh?

Kristie, Dan, Karel, and I have signed up for a ballroom dance class together. Can you believe it? Me, in a ballroom class? The four of us will be studying together, a lot.

Dad, don't read what follows. Only Mom. It's girl stuff. (I know you'll read it anyway, but I take no responsibility for anything you misunderstand by it.)

I'm a little bit confused. I like both Dan and Karel. A lot. Kristie does, too. (Read between the lines.) I'm just going to have to trust God on this one, I guess.

Love to both of you, and to Rick and Gary, too. I guess they can read this, too, even though I'm sure they'll tease me about it. (Guys?)

Bobs

**********

Mother, Father,

I'm really excited about classes. It is all coming together quite nicely.

I know you wanted me to do the Master's degree closer to home, and I know you're worried about me finding good companionship among these Ehyephoottu, now that I'm an older student. I don't think there's anything to worry about. I've made three special friends who don't care at all about my social standing, at church or anywhere, and we will be studying together. I'm sure I will be able to rely on them if I get into trouble, either with school or with my social life.

Roberta is my roommate. She's a bit older, but she's steady. She is a nurse, and a student of dance. She's doing PhD work in anthropology. She has also been what the Church calls a service missionary -- not just a missionary like I was, she spent three years in an island country, teaching about health, hygiene, as well as about Jesus, and being a nurse where they needed more nurses. She's teaching me a lot.

Daniel is a football player. He's just a little older than I. He was on the team here five years ago, and he played professionally after college. But he's a good Ehyephoot boy, no drinking, no womanizing, responsible about his money. And he cares about people.

I will admit, he didn't particularly hide his appreciation of my looks when we met, but he no longer makes an issue of it. He really knows how to behave himself like a gentleman. He is as much of a gentleman as any of the men you have arranged for me to meet in the past, far more than some.

Karel is a bit of a riddle. He's about five years older than I am, about the same age as Roberta. He is also a former football player. Daniel and he were teammates, and they have remained friends.

I met Karel once, a long time ago. Maybe you remember me mentioning him, Mother? He stepped in when a group of boys were misbehaving towards me.

He's a little socially backwards, but he is no less a gentleman than Daniel, and no less solid, even more responsible than Daniel.

I have met my professors and arranged to meet with them regularly to discuss my academic progress. The department head has agreed to report to you, should I fall behind in my classes, per your requests.

I have full confidence you will be pleased with my work in the graduate program here.

Your faithful daughter,

Kristine

**********

Hey, guys, it's me!

I'm here safely. Karel is on campus, for some reason, but we are hanging out together. And some. Blame it on Karel, but we've met the two most wonderful women in the world. Besides Mom and Shel and Debs, of course. We're studying together and taking a ballroom dance class together and, just maybe, Karel has met someone as cool as you, Sheliah. Maybe me, too. I'll keep you posted.

love you guys,

Dan

PS -- They're names are Bobbie and Kristie. They both dance. I do mean dance. And they are beautiful, as well as cool, but more important, they understand the Gospel.

**********

Hi.

Just letting you all know that the semester has had a good start.

Not much to report, except that Dan and I have made friends with two of the nicest women I've ever met. Bobbie, Roberta, that is, is in the pre-PhD track in anthropology with me, also working in island culture, coincidentally. The professors are encouraging us to work together. Kristine, who goes by Kristie, is her roommate, working on a Master's in education like Dan.

They are both returned missionaries, and we seem to be able to talk about the doctrines of the Gospel with them.

We have some classes together, and have arranged to study together. Not to mention taking a ballroom dance class together.

Maybe too much to report.

The car is running fine, Dad. I don't yet have any place to tear it down, but, the way it's running, I won't need to.

The dorm laundry and cafeteria are just fine, too, Mom.

No engineering classes, Dad.

The dorm phone number is (elided).

Dad, the next time I see you, I want a father's blessing. I'm may be facing some wonderful choices that I'll want God to help me with.

Love you all,
K

Table of Contents

Optional: Hexadecimal Time
Next: Talking about Missions

You can find the original first draft of this chapter and various approaches I have tried with it here: https://free-is-not-free.blogspot.com/2016/05/economics-101-novel-ch04-going-by-four-letters-home.html.

Economics 101, a Novel, ch 1 pt 4 -- Going by Four

xPrevious: Bobbie and Karel Meet

Table of Contents

Opening social? I'm out of my depth, here. I have always avoided social events as if they were the plague. Give me a dance, where I can just ride the rhythm of the music -- or a football game, where the focus is out on the field and I can go with the flow of the game.

Oh, well. None of the characters in this story am I, and all of the characters am I. Thank you for your forebearence.

"Suddenly I'm thinking the apartment off campus was not such a great idea," Dan grumbled as he and Karel left the Education Building.

"Why is that?"

"Re you Henny Tannah. No. What's that island saying?"

(Is it okay if I have Dan and Karel borrow a bit of Japanese for this, since you wouldn't know the language they are referencing, to understand Dan's confusion?)

"I'm not recognizing anything here."

"Yo-yo Bennie Hannah. No, that's not it, either."

"Sounds a little disparaging of an island language."

"You know I don't mean it that way. Closest I can remember. It's hard to remember a proverb in a language you don't know."

"You know more languages than I do."

"The languages I know are all related to each other. But, what happened back there -- the two best-looking girls in the whole lecture, and there they are sitting either side of you."

"Sheer coincidence."

"And when you found the holes in the other teams' defense on the football field, that was sheer coincidence, too."

"I still don't really understand how I could dig those holes in the defense."

"Drove the coaches up a wall. We'd be running our plays like clockwork. At first we'd be doing great. Then their defense would get to reading our plays, and we'd be stymied. And coach would send you in.

"After a couple of turnovers, you'd be out there, totally out of position, looking like you had forgotten the playbook, or just wandered onto the field from the stands, and suddenly there'd be nobody around you. And when I looked at the right time so I could get the ball to you, you'd take it and go for what we needed. A couple of times with that, and their defense would be focused on you, the coaches could send some new plays in for us, and we'd be off and running again."

"I still think it had something to do with me being in my own world a lot. I had different goals than most of the players. But that never explained much."

"That's exactly what the coaches said. And it was why the team waived you after our second year of pro together."

"They didn't know what to do with me."

"They were scared of what they couldn't control."

"Maybe. But what does this have to do with reasons for me to end up seemingly with a flower in either hand? That was what you were trying to say, wasn't it?"

"Yah. What's the phrase again?"

"Ryō-te ni hana."

(「両手に花。」 if it were Japanese. We don't have a font to show the language of the Children of Peace, but a rough Latinization might be "sheo-wan be pil".)

"Yeah. That one. Re-oh-teh nee Hannah. Uhm. So, ... what does it have to do with ...? Well, ... uhhmm ... you weren't doing what everyone else was doing?"

"I guess. Maybe."

"Okay, so I and all the other guys are looking to get a date. And get married. And you are not."

"I figure it's more interesting to find out a little about a woman before I take her out on a date. I think that's why some women feel comfortable around me."

"So all I have to do is quit trying to get a date?"

"I don't think it's quite that simple. The minute I ask a woman to go out, she usually runs away."

"And that's why you still aren't married."

"I guess."

"And we've had this conversation before."

"True. I've gotta get to my next class."

"Okay, C:40 in the university president's garden, right?"

(C:40 in hexadecimal time would be about 6:20 PM on the 12/24 hour clock we use.)

"Seems a bit early to me, but that's what they said, and we agreed."

"Right. 'Later."

"Yeah, later."

*****

Kristie stood in front of the full-length hall mirror, lifting her hair for a look, then letting it down for another.

"Do you think the guys find me attractive, Bobbie?" she asked.

"Hunh? What?" Bobbie was sitting on the floor in their bedroom, checking her textbooks against her syllabi.

"I always worry about whether the guys find me attractive."

Bobbie leaned sideways and looked through the doorway at Kristie's back. "So you did just ask me that."

"Yes, ..."

Bobbie got to her feet and walked into the living room, to stand behind Kristie at the mirror. She put her hands on her shoulders. "Kristine Person, ..." Then she examined Kristie's hair and her face in the mirror, shaping her hair and lifting it in various styles, letting Kristie look at the effect.

"For the opening social, huh?"

"Yeah."

"... you know that's not the right question. What do you think of this?"

Kristie shook her head. "No that's not me. Too exotic. Well, the Sunday School teachers always said we shouldn't worry too much, but how are we supposed to find a husband if we don't make ourselves attractive?"

"Okay, picking a wrong question to answer first, yes, the guys find you attractive. But which guys? How's this?"

Kristie's face clouded. "That's not fair, asking which guy. No, I'd feel off balance with my hair up that high."

"I didn't say which guy, I said which guys. As in, I would bet Karel and Dan will both find you quite attractive enough, even without you doing your hair up, or even using makeup. How's a tight bun, like this?"

"That's nice of you to say. Maybe, but not today. It'd take too long to do it right."

"I don't think you should worry about guys who don't find you attractive. They don't really matter to you. Have you ever bobbed your hair?" Bobbie cupped her hands under Kristie's hair and lifted it close to her ears.

"Don't matter? Really? Don't you worry about it? I mean, sure, you're the kind of girl just about any guy would find attractive. Yes, I have, but that's so, what? like a tom-boy. I bobbed it in high school."

Bobbie smoothed Kristie's hair and took her by the shoulders and turned her around to face her. "So are you. Half the guys on campus would kill to get a date with you, and the other half would die for you. And these two guys, Dan and Karel, are a bit more grown up, I think. They will behave themselves courteously, instead of any of that."

Kristie looked perplexed.

Bobbie thought for a moment.

"I wonder, though, have you never wished certain guys wouldn't find you attractive?"

"You mean, guys who try to push themselves on you?"

"Uh, huh."

"Yes, I guess I have." Kristie's face clouded again, in mixed emotions.

"Once," she continued, "when I was a freshman, I was walking alone on a road off-campus, and a bunch of creeps came up behind me in a car and started whistling and howling and stuff. They tried to get me in the car with them."

"Oooh. That's horrible."

Then her frown cleared. "But then this really cool guy came along and told them, 'Get out of here!'. And they did. He walked me the rest of the way to campus to make sure I got to my class okay."

"Wow!"

"I didn't find out who he was until later."

"You didn't ask his name?"

"I was a freshman. He was an upper-classman. I was too awestruck, I guess."

"But you did find out who he was?"

"It was Karel Pratt."

"Oh." Bobbie's face, peculiarly, did not register any emotion.

"When I found out who he was, I started going to all the football games to see him. That's how I got interested in football."

"So, you've had a crush on Karel for a while?"

"I've been in love with him for six years! I was disappointed today that he had forgotten me, but here he is in the same class with me! You won't take him away from me, will you?"

Bobbie blinked. She thought for a moment, and said, "Six years to think you're in love with someone you don't really know is a long time -- long enough to develop a lot of wrong ideas about him. He might not be your white knight after all, ..."

"I went on a mission partly because I heard he thought it was okay for women to go if they wanted to teach people about Jesus."

Something inside Bobbie was invisibly crumbling. She'd known various kinds of disappointment before, and, somehow, she had been almost expecting disappointment this time, too. But she could see facing this kind of internal conflict was not going to be easy. The dreams she had been almost thinking she might be ready to permit herself might have to be postponed again.

The nurse inside took over. "Well, like I say. Don't worry about your looks. The guys that are important will like you anyway. At least, that's what my mom says."

Mary Whitmer had not always said such things. But she said such things now, and it was more important for Kristie to hear the conclusion than to hear the history of how Bobbie and her mother had come to it.

"In that case, I think I'll just be lazy and go with my hair down."

"Good idea. I think I'll do the same. It's getting about time to go, anyway. The point is, real love takes time to negotiate. There's lots to learn about each other."

"I think I can do that."

*****

Karel was a little early. He had a class until B:C0 (about 5:30 - 5:40 PM), so he skipped dinner and walked down to the president's residence, arriving before C:00 (six o'clock). Being among the first to arrive, he got drafted to help. He found himself at the front sidewalk, passing out mimeographed copies of the ice-breaker scavenger hunt instructions when Bobbie and Kristie arrived.

"Karel! Are you on the committee?" Kristie asked.

"Nah, I got here too early and got drafted."

"How long are you going to be doing that?"

"I guess until I run out of these or someone relieves me.

Bobbie had a suggestion: "Well, let us help you."

So Karel shared his stack of instructions with Kristie and Bobbie.

Kristie had another suggestion: "We can do one of these as a group, ask people questions as they come in. I'll write the answers down."

Dan joined them a few minutes later, and the four of them passed out the scavenger hunt instructions, demonstrating the game by asking faculty and other students the questions on the form as they arrived.

After about a half a chip, they had gone through several of the forms as a group, and a couple of committee members came to thank them for helping get the festivities going, and relieved them.

Since they had already finished the scavenger hunt, they just wandered around together, talking with each other and talking with the professors and other students, and eating some of the refreshments -- you know, doing the basic social activity stuff that we used to call networking.

At one point, Karel got involved in a mock debate the Young Democrats and the Young Republicans were having, joining on the side of the Democrats. Bobbie joined with the Republicans. Dan and Kristie stood by and listened, laughing when someone said something humorous, and trying not to look bored when the discussion heated up.

(Democrats, Republicans. You'll have to give me a break on this one, too. The party I'm translating as Democrat focused on consensus, liberality, and social responsibility, and the party I'm translating as Republican focused on public and individual choice and responsibility, and conservative use of public funds. Or, at least, their party platforms proclaimed such things, with a fair range of actual interpretation among party members.

Mimju-pa and Gyaudai-pa.

Since parties tend to swap ideologies a bit, maybe it would be better to call them liberals and conservatives. But, no that really wouldn't fit.)

After about a half a chip, when the debate was clearly heading for a third time around in a circle, Karel and Bobbie decided they'd had enough and took their leave. Before they left, all four had been invited to join in the campus political organizations.

About D:C0 (about 8:35 PM), Karel said, "Well, I don't know about you guys, but I'm hungry."

"Is it your treat, Karel?" Dan joked.

"Now, Dan, there's no call for that!" Bobbie chided with a laugh. "We'll go double Dutch."

Dan corrected, "Quadruple Dutch? Anyway, I know a burger shop below campus that makes a decent cheeseburger for a pair of dimes."

Kristie said, "My friends would just say 'Dutch'. But if we're going to eat someplace, buying our own is fine by me."

(Okay, Dutch, etc., is a rather loose, culturally insensitve translation. Sorry. It was the best I could come up with. Cultural sensitivity was still of a fledgling movement on Xhilr, too.)

Karel said, "I was thinking about the cafeteria in the student union. Since I'm living on campus, I can get a discount and Dan and I could split the bill. But hamburgers sounds good to me, too, if everyone's okay with that. I think it'd be a shorter walk all around."

And that's what they did, talking about classes and university life, and a little about future plans, while they walked to the hamburger shop.

(Hamburgers. Ground meat with vegetables and garnish between buns of bread.

Aren't you curious about what they ordered? No?

Yes, you are.)

"What c'n we do ya for?"

(The owner was running the grill and taking orders that evening. He was originally from a state much like Texas, and the theme of the shop would have reminded you of Texan, and the service would have reminded you of Texan. Rough dress. Drawl. Much deliberate playing with grammar. Gotta make life interesting.)

(Texas. I tell you, if you went down there, you'd call the place Texas. Big land, big egos, cowboys, twangy music, ....)

Dan said, "Women first."

Kristie asked Bobbie, "What are you going to get?"

"I'll have just a single hamburger, with onions, lettuce, and tomatoes."

(Onions must be universal in water/carbohydrate biosystems. Lettuce? Leafy vegetables, of course. Maybe it was closer to mustard green than lettuce in flavor. Not that their tongues worked quite the same as ours.

Tomatoes? Color doesn't matter so much, but the structure size, and consistency of the fruit would be similar. Taste? Well, closer to tomato than grape or strawberry, anyway.)

"What'll ya have to drink?"

"Just water, please."

"How about you, Miss?"

Kristie said, "Same for me, but with a lemon soda."

(Lemon? Citrus-y fruit more sour than sweet. Soda -- well, yes, fizzy water.)

"And the boys?"

Karel said, "I'll have a cheeseburger, with lettuce, tomato, and mayonnaise. And a cherry cola."

(Cheese -- milk cheese from mammalian cattle. Closer to cow than goat. Mayonnaise? Yes, vinegar and egg of domesticated, uhm, I'm not sure but that's closer to a reptile than a chicken, but then chickens are pretty close to reptiles anyway. Cherry? Closer to cherry than to plum or apple. Cola? Punted on that bean. But it was a bean.)

And Dan said, "I'll have a cheeseburger, too, with pickles and ketchup. And water."

(Pickled fruit similar to a cucumber. Ketchup -- of course.)

"All together?"

Karel said, "Yes."

And Bobbie said, "Separate checks, please."

But Dan insisted, "The guys are treating. Karel and I'll split the tab later."

And Kristie said, "It's okay, Bobbie, isn't it?"

And Bobbie laughingly gave in. "Sure. Just this once."

And the conversation continued while they ate and while they walked back to the girls' apartment.

After Dan and Karel said goodnight, Kristie and Bobbie went inside.

"So, did anybody get any lip?" their roommate Wendy asked from where she was studying at the table.

Kristie replied. "We just met them today."

And Bobbie said, "Give us a break."

"So it was boring." Wendy was insistent.

Bobbie said, slightly pedantically, "These socials are for meeting the professors and other grad students. It's not supposed to be especially exciting or romantic or whatever."

"You're just jealous, Wendy, leave it alone," said Jennifer from where she was sitting surrounded by her books on the living room floor. "You guys can give us a play-by-play when Wendy isn't around."

"No, really," Kristie responded, "we just socialized with everybody. We didn't plan on this being romantic. If it goes that way, it goes that way. If it doesn't, you know, it's nice to have friends."

Joy, who was curled up on the sofa reading a romance novel, complained, "You two are just too cool to believe."

Michelle, in the kitchen, asked, "So which of you is angling for which of them?"

And Bobbie said, "To be honest, I'm not sure right now which one I'd rather start taking an interest in, if I do. I'm just going to go with the flow."

After a few more tries, the roommates gave in and let it alone for the night.

After lights were out and personal prayers said, Kristie whispered from across their room. "Bobbie?"

"Mmm? Yeah?"

"Thanks."

"One step at a time, Kristie. I'm not yielding the field, just trying to make sure everyone has a fair chance. Karel and Dan are both pretty decent guys."

"They are. Anyway, thanks."

"Sure. And thank you, too. It was fun."

What each said in their own prayers is their own business, but I'll note that all four of them mentioned gratitude for new friends in their prayers.

Bobbie's last thought before she went to sleep was, "Maybe not so hard, after all."

*****

On Wednesday, Bobbie and Karel ended up in the same section of the undergraduate level course in island culture.

"Hello again, stranger!"

"Oh! Hi, Bobbie. Should we sit where we can compare notes?"

"That'd be okay. It's a shame Kristie and Dan won't be taking this class."

Karel laughed. "Maybe that'd be a bit too much together. Are we taking more of the same classes?"

"Let me see your schedule."

"Let's sit down so I can get it out."

"How about over there on the right, at the front?"

Having sat down, they laid their schedules out to compare them.

"So," Karel said, "we'll be in the same section of the experimental lab in traditional and primitive technologies."

"That'll be a fun class."

(More then just fun, that course would be a lifesaver for them.)

"That looks like all for this semester."

The professor came in about then and introduced himself.

"We'll be covering about ten differing island regions," he said. "Many of them have had fairly advanced cultures during their histories, and there is quite a lot of material to cover. We won't be able to cover it all in class, so you should plan on a lot of homework, and also plan on forming or joining study groups."

After the lecture, Bobbie and Karel talked about when they could meet in the library to study together, and several other students came over to ask if they could put together a study group.

Tuesday and Thursday evenings seemed to work best.

(Wednesday. Tuesday. Thursday. Sunday is named for their sun and Moonsday for their two moons. The rest are not directly translatable, so I'm just using the names of our weekdays.

They do have a seven-day week, historically derived from the lunar month of their closer moon rather than that of their farther moon.

No, two moons is not a stable configuration. But their orbits are stable enough at the time of this story to have allowed civilization to develop, and to not yet pose a near-term direct threat.)

*****

The four of them were together again for the interdepartmental education class again on Thursday. After the class, they discussed studying.

Karel explained, "Bobbie and I are thinking we'll get together in the library with some of the other anthropology students."

And Bobbie added, "We thought we could do the same for this class.

"When are you getting together?" asked Kristie.

Bobbie answered, "We're thinking of Tuesday and Thursday evenings, at least, for now."

"I could probably do that," Dan said.

"Me, too," said Kristie. "What time and where?"

Karel said, "Tonight, after I finish eating dinner at the dorm cafeteria, I'll run up to the library's first floor study area. We can meet there, and then we'll figure out where to stake out a study area."

"So, between C:40 and C:A0, tonight?" Dan asked.

(Between about 6:20 and 6:50 PM.)

"And see where it goes from there," replied Karel. "I need to get to my next class."

"Which way are you going?" asked Kristie.

"Science building."

"I'm going the same direction."

"Let's walk together."

"How about you?" Dan asked Bobbie.

"I'm going to study at the library for about an hour. Are you going that way?"

"Yeah. I don't have a class now, and I probably should park my books somewhere and figure out what I need to study."

Karel suggested, "You guys can scout us out some tables, maybe?"

That was agreeable, and they left together, separately.

*****

About E:60 (a little after 10:30) that evening, the four of them walked back to the womens' apartment together, discussing theories and philosophies of great philosophers of their world whose works were similar to those of Plato and Locke as they went, with Karel tossing in ideas from modern mathematicians whose works were similar to that of our Von Neumann and Turing, just to keep the discussion lively.

Bobbie was unimpressed. "Quit dragging engineering stuff in."

"But this is about machines that think and learn."

Dan sided with Bobbie. "That's science fiction."

And Kristie defended Karel. "Maybe for now, but science fiction seems to predict the future a lot."

"It's not the technology. It's the math."

Even Kristie didn't know what to say to that.

At the apartment, as Dan and Karel were about to leave, Dan asked, "Does anyone besides me like to dance?"

And Bobbie replied, "Does a duck swim?"

"Dancing's fun," Kristie admitted.

"You know about me," Karel laughed.

"Heh. Can't drag you off the dance floor sometimes." Dan laughed, too, before explaining, "Our stake is having a back-to-school dance on Friday night. Should we all go together?"

(Borrowing a term from the similar organizational structure in Mormondom, a stake for them comprises several smaller congregations of the Church, roughly a thousand to two thousand members in all. Comparable, I understand, to a diocese. In this case, most of the members of the stake are students. Of course, not all of the students in their stake would attend the dance. Why stake? Look in Isaiah in our Bible. Something about the stakes of the tents. There's a similar scripture in their Holy Book.)

"Sounds like fun," Bobbie said, and everyone agreed.

But, as they waved goodbye to Dan and Karel, Kristie whispered, "Bobbie, who is going to dance with whom?"

Bobbie turned to her and smiled and said, "I think we'll just have fun with whoever is handy at the moment."

*****

And that's how it worked out.

As they were walking to the dance, Karel suggested that they should not be exclusive, and they danced with many of the others who had come, as well as with each other. At one point, when everyone was dancing a dance similar to the Charleston and they were a dancing as a foursome, Kristie and Bobbie both got a little winded and sat out at the side of the gym, leaving Dan and Karel to carry on as a twosome.

Bobbie seemed to be interested more in the faster songs where they could do formation dances as a group of four or join with some of the others in larger formations. She tended to sit out the slow dances, unless she could talk her partner into dancing ballroom.

Karel danced almost every song, and took turns with both Bobbie and Kristie, as well as with others. When he could sweet-talk his partner of the moment into dancing ballroom, he would.

Dan and Kristie just had fun, dancing with everybody and sometimes sitting out to talk. And sometimes when Karel and Kristie were busy dancing, Dan and Bobbie would sit out the dance together, talking.

About F:60 (a little after eleven), Bobbie announced, "I've got work tomorrow, so I'm going to turn into a pumpkin early. (Well, she made reference to an old fairy tale in which a magically disguised princess had to return from a dance before midnight or face unmasking. Yeah, hollow, fleshy gourd for a coach. Where did the seeds go?)

And Kristie said, "I should probably turn in a little early, too, so I can work on my homework tomorrow."

So Karel and Dan walked them back to their apartment under the light of the hinter and nether moons.

While they were walking, Dan said, "You know, they have ballroom dance classes here."

Karel said, "Sounds like a suggestion. We could join a class together."

Kristie concurred. "I think that would be fun."

And Bobbie concurred as well. "I'd like that. Let's do it."

------

The next Moonsday, the four of them were in line together at the registration desk, to add one more class, ballroom dance.

Hmm. Japanese, Kanji? Texans, Democrats, Republicans? Dimes?

Close enough, I guess.

Plato, Locke, Von Neumann, Turing?

You would recognize them better by the philosophies they espoused than by their names, of course. I do hope you'll forgive the references.

Hexadecimal time -- Let's look at those clocks again, labeled according to our modern convention for hexadecimal, 0 - 9, A - F:

Table of Contents

Next: Letters Home

You can find the original first draft of this chapter and various approaches I have tried with it here: https://free-is-not-free.blogspot.com/2016/05/economics-101-novel-ch04-going-by-four.html.

Monday, May 3, 2021

Economics 101, a Novel, ch 1 pt 3 -- Introducing Karel to Bobbie, And Vice Versa

Previous: Introducing Karel

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So, how did Karel and Bobbie end up making each others' acquaintance?

A few days before classes began, Bobbie was seated in Doctor MacVittie's office discussing her preliminary plans for her doctoral thesis.

"Your plans call for spending some time observing and interviewing islanders on-location."

"That's right."

"We'll have to look carefully at arranging the fieldwork. I'm not sure we can promise anything. We may have to ask you to adjust those plans."

Bobbie sighed before responding. "I'll cross that bridge when I get to it, I guess."

"Would you be interested in working with another student who is planning his thesis in a similar area?"

Her face became a mask. "His?"

"Uh, yes. His planned thesis is in island economics. We're thinking you would find quite a bit that you could cooperate on."

"You're not trying to set me up with this guy, are you?"

"We don't play games like that with students' lives."

Bobbie was not looking convinced.

"We haven't talked with him about it yet. We thought I could suggest it to you, and only mention it to him if you agreed."

"May I ask his name?"

"Karel Pratt. He--"

"He was a football player here about five years ago."

"You know him?"

"No."

"Football is another of your interests?"

"Football is applied choreography, so, yes. But my mother showed me a newspaper article about him a month or so ago. It seems that football players with advanced degrees are a rarity."

"He has a bachelor's in physics and a master's in engineering, played football as a walk-on player."

"So he has a wide range of interests, too." Bobbie hesitated, and did not verbally complete her thought.

"I didn't say a wide range of interests was a bad thing, I just wanted you to understand you'd need to focus. And you satisfied me that you understood that.""

"Did you ask him about his focus?"

"I understand Doctor White, his supervising professor, did."

Bobbie looked down and rubbed her temple.

Doctor MacVittie pressed ahead, carefully. "Uhm, you could meet in my office and talk about it, if you'd feel more comfortable."

She looked back up, dropping her hands in her lap. "I'd rather not meet him where he knows he has to behave himself. If he's interested, he can contact me, and we can work out whether we'll work together from there."

"So it's okay if we mention this to him?"

"Oh, sure, I guess." Her expression did not suggest she was comfortable with the idea.

"Doctor White will be busy on the first day of classes, so he'll be talking with me then, and I'll suggest it."

*****

After visiting with Doctor MacVittie on the first day of classes, Karel went to his first class, a graduate-level cross-discipline survey of education theories and topics.

As he entered the lecture room, he looked for a seat at the front. PhD candidates were expected to show leadership, and he rightly assumed that the professors who would approve his thesis and candidacy would not perceive sitting in the back as showing leadership.

Whether the supervising professors would be right in such perception is a separate topic of consideration, which we shall set aside.

As he moved to the front, he greeted some of the students. Choosing a seat slightly to the left of center, he laughed silently to himself at the spurious, but accurate, potential political interpretation of his spur-of-the-moment choice of seat.

Shortly, a petite, very pretty blonde came up and excused herself.

"Is this seat taken?"

If you called her a blonde bombshell, not many people would have disagreed. (For the record, she, herself, would have been one of those who disagreed. Politely, but firmly.)

"No, no," Karel shook his head and then nodded with a smile. "Go ahead."

"I'm Kristie Person, by the way," she said as she sat down. "I'm in the Master's program in education."

"Hi. Karel Pratt. Pre-Phd, Anthropology. So this course is in your primary field?"

"Yes. I'm coming in from a bachelor's in PE, so my professors advised me to take the survey class."

"I see."

"Karel, so nice to see you here."

Karel turned at the sound of Dan's voice behind him. He noticed Kristie's brow crease ever so slightly.

"Dan, you made it." The two men slapped hands.

"Well, introduce me to your friend!" Dan said as he sat down on the other side of Kristie.

"I just met her myself. Kristine Pierson. Right?"

Kristie looked a bit non-plussed. "Sort of. My name is Kristine, but everyone calls me Kristie. And Person and Pierson are sort of the same name in Sweden."

(Uhm, "Sweden", yes. No? You will indulge me in this, won't you? The country she named would be somewhat similar, up in the northern parts of their old world, lots of snow and reindeer and northern lights. And the names .... Okay, not Sweden, but a country strikingly similar to Sweden.)

Karel grinned sheepishly. "Sorry about that."

"You'll have to forgive my friend. He can be a little clumsy sometimes. Dan Claymount. Karel and I used to play football together. He was much less clumsy on the football field."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence." Karel chuckled.

"Oh, that's right. I remember. Dan, you were our quarterback five years ago, and Karel, you were the running back who made all the big plays."

"He sure was." Dan concurred.

"No, I wasn't. Coach saved me to mix things up when we got stuck. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't."

"You're just being modest. I watched a lot of your games. Dan was a good quarterback, too, but you were good on the field."

Karel ducked his head. "So you're a fan of the school's football program, I take it?"

"Yes! Football is one of my favorite sports!"

One of the professors stood up to greet the students.

"Welcome, to this year's graduate survey in education topics. I'm Doctor Donival. Please check your schedules to be sure you are in the right place." And she proceeded to explain the syllabus and the planned assignments.

And all of the students in the room busied themselves taking notes.

After about ten minutes, Doctor Donival shifted from the course outline to the material for first lecture.

After another ten minutes, Karel became aware that the seat to his left was now occupied, and he looked over and nodded to the woman sitting there, then turned back to the blackboard, forgetting for a moment to breath. Mentally shaking himself, he deliberately returned his focus to the lecture.

At the end of the lecture, Karel turned again to his left. "I have notes from the first twenty minutes, if you'd like to copy them," he offered, opening to the first page in his notebook.

"Thanks. That would be nice," she said, and started copying.

We missed her reaction when she sat down by Karel, but when she read Karel's name on the notebook, we suppose she would have been thinking to herself something like, "Of course."

"You could copy my notes back at the apartment, Bobbie," Kristie was helpful.

"You two are roommates?" Dan asked.

"Yes, actually. If you don't have time, Karel, ...," Bobbie lifted her pencil. If you had watched closely, you might have noticed a flash of surprise at how easy it was to use his name, which surprise she quickly covered.

"No problem. Get it while it's fresh." Karel was being careful not to watch her too closely.

"Well, are you going to introduce me, Karel?" Dan prompted.

"Oh. Bobbie Whitmer, meet Dan Claymount. He and I were on the football team about five years ago. Should I tell her what you are doing your masters work in, Dan?" Karel was anything but surprised at how pleasant it felt to say her name.

"Underwater basketweaving," Dan replied.

Bobbie looked up from her copying, amused. "Sports education, with a coaching emphasis."

"How did you know?"

"Read your mind." She smirked. "Karel's mind is not as transparent."

"I see." Dan clearly did not see.

For him, being so unsure of his position was a rare thing, both on the football field and off, and he was rising to the challenge. "Say, is anyone going to the opening social tonight?"

"Maybe we can make it a foursome?" Kristie was also rising to the challenge.

What Bobbie and Karel were thinking at this point would be hard to say. For separate reasons, they had learned to go with the flow in social situations, waiting for opening gambits to play out before deciding which way to move.

"Sounds good. What do you think, Bobbie?"

"Why not?"

Visiting this campus, you might be reminded of Brigham Young University. But it isn't, of course. It's an Ehyephoot institution. You will notice some differences.

Maybe we could call it Eunice Clark Young University. But that would be the school at which Bobbie took her degree in nursing.

Orson Pratt University? No. That wouldn't be it. Let's call it Orson Hyde University.

Table of Contents

Next: Going By Four

You can find the original first draft of this chapter and various approaches I have tried with it here: https://free-is-not-free.blogspot.com/2016/05/economics-101-novel-ch03-introducing.html.

Economics 101, a Novel, ch 1 pt 2 -- Introducing Karel

Previous: Introducing Bobbie

Table of Contents

We've met Bobbie for real now, and seen a little of Kristie.

Does it go without saying that I'm borrowing from this world to give rough translations for the names?

Well, before I introduce Karel and Dan properly, I also need to tell you, time on their world is measured a little differently from time on ours. Am I stating the obvious? I do that too much. I suppose you don't want all the details, but so far I've been using a rough translation of the time units as well.

Karel turned the ignition off and sat for a minute outside Dan's house. He needed a little rest.

The door of the house opened and Dan stuck his head out the door. "Hey, Karel, how the heck are you?"

"Not bad for just finishing a five hour drive. How about you? Got your stuff?"

(Five hour drive. He actually said "three and a half chip drive", since you need to know.)

"Yeah, I got my stuff, but come on in and say hi to the family. My little sister's dyin' to see you again."

Two voices chorused, almost in unison, from inside the house, "Dan!"

"Your little sister ignores me whenever I come any more."

Dan ducked back in and came outside, carrying a small briefcase. "Unless you give her a ride on your shoulders.

The door opened again behind Dan, and a fifteen year-old girl came running out and slapped her big brother up side-of-the-head. Dan just ducked and grinned.

Karel climbed out of the car, glad for the excuse to unbend, and walked around and gave the girl a hug. "My, you've grown, Sheliah. Wanna piggy-back ride?"

"Mom says I'm getting too old."

"Ah well. Are you still gonna marry me when you turn twenty?"

(Twenty. They actually use hexadecimal numbers, for what it's worth. Gives a different sense to "teen-age", even I don't coin the word "hex-age". And 20_ten just doesn't read like 14_sixteen. But I'll stick to decimal here. For now.)

"Mom says you have to find someone your own age before then."

"Darn. She's probably right about that, too, though."

"Where are you gonna find someone as cool as me?"

"That's a tall order. But I'll let you know when I do."

Karel went in and said hi to the Claymount family, then he and Dan got in the car and headed out of town.

"I don't know whether I'm better friends with you or your family sometimes."

"Yeah. Too busy to keep up with each other. Sure is too bad the team waived you after your second year."

"Football can't last forever."

"Which is why I let you talk me into checking out grad school with you, right?"

And they caught each other up on personal news as they went, until Dan dozed off.

Dan had promised to drive at least half of the way from his town to the university. But Karel knew he would be tired, and would probably not be able to wake up enough to drive when it was his turn. So they had left early enough that they could stop and get some sleep at a rest area on the way.

*****

(We used to stop to sleep at rest stops in the middle of the night, like that. But we can't any more. Too many problems with criminal activities going on in the middle of the night. So the highway patrol has to wake you up and tell you to move on.

But back then, in the UIS mid-west, too, it was standard operating procedure for students traveling the long distances between home and college, especially for male students. Not so much for female students traveling alone, of course.

Football. You'll allow me to continue with the substitution? It was a game with rules close to American Football in our world, anyway.)

*****

Not quite a chip after sunrise, Karel parked the car in a school parking lot and reached over to wake Dan up.

"Hey, we're here," he said, shaking his shoulder.

They had caught a bit more than three chippu of sleep at a rest stop east of the mountains, but, even with that, Dan was still not feeling safe behind the wheel. So Karel had driven the rest of the way in.

"Oh, man. Sorry I couldn't wake up."

"That's okay. You can drive on the road back."

"Has it been five years?"

"Five for you. Since I finished up my master's during the off-season while we were playing pro, it's only been a couple for me."

"Yeah. So, I'm going to the PE department to look at a graduate degree in sports education while you check out the anthropology department, right?"

"That's the plan."

"And you'll come down to the PE department to look at studying dance as another option, right?"

"Right. So we'll meet down there and then go get some lunch."

------

And that is how it was that Karel was sitting in the anthropology department offices, tired from the long drive, trying to read application form instructions, when Bobbie came in that morning. And why he wasn't there when she came back.

He did get an appointment to talk with a member of the anthropology faculty heading down to the PE building,.

------

"Hey, Karel, what's wrong?"

"Oh, nothing."

"You look like you just lost a friend."

"Just kicking myself for not trying to get a girl's phone number."

"That happens."

"Didn't even introduce myself. I only said something stupid like 'Nice day.'"

"Heh. Hey, don't sweat it. If it was meant to be, you'll get another chance."

"You should talk."

"True. Girls just don't understand us boys. Did you get an interview?"

"Got an appointment for the afternoon."

"Me, too. Are you going to come in and ask about the dance program or what?"

In the dance office, one of the professors was available to talk, but she was not encouraging.

"We just don't have the expertise to help you with teaching dance to football players, and, frankly, I think the football body would not train well in dance. Getting the turnout would be nearly impossible."

"I know it would be pioneering, but I'm willing to put in the effort."

"I really hate to be so discouraging, but I can't promise that any of the faculty here would be willing to put in the effort to help you. We're up to our necks in our standard curricula, anyway." (We'll forgive this professor for not being a little more forward-looking.)

Karel must not have hidden his disappointment well.

She continued, "Look, you have another option you're considering, right?"

"Yeah. Anthropology."

"Maybe that's going to be a stretch for you, too, but I think it will be less of a stretch."

On his way out of the office, he noticed a poster on the wall.

"What's this?"

"Oh, that's from several years back. A master's candidate at," and she named the school Karel remembered Bobbie saying she'd gotten her master's from, "who came to give us some workshops in modern dance here. It was very exciting. I keep the poster as a reminder."

"Roberta Whitmer," Karel read absently.

"Do you know her?"

"Know her? Can't say that I do."

After that, Karel and Dan went up to the school cafeteria, showed their alumni cards, and bought lunch. While they were eating, they talked about the morning.

"I can't believe she just basically turned me down flat."

"You've got to quit letting women walk all over you like that." Dan grinned between bites. "On the other hand, maybe that girl you didn't really meet this morning is part of your destiny."

Now, for whatever reason, Karel had not mentioned anything further about Bobbie, not even about seeing the poster.

"Destiny. Maybe. Well, let's go to our interviews."

Karel's interview was with a Doctor White. When Karel gave him his CV to look at, he scanned it, muttering, "mission, football, instrumentation technician, military, engineering, semiconductors, ... . Lots of experience. But I don't see an obvious connection. Why do you suddenly want to get a PhD in Anthropology?"

"When I was a missionary in," and he named the same mission that Bobbie had named, "I thought the islanders I worked among had an intuitive understanding of the cultural basis of economics and management. At that semiconductor company where I worked, I watched managers who seemed to have no interest in things cultural tear the company apart with bad management and worse economics. I think their lack of interest in the human factor was the proximate cause of their bad management, much more than the technology."

"I see. So, what do you intend to research?"

"I want to learn how to describe the human factors and develop some useful economic models companies can operate under, that take them into account."

"Okay, that sounds like something we can work from."

So Karel also had to explain his groundwork for coming in from outside the major, just as Bobbie did.

Of course, he had different holes to fill. Where he would just monitor the senior-level research methodology class, he would have to actually take the anthropologist's introduction to medicine and physiology, and so forth.

He also committed to correspond with Doctor White for further advice as he prepared to begin coursework in the fall, and Doctor White promised to shepherd his application through the processes.

When Karel and Dan left later that afternoon, they both had the necessary forms and had made the necessary contacts.

Dan drove on the way back, and they arrived at his home around midnight. Karel crashed in Dan's room for three and a half chippu before driving home in the morning.

On the way home from Dan's house, he complained a bit to God:

"Why didn't I try harder to strike up a conversation?"

It didn't feel natural, did it?

"If I were smooth like Dan, I could have gotten her phone number, I'm sure. Why can't I be smooth like him?"

Dan said it himself, he's not particularly successful at getting married yet, either.

Karel didn't have a quick response to that. But, ultimately, he said, "Well, Father, like Dan said, if it's something that should happen for me, I'd sure like another chance to make her acquaintance."

He could have described the response he felt as a galactic "Hmmmm."

------

Dan picked up some publicity work for their former team, and Karel picked up some consulting work, mostly for his father's company, and both Dan and Karel spent a lot of the time over the next eight months preparing to go back to school.

They made another trip about a month after their first trip, to hand-deliver their applications, because it was a little close to the deadline.

Karel wanted to live on campus, and Dan wanted to live off campus, so after they submitted their applications, they each spent part of the day separately arranging for housing and checking out possible work opportunities.

I explained a little about what a "mission" is, at the end of last chapter. I forgot to mention there that a missionary's field of labor is also called a "mission" in Ehyephoot parlance.

There are two parallel organizations within the Church. One is focused on the members, and one is focused on the missionary work.

In the latter organization, a "mission" is both a physical area, and the organization within which the missionaries assigned there work. It's similar to the church I attend, where, at this time, Japan, is divided into seven or eight areas called missions, and the Philippines is divided into twenty or so. Each of these missions had around fifty to a hundred fifty missionaries working in it (in our world, also, up until the Corona virus pseudo-pandemic.)

When Karel served his mission, there were not nearly as many missions in existence. A few years later, when Bobbie was serving hers, some of the missions had been divided, so there were a few more. Even though it was the same mission, it was a smaller area when Bobbie served.

(Which mission they served in, well, I don't want to dig into Xhilr geography. Not just yet.)

About time, before I strain my back in interpolation -- there are sixteen chippu to a day -- 10_sixteen.

If we were to travel to Xhilr, we would experience their day as approximately the same length as an Earth day. But, of course their days aren't exactly the same length as ours. That kind of equivalence would require constant intervention over distances so vast the comparisons wouldn't be meaningful. Whether they are longer or shorter, and by how much, doesn't really matter.

Midnight is zero or 10_sixteen. If the days were exactly the same length, there would be exactly ninety earth minutes to the chip:

(Just for the record, I once calculated it as ninety-one and a fraction minutes to the actual chip, but, as I say, the calculations become meaningless at the distances and velocity differentials involved. Because of the different paths the planets are traveling, I'm not sure the calculations I made then still hold, if I even got them right in the first place.)

Table of Contents

Next: Bobbie Meets Karel

You can find the original first draft of this chapter and various approaches I have tried with it here: https://free-is-not-free.blogspot.com/2016/05/economics-101-novel-ch02-introducing.html.