Doing the math

Well, the plumber did turn up yesterday and he managed to get water coming out of the taps, but it was a temporary solution. As I suspected (and feared), the pump is fried. He’s coming back today to install a new one.

This is not Scotty, the wonderful plumber we had for years, who kept coming out for me long after he’d officially retired and who, when the well pump needed replacing a few years ago, found me a secondhand one, so the job cost $200 instead of $1000. Sadly (and not just because he helped me out so often – he was a lovely, lovely man), he passed away last year.

So, I’ll be paying full whack for the replacement pump. Minimum, the plumber told me, of about $550. That, of course, does not include labour yesterday and again today, nor does it include taxes. (Nobody ever tells you what anything is going to cost including taxes in this country.) So, I’m ball parking $700, which is $50 more than the amount I’ve managed to tuck away towards the property taxes at the end of June. And it could be more. Sigh. Well, needs must. At least I got to have a shower in my own home last night for the first time in a week and a half.

Speaking of property taxes, the assessment arrived in the post a little while ago. All I noticed was the assessed value of $510,000, which I assumed was an increase and meant I’d be paying even more in taxes this year.

It also made me wonder what the percentage increase was since we bought the house in 1996 for just over $80,000. Once upon a time I would have been able to remember the formula for calculating this, but the other night it escaped me. Rounding it to just over 80 and just over 500, was it 80 divided by 500? Or 80 times 510? Or…? Thought I had it. First time I tried I came up with 400%, which I knew was wrong. Had another go and came up with 625%. Decided to check with my friend Ray who used to teach math. He replied that he hadn’t had his coffee yet, but he was pretty sure it was: 

(500-80)/80*100 = (420/80)*100 = 5.25*100 = 525. 

Jesus wept. What does the asterisk even mean? No wonder maths did my head in. 

He also said his wife Lesley, who’s no slouch with numbers herself, thought it was something else. Wrote back to say I’d started with 400, then had another go and came up with 625, which turned out to be Lesley’s calculation. A brief moment of surprised vindication, followed by the certainty that Ray had to be right – even if, for the life of me, I could not figure out how his formula worked. Over at Chez Ray there was a determination to establish who was right. A little while later I got a text saying, “Lesley’s math professor brother says 525%! Yay!” 

Just now, when I grabbed the property assessment notice to confirm the $510k figure, I noticed for the first time that, oh, the assessed value has actually gone down by 5% since last year, when it was $536k, which was 13% more than 2022, when the value (and the taxes required) insanely increased by 52%. Which is a good thing, because I’d been assuming the property tax was going to increase again this year. So, even though the money I’d set aside is going to be wiped out (and probably more) by the new pump and I’m starting from scratch, I can probably just about manage to pay the bill without going into the mortgage line of credit. Phew.

Oh, and back to maths for a second. A mutual friend posted this on Facebook the yesterday. Sorry, I know the link’s no use to you if you’re not on Facebook, but have a watch if you are. Good summary of what I felt about the approach taken by most of the maths teachers I ever had. 

Flagged Ray in the comments to ask if this sounded about right. He replied saying yes, pretty much, although this had always been his approach.

It even looks like him.