Can't Stop the Questions

Chapter 9: Shopping

Much to the chagrin of VA's basketball fans, the flashes of brilliance displayed in the quarterfinals of the Acadiana Classic prove to be a flash in the pan. The VAs incurred two losses in a row and finish fourth. However, lately, VA's girls' sports tended to perform better than boys' basketball since, while VA's girls' sports are still underfunded, their opponents tend to put less money into girls' sports.

As a quiz bowl practice ends, two weeks after the Acadiana Classic ends, the high school B-squad, now with Caleb playing, gets a briefing for the LQBA Winter Invitational South the following week:

"For the LQBA Winter Invitational South, no one will play all the games. Substitutions will be made as appropriate during or between games" Warren tells the five B-team players.

"On what basis will substitutions be made?" Pablo asks the coach.

"The matchup between opposing teams, as well as your own in-game performance"

We didn't use substitutions for years, with Audrey back into play, Caleb is back down to the B-team. For instance, if an opponent is weak, or weakest if the opponent is globally weak, in arts and literature, Nadine will be benched. But Pablo will be benched if the opponent is strong all-around, Warren keeps to himself when the training session ends.

Then, after the quiz bowl practice, Audrey and Nadine both invite him to do their math homework together.

"So we want to know when the power loss due to friction is the same as that of drag" Nadine then proceeds to ask a question to the other two. "Is mu a variable to solve for?"

"No, Nadine. Mu is held constant, kind of like your slope in a linear equation. On the other hand, drag is proportional to velocity, so we'd have D equal to C times V" Pablo explains to his teammate on the B-team.

"But how do these things relate to the power losses they cause?" a confused Nadine fumes against the lack of information on the problem statement.

"The power loss is simply force times velocity, in which case we can multiply both equations by V" Audrey, drawing upon her knowledge base, answers Nadine.

And then we'd have mu times V equal to C times V squared, Nadine proceeds to write down the rest of her solution, meaning the power loss of each is equal at either 0 or mu/C.

"This reminds me of car trips for some reason" Pablo comments on the solution.

"Speaking of car, I just got started learning to drive" Nadine tells him.

Since none of them are taking physics, they don't suspect that what the problem calls mu is actually weight-dependent, and C is partly a reflection of an object's geometry. And, once the problem ends...

Now that I am known as a quiz bowler across town, the parents of my football teammates in middle school or ninth grade kept asking me to tutor my football teammates, or their younger siblings, if any, and pay me to do so, Pablo is realizing that some of them have a lot of catching up to do in class. Especially if they want to keep playing next year, or play another sport. Natalie and the other regular tutors of the team must have a lot of tutoring requests by now, especially when finals are closing in...

Like, on Friday night, Finn's little sister asks him for help. However, her parents ask him to meet with her not at their home, but at Walmart.

"I wonder why you wanted me to meet with her here" Pablo asks her parents.

"It's about sales taxes. It would be more appropriate for her to learn about sales taxes when shopping than at home" Finn's father answers him before turning to their youngest daughter. "Pablo has arrived to help you about taxation"