Moonlighting agony uncle Professor Dirichlet answers your personal problems. Want the prof’s help? Send your problems to deardirichlet@chalkdustmagazine.com.
Dear Dirichlet,
Boy, am I in a world of woes! In the coming months, I have to go into surgery six times for a whole host of illnesses. To its credit, the hospital has allowed me to arrange my own schedule. In your doctoral opinion, which procedures should I undergo first?
— Under the weather, Cambridge
Dirichlet says:
Bypass, Intestinal, Dental, Myotomy, Appendectomy, Septoplasty: the usual order of operations. If you’re in the US, insurers will insist on Pacemakers, Excision, Myotomy and then D, A, S, which is unfortunate as you don’t need the first two things doing. Remember, only genius will get this right, and American healthcare is a disaster anyway.
Dear Dirichlet,
I’ve decided to get the family active. No more lounging around in our pyjamas after 9am, watching Super Mario Maker streams on Twitch! I’m starting by getting the children to bike around the neighbourhood after breakfast. The youngest is 3 months old, and I’m struggling to find something appropriately sized. Know any good retailers?
— Luigi, Dallas
Dirichlet says:
No need to go shopping, just bring in the Floyd–Warshall algorithm. Simply use it on all pairs of vertices $(u,v)$ and then find the pair that minimises $\operatorname{dist}(u,v)+\operatorname{dist}(v,u)$. Since this represents a path from $u$ to $v$ and then back to $u$, that will find you the smallest cycle.
I notice you’ve included a donation of $3 in your letter and a lot of letter ‘R’s. Thanks for the continued support. Appreciate it.
Dear Dirichlet,
I need to paint large letters on the side of my science communication-themed narrow boat — “Yes! It’s LAVA!” etc. I’m finding getting the spacing right between the characters a bit tricky though. The pairs “Ye” and “VA” are particularly difficult. Do you know any guides which can help?
— Times New Showman, Edgbaston
Dirichlet says:
I, too, have enjoyed many hours idling through the beautiful canals of Birmingham on a barge with my badgers. With regard to your lettering, you may just find it easier to use a computerised typesetting system. Attract millions of pounds of funding and media interest by taking something we’ve been doing for years and renaming it ‘machine kerning’.
Dear Dirichlet,
I work in a timber firm and I’m pretty sure a colleague is stealing my logging equipment. Chainsaws, planes, flannel shirt… They’ve been disappearing all year but it’s been worse since April. I tried to catch the thief recently by hiding just out of range, but I missed them by a whisker. Have you heard of such a thing before? I know it sounds like a conspiracy.
— Lumber Jack, The Box
Dirichlet says:
What you have there, Jack, is a devious toolbox plot. You say you noticed it starting after the first quartile of the year? Of course you did, but fret not, by the end of the third quartile, everything will quieten down.
I’m sorry to hear your story but I will repeat what I’ve been telling my students forever: label your axes.
Dear Dirichlet,
How many Platonic liquids are there?
— Sofia, Bulgaria
Dirichlet says:
Two.
Heed Professor Dirichlet’s previous advice:
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