Today the Pikes pyramid came up in conversation. The lady said, "do you know that the kids are using some new fangled way of doing math that uses numbers in a pyramid?" "It's the latest!" I just smiled. About two weeks ago a lady needed a fast and rough estimate for a job so I grabbed some cardboard from a box to write on, her 9 year old son walked up in total amazement as my fat carpenters pencil was burning lead onto the cardboard with numbers a plenty on it. (long division) He looked at his mom and said, "that man is doing "real" math". He was truly amazed. As I got in my truck I realized I have a calculator on my phone that I could of used, but then again what if I didn't? I got the job.