11 November 2010

Eleven Eleven

I could talk about the historic armistice of 1918, of course. Eleventh day of the eleventh month, at the eleventh hour, wasn't it? In a detached car from the Orient Express, if I remember correctly.

Or I could go slightly sideways and discuss the sheer fun of Bilbo Baggins's "eleventy-first" birthday party (yes, I realize I'm missing one "1", but oh well).

I'd rather talk about my dorm room during my second year of college. Its number? You guessed it - 1111. In fact, I picked it for its number, as it didn't have much else to recommend it. In shape, an irregular pentagon that was very difficult to arrange furniture in if you wanted to have floor space. In size, well, you might be able to swing a cat in it, but only if it were a small and quite complacent cat. There were four of these rooms on each level of the tower in our dorm; not-so-affectionately called "wedge rooms", they were generally inhabited by sophomores (as were all four of them on the 11th floor). They absolutely sucked for having friends come and visit, as there wasn't enough space on the floor for anyone taller than about 3'9" to stretch out, and if you just wanted to hang out or do a group project of some sort, forget it - definitely had to shift to the lounge.

Yeah, okay, pretty boring. A room is a room, after all. So just for the heck of it I Googled "1111". Let me tell you, there is some seriously weird hooey out there. People babbling about angels hanging around when you notice the clock reads 11:11, for example - now, there's some delusional folks for you, sure enough. These so-called "mysterious" appearances of the number - hate to tell you guys, but *whispers* they happen twice a day. More if your clock is broken so it never leaves 11:11 in the first place.

How about looking at the number as its own entity? Factors, those are pretty cool - 1, 11, 101, 1111... I'm getting the strange urge to switch to binary at this point, anyone else? It's next year that it'll be super-important though, when 11/11/11 fits the bill. I'll bet there are already tons of weddings booked for that date.

As for me, I'll certainly keep my eyes peeled for anything odd around 11 o'clock today - just because I don't believe in something special doesn't mean it might not happen anyway...

8 comments:

Unknown said...

Wow, never thought of 1111 in that way. Thanks for giving me a new perspective on what seems to be an extraordinary number.

Mary@GigglesandGuns said...

This is sure a different way to approach the day. You've planted a thought and now I'll be watching around that time. :)

CA Heaven said...

Yes, that's what we learnt in school; 11/11 at 11pm ... and not even confused by the way Americans swap day and month >:)

Cold As Heaven

Jen said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jen said...

I'm visiting from Rayna's "Coffee Rings" blog and I'm very glad I stopped by :)

Numbers are interesting things, aren't they? I've read a bunch of "mysterious" stuff associated with different numbers. Who knows?
I missed the first "1111" today but I'll try and be extra observant for the second :)

Cheers!
Jen

Hart Johnson said...

Yeah, I'm having binary impulses, too... If my calculations are right, 1111 is 15, which is how old my daughter is, so I'm expecting DRAMA! Then again, when one has a 15 year old, drama is more the norm than the exception.

Fun way to go here, Leanne!

ViolaNut said...

*dies* Wow... I don't even remember writing half of this post. And I haven't had a drink in weeks.

Chary - I still like square numbers best... but this one is symmetrical, so it's cool. ;-)

Mary - if anything woo-woo happens, let me know, 'kay?

CaH - due to having French class first thing in the morning two years straight, this is one American who follows the day/month/year format. So no worries on my end. :-)

Jen - she does some great stuff, huh? Stop by here often, most of the others make more sense than I do. ;-)

Tami - seriously, I don't remember writing half of this. I was typing at about 1 AM, then I woke up an hour or so later, and blogger was being turdy, and I couldn't save, and, errrm... this is what you got. *shrug* I'll do better next week...

Sue said...

Thanks for a new perspective.

Something did happen here at 11:11. I was in the supermarket and there was an announcement requesting everyone to stop what they were doing to observe a minute of silence. That was really special, but definitely no angels, and nothing supernatural.

But weddings next year? Really? Gosh.