Last Tuesday, I was looking through several old books that my mother was considering donating to the library for their book sale. I had already selected several interesting books to keep when my dad held up one old dusty blue book and told me that it was definitely a book that I needed to have. The title of the book was College Algebra.

Algebra and I have a mutual agreement which we forged upon my graduating from college. Algebra would discontinue molesting my mind if I would never again open an algebra book. Unfortunately, I broke that agreement when my dad presented me with that book, and my curiosity caused me to open the book which was written in 1938. Little did I realize that the old algebra book would eventually have its revenge for my breaking the agreement.

As I looked through that old algebra book, I related to my parents a recent incident that I had encountered with algebra. A few weeks ago, I was confronted with the following question from a student who was asking me for help: "Old McDonald raises ducks and cows. The animals have a total of 32 heads and 72 feet. How many ducks and how many cows does Mr. McDonald have?" I told the student that the obvious solution to the question would be to visit Mr. McDonald’s farm and count the cows and ducks or send Mr. McDonald an email and ask him.

The old dusty algebra book also reminded me of an incident that occurred last year in my science class. First, I’ll have to admit that, for various reasons, I actually keep an algebra book in my classroom. One day a student asked me what was inside a locker that I keep chemicals locked up in. I replied that there were things in the locker which were hazardous to students. After a short pause, the student asked me why I didn’t have the algebra book locked in the locker. Without hesitation, I emphatically replied, "Excellent idea!" I then locked the algebra book in the locker.