We prefer the word tatting. 
Hilariously, I work in IT now.
“I maintain the server that runs your SAGE/QuickBooks/ERP/Medical software. I don’t know shit about anything going on INSIDE the software.”
For many years, my brain insisted on parsing your user name as “puzz legal” and not “puzzle gal,” leading me to believe you were a lawyer. 
Lots of info on lots of puzzles
A place to buy hand made wooden puzzles. Sadly, the founder died about a year ago, but his employees have kept the lights on
Fun stuff from Australia
Perhaps the largest publicly available puzzle museum
https://www.spurlock.illinois.edu/exhibits/profiles/fall-to-pieces.html
Makers of some of the best commercial puzzles in the market, especially in metal
https://hanayama-toys.com/
There are some others i might find from my laptop. But here’s a taste.
“Well, I’ll admit that I was being a little uninformed, but you don’t have to take it that emotionally…”
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I was great at math and loved it (numbers are less random than people), but when I got to Advanced Weirdo Math like Calc in college, I rebelled at the impracticality of it.
After I raised my hand and asked the prof what good Advanced Calculus would do us, he replied “Hmmm, I’m not really sure… well, you could always teach Advanced Calculus.”
I took enough physics and engineering to see how practical calculus can be. Abstract linear algebra on the other hand seemed like dark magic to me and I avoided it diligently.
There are lots of uses for calculus. I’ve even used it (rarely) in my job. But it’s not something everyone is going to encounter a use for.
The correct answer is “Yes. In fact, he owes me $20. He said I should see you about it.”
Yeesh. I get that most folks don’t have a direct need for calculus in their daily lives, but someone who teaches calculus should know what it’s good for. Your prof sounds like one of those Ph.D. folks that have spent their entire lives in academia and don’t have a clue about how it applies to the real world.
Advanced calculus allows you to calculate heat flow for a building. You can use it to make sure that your bridge isn’t going to oscillate or shake itself to death under various differing conditions. Calculus allows precise control of various processes through PID loops. PID = Proportional Integral and Differential. The integral of a signal is just its total (the total area under the curve if you graph it). The differential is the rate of change of the signal (the slope of your curve if you graph it). Integrals take care off long term errors in your control system. Differentials allow the system to respond quickly and accurately to sudden changes. The production of beer, steel, plastic, gasoline, pretty much most things relies on calculus and PID control loops.
Let’s say you are pumping a bunch of liquid into a tanker railcar. You don’t own the tanker car, so you can’t put a level meter in it or modify the railcar in any way. So how do you know how much liquid is in the tank? Simple. Put a flow meter on the tube that is feeding the tank and integrate the signal from the flow meter. Integration gives you the total of what flowed through the pipe.
I get that most people don’t need calculus to figure out their grocery lists or things like that, but someone who teaches calculus should have at least some basic understanding of what it is used for.
If you play 3D video games, all of those matrix and vector calculations going on in your graphics card are a direct application of all of that voodoo dark magic stuffs.
As was I, coincidentally. No, I don’t know hand-to-hand combat; I was an electrician. No, I never killed anyone, although I killed a number of circuits.
And probably your fair share of shots of Fernet Branca.too.
I get annoyed at people who can’t wrap their heads around it. My brother occasionally does needlepoint. The projects kept him from going around the bend when he was stuck at home with a bad case of shingles. (Why stuck at home? Because he couldn’t bear to wear a shirt.) I had an older male friend who would knit at the meetings for one of my clubs. Another guy kept making fun of him, which he ignored. After I came to his defense, stating that he was the only person in the meeting who was also being productive, he knit me a scarf.
Depends on what you mean by “Advanced Calculus.” I’ve never personally encountered a class by that name, but it’s my understanding (and Wikipedia backs me up) that there are different things that the term “Advanced Calculus” can refer to, and one of those things is, essentially, Real Analysis: the theoretical underpinnings of real-variable calculus.
Which is interesting to those who find theory interesting, and arguably helpful in understanding what’s going on behind the more applied areas of calculus, but doesn’t have much in the way of direct practical applications.
I took many courses which used progressively advanced calculus. It has many practical uses which I would certainly expect a pure mathematician to know, but I think he was joking. But there are ways of structuring courses to minimize math and largely avoid its use (particularly in business), and plenty of people will never need to apply it nor remember how to do so.
Cool thanks. What I would like to do is buy a little Sterling engine. - Engines
Not to get personal, but do you make better money than average? I have always heard (usually from applied math majors) that actuaries make great money since they are the ones that make/save their companies money.
Yes, actuaries are paid pretty well. I’m underpaid for an actuary, because i was never very financially ambitious. And I’m currently working part time. I make about as much as my husband, who is a full time web developer.
Puzzle gal’s name goes very well with her profession IMHO. She likes puzzles and I would guess that the numbers she works with in her profession are quite a puzzle to assemble.
Please take that as a compliment PG.
Being a mechanic for a living as well as a general handyman had it’s drawbacks. I had no problem refusing strangers but when it came to friends’ part of me actually enjoyed doing it and the other part kind of resented it. For the most part I preferred to keep it a secret.
I can see that. Appreciated, but sometimes enough is enough.
My Wife and I play a lot of chess or cribbage. We have high pressure jobs, and those games allow us to focus on something else. And unwind.
Classic rock, a few beers, chatting and some chess, a perfect night.
Some would consider that boring or that we are some sort of snobs for playing chess. Nothing could be further from the truth, and whatever floats your boat says I.