Shannon Larratt is Zentastic

I made this application in order to write some printer routines (I’ve never needed to create software that printed anything directly before, let alone doing things like print previews), but it’s also a pretty useful program for teachers or homeschoolers for printing math — addition — worksheets. You can tweak the settings to allow for any difficulty level, and it automatically arranges everything in an optimal pattern for your printer, assuming I’ve done everything right.

Download it here: zenmath-add.exe (just run it)

Nefarious helped me debug it, by doing a few sheets of math with an eye for finding errors, and she found a mistake in the sheet below in the way that hints were given for carry digits. That’s been fixed in the download link above.

Feedback on bugs is appreciated, when it’s all debugged I’ll give it a permanent link, because I really do think it’s useful. As always I’m happy to share the source code and will post the final version when the time comes.

Other than that, Caitlin got me some wheatberries and soaked them for me, so I’ve been making delicious salads out of them which I find easy to eat… I’m still having some trouble with nausea and while it’s good that I’ve lost forty or so pounds (not that anyone can tell because having a big beard masks the weight you carry in your face I think), it’s also not so good. I dropped Nefarious off at a friend’s house today and her mother asked me, “how are you feeling”, and you know, I get that the question comes from a kind place but I wish people would never ask that. I don’t like having to lie and say “oh, fine, thank you,” or whatever nicety the social contract demands — it’s not as if I can say “fucking awful, do you mind hitting me on the head with that axe over there so the pain will stop?” But anyway, yummy wheatberry salad, made with said grain, along with cranberries, walnuts, green onion, shredded carrot and radish, a mix of all sorts of beans, lemon, chutney, and various other things. So delicious.

I also whipped out my limited sewing skills (last used to sew clothes in high school) and repaired “Big Dog”. Nefarious thought he was looking a bit thin, so she cut him open to add some more stuffing, but didn’t really get as far in her planning as how she’d close him back up. She has a giant bag of thread/thin rope of different colours, so she found some that matched his fur and I closed the wound. He has a bit of a scar from the surgery, but no longer has a scary hole in his neck.

Plus I gave him a tattoo.

And finally, other than that, a little advice…