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Matthew Conroy

@matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy
56 followers 4 following 449 posts

I'm a mathematics teaching professor in Seattle. I'll be teaching Intro to Proofs in the coming year. I spend a lot of time making sound and visual art, often […] 🌉 bridged from ⁂ mathstodon.xyz/@matthewconroy, follow @ap.brid.gy to interact

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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 30/09/2026
Crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows crows.
A view looking upward at a building under construction.  Along the top is a wooden rail with many crows.  The building is covered in a bright yellow material.  One crows is in flight.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 30/09/2026
Found a house for sale on my walk home today. Asking $1.5 million for the house, and yet they can't get their brochures printed correctly...
A two-sided flyer for a house for sale showing four images of the house.  One image is overlaid with text. The text reads:
ERROR: ioerror
OFFENDING COMMAND: image
STACK:
-dictionary-
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 21/09/2026
I felt like riding down to the waterfront today.
Handmade panoramish photo of part of Seattle's waterfront, with Puget Sound on the left and lots of railroad tracks on the right.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 18/09/2026
Took a few pictures today.
A leaf on the ground.  It is dry and cracked in many places.A leaf on the ground.  It is dried and cracked in many places.A close up of a wooden fence, showing a bent, rusty nail and faded bits of lichen.Blue/purple hydrangea flowers, close up.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 16/09/2026
I wanted some kraft paper to wrap some artwork. The artwork is more than 3'x3', and I found 4' wide paper that I thought would do the trick. Without thinking too deeply, I bought 600' of it. Turns out, the roll weighs about 50 pounds, not super easy to manage […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
A 4' long roll of paper suspended using a broom handle and three books on each end.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 12/09/2026
This is one of my favorite things I've ever made. I made it in 2000 as a member of the video art group Paul Harvey Oswald. This video was for the On The Waterfront festival in Rockford, Illinois. The audio sample is from a fantastic LP I have that was created […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 11/09/2026
I just read Man Bites Man, a book of drawings/cartoons by various artists from 1981. A lot of ho-hum, but I thought this piece by Ralph Steadman, "Ecology Lesson", was worth sharing. archive.org/details/manbitesmantwod… #drawing #books #reading #ralphSteadman
A black and white pen-and-ink drawing.  A child sits in front of a screen.  The child's face is distorted as though burned or mutilated. There are wires connecting the child's face and head to the screen.  Text on the screen reads: "Hi Kid!! Today, I'm gonna learn you about nature".  To the left is a tree with a bird, a single musical note indicates the bird is singing.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 04/09/2026
The tutoring center that I direct at my university was just renovated. We replaced all the whiteboards with blackboards, and added more. But now I'm being told I cannot buy Hagoromo chalk for the center because it is too expensive. Does anyone have any experience with chalk that is even remotely […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 01/09/2026
Fallen apples. #photography #blackAndWhite
Black-and-white images of many fallen apples on the ground.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 31/08/2026
Rode my fairly usual, flat, dull (but completely car-traffic-less) ~70k ride today and tacked on a few more k by riding through the UW campus (where I teach and do other things). There's this nice fountain on campus. #cycling #bike
A yellow bicycle in front of a large circular pool of water in the center of which are several fountains shooting water into the air in nice arcs.  Behind can be seen nice old campus buildings.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 20/08/2026
Such personalized messaging!
Screenshot of part of a webpage with the following text on it:

Type                                       Requested by

Confidential Evaluation University of Washington

Message from University of Washington

Dear Dr. %EV_First% %EV_Last%,

Thank you so much for agreeing to provide a promotion review for
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 20/08/2026
Did a short ride today. I rode to Fisherman's Terminal en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fishermen's_T… and rode to the end of the dock. I like seeing the variety of ships there (mostly commercial fishing boats, as far as I know). It's particularly nice to […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
A bicycle on a dock.  The bicycle is in the foreground.  In the background is a ship, the Glacier Bay.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 18/08/2026
The Criterion Channel added the full series of The Prisoner recently. I've been watching it as a soporific before bedtime. It's really quite terrible and boring; I might have to stop. But in episode 6, Number 6 destroys a computer by asking it a certain one-word question. Can you guess what the […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 17/08/2026
Another Library of Congress stereograph animation to help my nerves. More on my website: www.madandmoonly.com/doctormatt/ste… #animatedGIF #stereograph #photography
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 06/08/2026
Being stuck inside with the windows closed for smoke-filled, hot air consistently triggers my anxiety and hypertension. To make myself feel better, I made another animation from a Library of Congress stereograph. This time, of an elephant. More on my website […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 04/08/2026
Pigeons, cheapo "quad cam", 2003. #photography #pigeons #blackAndWhite
Four images of the same scene of the base of a tree and two pigeons.Four images of the same scene of two pigeons and a trash can.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 23/07/2026
Here is a poem I like. William Hathaway When I Was Dying The dullest people I knew gathered round my bed, the ones who made me feel stupid or ashamed when I was living. My flustered wife held my hand like a fish, worried our children might eat poorly at the neighbor lady's. Outside the door I […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 22/07/2026
I like this poem. W. D. Ehrhart Money in the Bank (for Alfred Starr Hamilton) Sixty-one years Of your life are gone and I Have never heard of you Until today. I understand the poems Simpy grow Beneath your pillow as you sleep In your cheap boardinghouse room, And you only have to rise And […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 21/07/2026
This is a poem I like. Dave Kelly The Debt The bum in Salt Lake City shared his last half buck with me then I bought him coffee with my half he took me to a movie with his I bought him chow mein afterward he bought a fifth I paid for scrambled eggs and bromo we spent the last two cents in a […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 21/07/2026
I noticed that I can download all (or a big chunk of) my data on Movielens, the site where I rate movies (a free service of the University of Minnesota). So I downloaded the two relevant files and thought, as always, R will make quick work of this. I think […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
A scatter plot of "movie release year" versus "year rated".
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 19/07/2026
My first finished video in two years! I long ago got this idea to use convex hulls to create chords and I've now, finally, got a video finished using the idea. I hope you like it! vimeo.com/1211123454 #video #math #mathematics #convexHull
vimeo.com
HULL
An audio composition experiment using moving particles and convex hulls. At each moment, a set of convex hulls is created by finding the convex hull of the set of particles, then the convex hull of the particles not in that convex hull, and then another and another until all particles are part of some convex hull. A chord created using simple rational ratios is determined by the short sequence of the number of particles in each convex hull. The particles move linearly, occasionally speeding up for a moment, or changing direction. The "bounce" off the edges of the screen. Eventually, they start disappearing. No AI was used in the creation of this video.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 10/07/2026
Oh, I just watched a cute rat eat several dandelions in my backyard. I guess that's incentive to attack the ivy with more gusto than I've been able to manage for a few years.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 07/07/2026
A little Runge-Kutta over breakfast at one in the afternoon. #math #mathematics #art #blackAndWhite
A black-and-white image of curves that approximate a differential equation.  There are regions of varying density giving the imag the appearance of light and shadow.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 01/07/2026
I like this poem. Dave Kelly Some Three Line Stanzas He is not dead he is sleeping he has got a job with god. I have two friends who are not here and I miss them (in California people write notes to me, they want soft words, I tell them it is too cold here winter has come in my teeth) Today […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 01/07/2026
I found a Stellar's jay feather today. We get quite a few Steller's jays around here in Seattle. They are very pretty, and make the least pleasant bird sound I know of (like a crow's caw, but much harsher). #birds #feather #StellarsJay
A close-up photograph of a Stellar's jay feather lying on the ground.  It is a deep blue with several black latitudinal bands.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 01/07/2026
I have a new chapbook. It's straight-up mathematical visualization, this time of the squares and cubes modulo n for n=2 to n=200. I have more description on my blog: www.madandmoonly.com/hhh Send me your postal address and I'll mail you one! I think […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
Front cover of a chapbook titled "Squares and Cubes Modulo n" with the author's name, Matthew M. Conroy, below it.A page of a chapbook showing circular figures, each numbered. Around the circle are radial "stacks" of small circles in various places.A page of a chapbook showing circular figures, each numbered. Around the circle are radial "stacks" of small circles in various places.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 22/06/2026
I'm feeling out of sorts tonight, so I fell back on my usual thing: making an animated gif from LOC stereograph images. Source and more animations on my website: www.madandmoonly.com/doctormatt/ste… #animation #stereographs
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 19/06/2026
Oh, I hate not being able to figure out stuff myself, but I've been trying and cannot seem to find the necessary information! I have a Lenovo Thinkpad P1 Gen 2 laptop. It has two ssd slots, one is empty. I want to add an ssd. I cannot for the life of me figure out if this Samsung 990 Pro ssd is […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 17/06/2026
I like this poem. Phillipe Soupault Sporting Goods As courageous as a postage stamp he went on his way clapping his hands softly to count his steps his heart as red as a wild boar was beating was beating like a rose and green butterfly From time to time he planted a little satin flag When he […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 14/06/2026
The campus libraries have a very large open cardboard box on one of the loading docks on campus. They are filling it with hardcover books they are removing from their collections. Discarding books makes me sad, as I can't get over my love of physical books […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
Stamped message on the inside of the front cover of a library book which reads "No longer property of the University of Washington Libraries"Title page of the book Harold Pinter: Complete Works: Two
with the title and the list of plays below it:
THE CARETAKER
THE DWARFS
THE COLLECTION
THE LOVER
NIGHT SCHOOL
REVUE SKETCHES:
Trouble in the Works
The Black and White
Request Stop
Last to Go
Special Offer
With an introduction: “Writing for Myself”
Title page of a book:

Library of Applied Analysis and Computational Mathematics
THE APPLICATION OF
CONTINUED FRACTIONS AND THEIR
CENERALIZATIONS TO PROBLEMS
IN APPROXIMATION THEORY
by
ALEXEY NIKOLAEVITCH KHOVANSKII
Translateq by
PETER WYNN
Page near front of a books with a typed message:
Be fair to others
Who might also want to use this book
Be sure
It is properly checked out
Before you take it from the library
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 06/06/2026
I love this poem. It makes me cry. It captures well my feeling of isolation in the world. Valery Larbaud Postscript O my God, will it never be possible For me to now that sweet woman over there in Little Russia, And those two friends in Rotterdam, And the young Andalusian beggar woman, And […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 28/05/2026
Work in progress. #WIP #math #mathematics
Photograph of a piece of paper with several circles cut into various numbers of pieces uses sub-circles and radial lines.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 16/05/2026
Oh no! Seattle graffitists are so high on dairy products, they've lost the ability to spell! #graffiti
The edge of a wall graffitied with "walnet apple vanllia ice cream" (sic) in black marker on gray paint.  On the right past the edge of the wall are several concrete steps going up and a handrail.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 16/05/2026
I just finished grading real analysis midterm exams. I am exhausted, not just from the focused effort (it the largest real analysis class ever taught at UW, I believe: until last year, the largest was 40, and mine is 85 students!), but from the feeling that I am hitting most of my students with […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 10/05/2026
A good 55km ride today with a fair amoung bit of gravel. I didn't get a picture on the route, so here is my bike in the alley behind my house, with the rhododendron and white rose (I think...) that just grow like this without my doing anything. Also, there's […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
A green-yellow bicycle leans against a retaining wall in an alley.  The yard behind the retaining wall is full of plants, including bright pink rhododendron flowers and white roses (I think: the stems are thorny in a very similar way to the way rose plants are thorny).A screenshot of Strava data showing fastest times on a descent near Seattle.
Rank Name Date Speed HR Power Time
1 Matt Conroy Nov 8, 2025 43.3 km/h 115 bpm — 1:25
1 Matt Conroy Apr 5,2026 43.3 km/h 113 bpm — 1:25
1 Matt Conroy May 9, 2026 43.3 km/h 119 bpm — 1:25
4 Matt Conroy Oct 5,2023 42.8 km/h 115 bpm — 1:26
5 Matt Conroy Apr13,2024 42.3 km/h 117 bpm — 1:27
6 Matt Conroy Sep 13,2024 41.8km/h — — 1:28
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 03/05/2026
Sunday goofing when I should be grading...
Many black curves on a white background.  The curves are orthogonal trajectories, so they only intersect each other at right angles.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 29/04/2026
I did an easy ride to Fisherman's Terminal today. They got big boats there. It was my first ride in weeks; I've been sick with some serious lung thing, but I think I'm better now. It was helpful that I wanted to get 1000 km YTD by the end of the month, and […] [Original post on mathstodon.xyz]
A bicycle leans against a crane control pillar(?) on the edge of a dock.  A large boat, the Titan Explorer is in the water in the background.  A large line connects the boat to the dock.  The sky is cloudy and water is gray.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 26/04/2026
Currently listening. Do you know Ed's? At one point, I had their album More Hard Times on cassette, vinyl, and CD. No air at all... www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7PTGmj2-98
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 22/04/2026
My win for this Tuesday. How are you doing today?
Medical report printout that says:
Here are the diagnoses that we discussed today:
1. Acute cough
2 Wheezing
Chest xray does not show pneumonia.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 19/04/2026
In a dream, Roy Rogers gave me his gun. It looked like it had been under the sea for decades, and was much lighter than I expected. [I am not a fan of Roy Rogers or guns. Or the ocean, especially, for that matter. Just kidding: oceans are badass. I do like rust, though.] #dream
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 15/04/2026
I'm sick with a rather intense cold and I don't feel like doing much so I made another animation from a stereograph. This one is of a pool at Eldorado Springs, Colorado. The pool was built in 1905 using spring water. I remember it was there when I was in grad school in Boulder in the 1990s, and […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 07/04/2026
WIP. Revisiting an algorithm I wrote a long time ago. #WIP #art #blackAndWhite
Black-and-white algorithmically generated image with some 5-way radial quasi-symmetry.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 05/04/2026
I don't, as a rule, read much so-called juvenile fiction, but it's a weird world and I find myself doing things unlike my usual self more often than usual these days. Today I read Whistle Down the Wind, by Mary Hayley Bell. Just coincidentally the day before Easter. Somehow I got the phrase […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 04/04/2026
Oh, gosh, I just saw Et j’aime à la fureur (Flickering Ghosts of Loves Gone By) by André Bonzel and loved it very, very much. Gah! I watched it on the Criterion Channel. I hope you have a good weekend! www.janusfilms.com/films/2247 #film #AndreBonzel
janusfilms.com
Janus Films — Flickering Ghosts of Loves Gone By
An epic, lyrical ode to videographers who raise the quotidian to the highest levels of art, André Bonzel’s _Flickering Ghosts of Loves Gone By_ (2021) is a personal and historical exploration of the home movie in all its unvarnished glory. Upon inheriting an enormous collection of amateur films Bonzel incorporated the work of complete strangers into a narrated montage of his own family’s century-long moving-image scrapbook. Many of Bonzel’s ancestors were aspiring cineastes, including his great-great-grandfather Maurice Expedit—a patent mogul, friend of the Lumière brothers, camera inventor, and rampant womanizer. In tracing his own conflation of sex and cinema back to its source, Bonzel plumbs his—as well as hundreds of others’—attempts to both preserve and reshape reality on celluloid, while in the process uncovering buried secrets, forgotten legacies, and some of the deepest motivations for capturing fleeting, everyday moments through the magic of a camera.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 02/04/2026
I ask my students to fill out a get-to-know-you survey at the start of the quarter. This is one student's answer to one question. I don't know what it means but I love it.
A screenshot of an answer to a survey question.

Question 6

A word that describes how you feel about this class at the moment is

Your Answer:

Fragrance
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 28/03/2026
I'm halfway through The Poetry of Survival : Post-War Poets of Central and Eastern Europe and wanted to share this poem by Miroslav Holub with you. Wings We have a map of the universe for microbes, we have a map of a microbe for the universe. We have a Grand Master of chess made of electronic […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 28/03/2026
I've updated my dice problem collection with a new problem (#29 of the now 83 problems). The question is: how many times, on average, do we need to roll a die, multiplying the results, until we reach a perfect square? So we might roll a 1 or 4 and be immediately square. Or we might roll […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 28/03/2026
[bloody lip, open mouth] My lip not infrequently splits. zine permission granted #photography #monochromeMarch #monochrome #blackAndWhite
A close-up, black-and-white photograph of a lower lip which is split and bleeding.  The mouth is open and teeth can be seen.
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 26/03/2026
I just finished reading Selected Writings: The Space Within by Henri Michaux. I didn't like it overall too well; it is rather too "one note". But here is a lovely bit. ATHLETE IN BED It's certainly odd that I, who don't care a rap for skating, no sooner shut my eyes than I see an immense […]
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Matthew Conroy @matthewconroy.mathstodon.xyz.ap.brid.gy · 22/03/2026
I've done exactly the same 10km walk for the past ten Sundays. I'm rarely this consistent with anything. It's not getting any easier (or faster), though. Hmmm. #walking
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