Seanan McGuire (seanan_mcguire) wrote,
Seanan McGuire
seanan_mcguire
  • Mood: happy
  • Music: Little Shop, 'Suddenly Seymour.'

Triskaidekaphilia.

As a kid, I was totally fascinated by numbers. Especially odd numbers (a fascination that would later translate into an obsession with primes, but that's another story, and one that doesn't really factor today -- except to note that 'February 13,' or '2/13' is a pair of primes -- the next prime-numbered year isn't until 2011). And, as I began my lifelong obsession with horror movies, especially the number thirteen.

It's an interesting fact that most people will give their lucky number as two, three, or seven, all of which are primes (and all of which are odd). Nine is also a common lucky number, and while it isn't prime, it's the result of squaring a prime. And yes, I actually sit around thinking about this stuff, which is why I have several books on my 'get around to writing this someday' list that feature mathematicians to one degree or another. Math is hard, but it makes me happy. Anyway, after examining the concept of the lucky number, and the numbers of those around me, I settled on my own lucky number: thirteen. As my horror movie education continued, I decided that Friday the thirteenth was obviously the luckiest day of all for me, because everybody else was creating a good luck void as they sucked up the world's supply of bad luck.

I never claimed that my logic made sense.

I love Friday the thirteenth. I love the doom-crows flocking around crying that we're all going to walk under ladders, break our mothers' backs by stepping on cracks, and have our paths crossed by spontaneously-generated black cats. (I don't love that people with black cats need to keep them indoors or risk losing them -- much like on Halloween -- but that's another issue.) I love the Halloween air that falls over the day, no matter when it comes along. I love that I get Halloween and then Valentine's Day this year, bam-bam, like a double-scoop of awesome.

I love Friday the 13th: The Series, and Friday the 13th the film series, and Thirteen by Vixy and Tony, and writing rondeaus, and Scott Westerfield's Midnighters trilogy. I love Baker's Dozens, and bouquets with thirteen flowers, and watching hotels pretend that they don't have thirteen floors, and everything else about the number thirteen.

What's your position?
Tags: good things, math is awesome, so the marilyn, superstition
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  • 80 comments

scholarinexile

February 13 2009, 20:48:20 UTC 8 years ago

Edit: I've decided that you bring good Friday the 13th luck. Your CD arrived today, which is good luck in and of itself, as well as a refund check from my car insurance company (apparently it's a "safe driving bonus"), my parents are coming for dinner (unexpected and good), and my wife has just discovered in the course of her genealogical research that we're related to Linus Pauling. Add that to the premiere of Dollhouse tonight, and it's working out to be the best Friday the 13th in awhile. Thanks!

seanan_mcguire

February 14 2009, 02:04:47 UTC 8 years ago

Oh, awesome! You're super-welcome.

scholarinexile

February 14 2009, 06:14:24 UTC 8 years ago

Further genealogy update: I've now traced my ancestors, through just one of several branches of the rather extensive Davis family tree, that my ancestors have deep and well-documented roots in English nobility dating back to at least the 1200s, and I've not even gone as far back as the online records go. I'm also apparently Isaac Newton's second cousin. My head is sort of reeling.

seanan_mcguire

February 15 2009, 15:42:11 UTC 8 years ago

...wow. Okay, you win this week's surreal Olympics.