back to square one

in the very early nineties, my dad once asked what my favorite tv show was, and i told him, "square one."  perhaps as a concerned parent, he inquired what sort of a show it was.  "i've seen it," my mom defended.  "it's really a good show."

i remember taking silent umbrage at a scout activity, when i overheard two leaders discussing the show's "mathnet" segment as "cheesy," although he was saying he liked it.  i wanted to stand up from sanding my kayak and declare "it's not cheesy!"

looking back now, it's way cheesy, but i loved square one, one of pbs's edutainment shows around the same time as where in the world is carmen sandiego?  square one was a sort of variety sketch show all about math aimed at preteens.  i recently discovered that youtube has several clips, and i remember nearly all of them.  i've got a great amount of respect for those actors; a lot of it was really goofy, but they did it with all their hearts and, at the same time, were fully aware of it and poked fun at themselves (as in the case of "common multiples man").

fractions, angles, multiples, negatives, roman numerals, percentages, and mathnet, cops who solved crimes using math.  i loved this show.