COLUMN: ‘Remember swearing you’d never use Pythagoras' theorem after school? Well, I did'

Let me set the scene for you: it’s half past ten on a Thursday night, and my Dad and I are hunched over a set of blueprints at the kitchen table, both scratching our heads.

As we stared at the plans for our new project, a home office/man cave, we played around with the idea of utilising the attic space. We were trying to figure out how much standing height we’d have upstairs, and whether it would be worth converting the space.

Magnifying glass at the ready, we checked and double-checked the measurements on the plans to no avail. They simply weren’t there. We cursed the architect and our own inability to figure it out even more.

Twenty minutes later and still no closer to figuring out our puzzle, we toyed with the idea of texting our builder, Anthony.

“We’re going around in circles here. Just text Anthony, and he’ll put us out of our misery.”

“It’s 11 o’clock; we can’t be texting the man at this hour.”

Common sense prevailed; we opted not to disturb Anthony and, by hook or by crook, to figure it out ourselves.

Frustrated, I combed through the plans once again and lo and behold, inspiration struck. 12 years after I left school, and buried deep in the back of my mind, Mr. Osborne’s “a² + b² = c²” echoed in my ears.

Pythagoras' theorem. Eureka.

Now, I swore a hole in a pot that it was pointless, a waste of time, and that I’d never use it again after school - as we all did - and yet, here I was.

In its simplest form, I had a triangle in front of me with two of the three required measurements.

With the help of a Google search, a trusty calculator, and a scrap of paper, 10 minutes later, I had an answer. Whether it was correct or not would be another thing, but rounded off, we should have about six feet three inches of standing height at its tallest point.

A quick text to Anthony the following morning to find out whether my Junior Cert maths had stood the test of time, and his reply of "there or thereabouts" was good enough for me.

To Mr. Osborne - you were right, and I was wrong.