> mathematically inclined / advanced: Where do you feel your interest in math was mostly developed? I did pretty bad in primary school, mostly because I never

> mathematically inclined / advanced: Where do you feel your interest in math was mostly developed? I did pretty bad in primary school, mostly because I never did/turned in any of the homework. Whenever we took tests, I did well, but enough of my grade depended on homework assignments that my test scores didn't make up the difference. I always did well on the standardized aptitude tests (back then it was the CTBS tests) - well enough that they had to place me in the "gifted" program. That didn't actually mean anything at my school - you didn't go to different classes and weren't separated from everybody else; it was just a label applied to everybody who scored above a certain percentage on the standardized tests. And man, did I hate math. I hated doing the never-ending worksheets of long division and thought math meant miserable drudgery. About halfway through 8th grade, I had the opportunity to start taking joint-enrollment classes at a community college. They taught me algebra there and that was when I started to enjoy math. I think a lot of that had to do with being able to move at a reasonable pace through the material rather than spending an entire year on long division.