Happy Mole Day! It’s a happy day in Chemistry Land set aside for singing “The Element Song” and telling punny jokes about moles!
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Wait, people don’t know what Mole Day is? Pi Day is this national institution, but Mole Day goes neglected like the red-headed stepchild of fake holidays? Even Talk Like a Pirate Day gets a lot of fanfare! The love I have for this day is deep-seated and strongly-rooted from celebrating with my chemistry teacher in high school, so today, there will be no excuse for not knowing (and loving) all that is Mole Day.
Nestled within National Chemistry Week, October 23 celebrations glorify the mole and Avogadro’s number, approximated at 6.022 x 1023. A mole is an absolute number without a unit, similar to a dozen. A dozen is always 12, whether it’s made up of donuts or people or cars. It’s the same with a mole, except that it’s always 6.022 x 1023, which is a number of fantastic magnitude, such that a mole of oranges would be as large as the earth. Practically speaking, when dealing with elements and compounds, the mole allows us to switch between atomic mass units (which are ridiculously small) to grams, which we can see, feel, and measure. So, 6.022 x 1023 atoms of carbon (atomic weight of 12 amu), or a mole of it, would have a mass of 12 grams, which is so much more helpful because we have known atom quantity and mass. On Mole Day, we’re really celebrating the awesomeness of this one magical number.
Not awesome? Or magical? Fine. Then I bake.
At our house, math nerds aren’t the only ones who get specialty baked goods. In popular Mole Day tradition, I tried out a new recipe for molasses cookies. I considered making guacamole, which has the attraction of being doubly punny (it’s called guacaMOLE and “avocado” is so similar to “Avogadro”), but I was in the mood for something sugary this year, so I searched out a new cookie to try. Tasty though they were, they were disappointingly flat and I did not deem the recipe worth sharing, but no matter! Mole Day marches on! I packed up the cookies for JG’s fellow math and science teachers with a note: “Celebrate Mole Day with a MOLasses cookie!”
I know, it’s geeky. But I love it. I love it so much. Every dork has its day, right? Well, this is mine.
5 comments
The thing about you is that you make your geekiness adorable and amusing rather than flat out annoying (like some geeks I have encountered). Everybody can appreciate an adorable geek.
Happy Mole Day!
That’s very reassuring to hear. Sometimes, I get a little too excited about chemistry.
Amazingly geeky!!! Wonderfully geeky!!
And, your baking adventures have the added side benefit of reminding us all about the science and math facts that we forgot 10 years ago.
I have a theory that seemingly boring classes can be otherwise jazzed up by making corresponding baked goods, but I have yet to really explore it. Like eating pie when you read “Titus Andronicus” or A-shaped cookies for “The Scarlet Letter” … Unfortunately, teachers have enough work to do, huh?
Flat or not, those cookies look delicious. Happy Mole Day!
I was glad that I reserved a small portion for myself because, from JG’s report, the cookies that sat in the teachers’ room didn’t even make it through all of the lunch periods. Good sign!
We celebrated mole day in my high school chemistry class! It was fun and we sang cute songs. It was also the only day that I enjoyed chemistry class (but that was because we had a terrible teacher).
Oh, bad chem teachers make me sad. I had a terrible physics teacher and I can see how the one day of random celebration would have made thing easier. Ugh. I still hate physics.
My chemistry teacher had us make moles- stuffed moles out of cloth. We had to sew them, and they were supposed to be sort of themed.
Mine was Molchael Jordan. One of my friend’s was Molymian. Those are the only two I remember, but it was a fun, easy assignment.
Despite this, I never remember Mole Day when it comes. On that same note, I also do not remember Talk Like a Pirate Day or Pi Day. Alas.
We had a mole-making contest in our class, but I never participated. I preferred to tell jokes or sing songs. Pi Day is a huge deal at our house, so it never goes uncelebrated! We are a nerd fest, indeed.
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