Eleven
Image courtesy of Worldion via iStock
​
Fun Facts
Palindromic Numbers
Twenty-two, thirty-three and so on down the line
Repeating digits have something else cool about them. They are palindromes.
​
A palindrome is something that is read the same way backward and forward. It can be a word, such as tot or peep or the band, Abba. It can also be a sentence or a verse or a number.
​
So double digits are palindromic numbers. So are 101, 5885, 23432 and a million other examples you could come up with.
​
​
Undecennial
If you're lucky enough, you'll see everyone
Many of us know that a decade represents ten years. But there's also a word for an 11-year period—Undecennary. (Pronounced un-DEE-sen-er-ree.) Undecim means 11 in Latin, which is where the word comes from.
​
Undecennial is the adjective derived from undecennary. It describes something that occurs or is observed every 11 years.
​
If you're wondering why we need a word for 11-year cycles, perhaps it has to do with our sun. During that time span, the Sun goes through a solar cycle where its magnetic field completely switches. The north pole moves south and the south pole moves north. And then they flip back again during the next 11 years.
​
​
Balance Sheet
A balance sheet is an important document for businesses. It shows what the company owns and what it owes. What a company owns are called assets. What they owe are called liabilities.
​
A balance sheet helps show the health of the company. If a company has to many liabilities, banks may not want to loan them money because the business might not be able to pay it back. And people may not want to invest their money in a company that could close its doors soon.
On the other hand, a "fat" balance sheet would show lots of assets and few liabilities.
​