Diversion: How To Roll a Six Sided Die in Your Head

via Boing Boing, from "MINDHACKER: 60 Tips, Tricks, and games to take your mind to the next level."

To emulate a 6 sided die, follow this procedure:

1. find a short word, such as “cat.”

2. Sum the numerical values of the letters in the word: C = 3, A = 1, T = 20, and then 3+1+20 = 24.

3. Calculate the number modulo 09 (see the section “How It Works” for the procedure).

If the remainder is a 0, 7, or 8, which will happen one third of the time, discard it and try a new word. Otherwise, the remainder will be a pseudo random number from 1 to 6. Congratulations! This is your 6 sided die roll. (The results for the word “cat” is 6.)