King of Excellent (according to Scaryduck)

Friday, November 26

How confused can you get?

A conversation with my Dad yesterday has given seed to something I haven't been able to stop thinking about since. We were talking about the fact that the UK can't seem to decide on whether to measure things in imperial measures or in metric. Let me show you what I mean.

We buy petrol by the litre, and then reset the miles on the odometer and calculate the miles per gallon.

It is illegal to sell anything by weight in imperial measures, but you can still buy an 'eighth' of dope.

You can only buy soft drinks in 330ml cans, or litre or 2 litre bottles, yet you buy milk in pints.

You can buy pints of beer, but if you want spirits they are in 35cl measures.

When it's cold we refer to the temperature in celsius eg. "It got down to -5 last night." But when it's warm we go back to fahrenheit, like last summer when the UK got into the 100s.

When you watch the weather they talk about millibars of pressure, and then talk about the 4 inches of rain we have had so far this month.

On an athletics field a man can win a gold medal for the 100 metres dash, or for throwing a 16lb shot.

The engine of my car is 1500cc, but the tyre pressure is 32 psi.

And here I am trying to teach my son about measurements.