Measurements baffle me. Don’t get me wrong, if I had to measure something, like perhaps a space to put up a shelf or something, I think I could do it. Well okay, I could do the measuring bit, but probably not put up the shelf too well.
It’s not that I struggle with making a measurement, the struggle usually comes more because of the way we tend to use them around here.
For instance have you ever wondered how come people here measure some distances, not by miles or even kilometres, but by using time.
Think about it. How many times have you asked somebody how far a place is away from another and they reply - “umm about half an hour or so.”
It kind of reminds me of those old maths questions we did when we are at National School. You know a train leaves platform A at 11.30 travelling and 55 miles per hour and another leaves platform B at 11.40 travelling at 60 miles per hour.
There were a lot of trains leaving in those days but I always that it was kinda unfair that we had to do those questions in Donegal because we didn’t have any trains.
Those questions were all about who was getting there first which I guess could well be the reason we’ve been all conditioned over the years to equate distance with time.
Then again I suppose the car makers have done that for us too when they put clocks in the car that tell us how many miles - or should that be kilometres - an hour we are travelling.
Even the authorities have started to get in on the act. On a recent trip to Dublin I noticed signs on the motorway that told me, not how many miles (or kilometres) I was from the airport, but things like ‘airport 20 mins,’ ‘city centre 35 mins.’
It’s all pretty confusing really and it’s no wonder units of measurement come up in pub quiz questions so often.
And the time/distance thing isn’t the only one we seem to have a bit of a mix-up with.
For instance these days we are all pretty obsessed with the price of a litre of petrol or diesel but then we’ll tell everyone how many miles we get (or don’t get) to the gallon.
And we probably shouldn’t even be saying miles. After all we’re all kilometres and metric these days.
Well at least some of us are. Today for instance I thought I was being funny when I accidentally broke a ruler and wondered out loud to my daughters if I could get out of going to football training (well it is very cold) for having a ‘broken foot.’
They stared blankly at me as if to say “what the hell kind of nonsense are you talking about this time?”
So, painful and all as it was to have to explain my joke I said, “you know, the ruler is twelve inches, and that’s a foot.”
They still didn’t get it. “But, but a ruler is 30 cm,” the girls said, and it was then I knew I was fighting a losing battle.
So much for my feet and inches and stones and pounds and miles and umm, half miles. Seems like perhaps some of the next generation might actually have grasped the whole metric thing.
I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised really that people will be confused or measurements get crossed over every now and then, especially when you think on how many types there are.
You know there are units of length, units of area, units of volume, units of liquid volume and units of mass and that’s just a few of the common ones.
In fact to find out how many types there really are, I resorted to the internet and did what any self-respecting person would do in such a situation - I asked the google.
Before I did so however I decided for fun to have a guess at the answer myself.
And you know what, I was miles out.
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