Those with a passing familiarity with the Survivor TV (television) show in the US may find it amusing to learn that one of our own (a metric proponent) is involved. It is not in the real TV program but a fictitious one dreamed up as a humorous story in The Times-Union newspaper in Jacksonville, Florida (2001 Jan 26, section D, page 1). The author (columnist Charlie Patton) selected sixteen people to "compete" for a million dollars by being the final survivor on a hypothetical "desert" island in the middle of the St. John's River in downtown Jacksonville. The people he selected are all prominent people in Jacksonville, including the Jaguars (football team) coach, Jacksonville Mayor John Delaney, a retired member of Congress now being mentioned as a possible choice for Secretary of the navy, a famous golfer, a rock singer, a popular TV weather man, the sheriff AND ... radio personality and talk show host, ANDY JOHNSON! Andy is known best to most of you for his frequent shows devoted entirely to promoting metric conversion in the US (next one Feb 21) and his sometimes posted or forwarded correspondance on this listserver. He is also a former member of the Florida Legislature who brought about some positive legislation for metric a few years back. The gimmick in the (fictitious) adventure is that each day, one of the group is voted off the island by the remaining participants. Our Andy Johnson coasts by for the first four days but then gets involved on day five when he and Mayor Delaney get into a dispute over the mayor's "Better Jacksonville Plan" (a multi-million dollar political football in that city). As an aside, I note that after Andy's recent two metric talk shows, he devoted the next two shows to fighting the mayor's plan. The story goes on (quoting now from the newspaper): It's clear that (the group) is going to vote against either Delaney or Delaney's arch-enemy Andy Johnson, one-time politician turned talk show gadfly. Johnson has spent most of his time on the island standing on a soapbox that he found among the flotsam along the river bank and giving long, passionate explanations of why he's against the Better Jacksonville Plan. For the first time in two decades, Johnson gets the most votes in an election. Unfortunately it's an election to see who leaves. He does. (end of quote) Sorry, Andy. Too bad that you didn't use your soapbox for promoting metric instead of for challenging the mayor (in the story, at least). from Bill Hooper ============ Make It Simple! Make It Metric! ============
