Dear Han, and All,
on 2001-03-16 19.40, Han Maenen at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> Pat,
>
> This is a strange message. Are some Australian shops and companies reverting
> to ifp?
No. These are rare and isolated annoyances - not part of any reversion.
I suppose it's a bit like the USA situation with motor vehicles.
If we consider a standard family sedan with about 10 000 separate parts,
each of which requires (say) 10 measurements. This means that all cars built
in the USA have each been measured some 100 000 times using metric measures
to the nearest tenth of a millimetre.
Now, let us also suppose that he maker of the sedan labels the odometer, the
speedometer, and the tyres in miles, miles per hour, and inches.
These three labels (they are not measurements) out of some 100 000 (0.003 %)
are sufficient to convince the car owner that he is driving an 'English' car
- in and 'English' nation - and all is right with the world.
Cheers,
Pat Naughtin CAMS
Geelong, Australia
> Han
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Pat Naughtin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Sent: Friday, March 16, 2001 12:05 AM
> Subject: [USMA:11640] Re: metric in Walmart
>
>
> Dear Greg and All,
>
> Two stories:
>
> I was in a furniture store some time ago with a view to buying a table. I
> asked an assistant if a particular table came in various sizes. 'Yes' he
> replied, 'this model comes in 5 by 3 or you can have it as 6 by 3.' My
>> response was, 'Could you tell me that in modern metric measures, please.
> I'm not old enough to understand your old measures.'
>
> In a camping store I was seeking a hose to connect my gas stove to its
> bottle. I asked an assistant to show me some hoses about a metre long. He
> replied, 'We've got some 3 foot ones here.' My response was simple, 'Could
> you please find another assistant to serve me, please. I did not come here
> for a history lesson - I wanted to buy a hose about a metre long.' I then
> ignored him - and, in the absence of a suitable assistant - I bought the
> hose from another supplier.
>
> I suspect that my anger in these instances was partly based on the apparent
> young ages of the assistants, as it was clear that they had recently left
> school and they were inordinately proud of their new-found knowledge of the
> foot as a measuring unit. I am sure that they didn't learn it at school; it
> was part of their on-the-job store training.
>
