I was in our local Raley's store this evening and got into a conversation with one of the junior managers about them stocking the latest Canola Harvest Zero-Transfat margarine. (Whenever we need margarine, Safeway gets our business for that trip.)
I then switched to my favorite subject and lamented the fact that the supermarket industry was one of the most reactionary with respect to metrication. To my surprise, he agreed with me. It turns out he's an amateur carpenter and woodworker. He was quickly extolling the virtues of everything being related in tens in the metric system and how awkward it is to work with fractions of inches. He does his projects exclusively in metric. He also told me about a friend or relative who had a boat built. It was specified entirely in metric, but the boat builder converted everything to FFU for the construction phase -- even though most of his measuring devices had both inches and millimeters on them. He was at a loss (as we are, here) to understand the mentality of such a person. Bill Potts, CMS Roseville, CA http://metric1.org [SI Navigator]
