Anyone else RAISED on the Metric System?

[Tyler Durden]

In the late 50's, the 60's, and early 70's some "forward looking" school districts, like mine, decided that the United States would join the rest of the world science community and GO METRIC. I mean, we were pretty much locked in with WATTS for energy; BTU's were hanging on in the heating and cooling industry and Horsepower in Automotive, but they weren't long for the world...right?

HAH.

So now at 55 I'm still stuck with a brain that wants to think in Metric...All Forms of Metric...while we still struggle along in an "English System" country. I can do the conversions in my HEAD, but hey, am I all alone here?

[Tyler Durden]

1. Oh right, just ME.

Closet Metric freaks. We Will, We Will OUT YOU!

[Heidi]

2. CMW was raised with it.

And although I learned it in school and at home (both of my parents were teachers at that time), it was still a big adjustment for me to get used to cooking/measuring metric when I moved here. Now, it seems to me a lot more logical than cups, teaspoons, miles, feet, inches, etc. :hi:

[bbernardini]

3. I think Atom and His Package say it best... (Edited: now contains lyrics!)

(Lord, It's Hard To Be Happy When You're Not) Using The Metric System.

YouTube links:

http://208.65.153.251/watch?v=UCP8kiL3jhA (Studio version)
http://208.65.153.251/watch?v=ybtBSqHAmSc (Live version)

12 inches per foot
two pints per quart
why don't we make it easy?
The English system of measurement must relate to history.
We can use units of 10 and convert with ease
like all the other countries.
I am in command
yes I am taking a stand
from this disease we must be free.
good god!

You're drunk with your tradition that has no validity
well I'm intoxicated with sports in metrics
come drink a deciliter with me
we want metrics we want it now
we know we can win
I weigh 170 pounds that's 90 kilograms
see metrics can even make you thin

all cool things are in metrics
for example here's just one
I've got my 9 well that's 9 millimeters,
sounds cooler than my point two seventy inches gun.
The president will not exist and they will call me communist and call me scum
but its worth it Canadians will think we are smart
or at least they will think we are not as dumb.

You're drunk with your tradition that has no validity
well I'm intoxicated with sports in metrics
come drink a deciliter with me
we want metrics we want it now
we know we can win
I weigh 170 pounds that's 90 kilograms
see metrics can even make you thin

the revolution is here
we must overcome at last
as we symbolically stick their fucking foot
up their fucking ass

guitar!

You're drunk with your tradition that has no validity
well I'm intoxicated with sports in metrics
come drink a deciliter with me
we want metrics we want it now
we know we can win
I weigh 170 pounds that's 90 kilograms
see metrics can even make you thin

[ghostsofgiants]

23. "come drink a deciliter with me"

Actually he says decaliter. Deciliter is a tenth of a liter while a decaliter is ten liters.

[bbernardini]

24. Oops. You're right. I missed that mistake when I cut-and-pasted the lyrics. nt

[mainegreen]

4. Nope, but as half my family is Dutch, we have some HEATED debates about it at christmas.

You'd never know that so much yelling and arguing could occur over something as silly as what system to use to measure things. Hell, sometimes I thought that steak knives would be drawn to engage in battle, especially when it came down Fahrenheit versus Celsius.

[Tyler Durden]

5. By the second year of college, I never though in inches at all.

This was 1972/73. A few years later when I came back to "earth" so to speak, I was astonished that nobody was using any metric measurements.

BOY did we miss the boat on that one.

[Crazy Dave]

8. I was a surveyor for 21 years

And we used tenths of a foot. Similar to metric as it's based on units of ten but uses the US ft., acres and volumes. I use that more than inches for my own designs and calculations.

[conscious evolution]

10. I accidently bought a surveyors

tape measure once.
Talk about a what the fuck moment when I saw the 10 inch per foot.

[Crazy Dave]

6. I've learned it and lived in two countries that use it

And have always been looking forward to using it here in the states but for some reason we're one of the few nations that can't learn it even though it's easier than fractions.

[kedrys]

7. I was

but I grew up in Canada and didn't come to the States until '79. I had to get used to the English system all over again.

BTW, here's why the metric system will never catch on in the US: 3rd down and 0.8 meters to go just sounds *weird*. :P

[Omphaloskepsis]

9. I took a lot of chemistry in High School/College...

Metric was mandatory there. I also took a lot of drafting classes. We didn't use it in those. But we should have. But yeah, I can easily use both.

edit :: but I still can't type.

[qb]

11. I learned it in elementary school in the 70s

Physics and engineering are so much easier in metric.

[begin_within]

12. 28.375 grams of prevention is worth 454 grams of cure.

[SouthoftheBorderPaul]

13. I work for a company that does a lot of international business.

I spend a lot of time doing conversions from one system to the other. I WISH we'd go metric. It's a much more intuitive system. So much simpler.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

14. me

[CreekDog]

15. All those guys named "Dave"

errr. :eyes:

[Ellen Forradalom]

16. 'Fraid not. I began sewing at an early age

which means I can eyeball eighth-inch increments up to about an inch and a half.

Celsius temperatures especially freak me out. 25 degrees is warm??

[Heidi]

17. In comparison to 0° Celsius, 25° C. is TOASTY!

Under any system of measurement, I loooooooooooooooooooooooooong for spring and teh summer. :cry:

[Ellen Forradalom]

18. I'm in SoCal, but swimming outdoors at predawn

in near-freezing temperatures is starting to get old.

[Heidi]

19. Ha! There's a German woman, Erika, down the road from us, who swims EVERY morning

in Lago Maggiore, except for November through February. She's probably more fit than I am. The lake is just 200 meters or so down mountain from me, but I absolutely REFUSE to swim in ice water. Erika doesn't seem to mind, though, and her hair is sometimes frozen as she walks back up the road past our house en route to her home after a swim. :scared:

[Ellen Forradalom]

22. Wow.

Amazing what you can get used to.

[Javaman]

20. No, I was raised on a forklift. nt

[ghostsofgiants]

21. I'm Canadian, so I was raised with it.

[mainegreen]

25. I'll have you know this thread got the word 'Celcuis' stuck in my browser right click menu

Three times!

:grr:

This would never happen with the Imperial System.