Metric System: For Real This Time?

Americans invented the personal computer, the cellphone, traffic lights and disposable diapers. On a large scale, we were the first to fly, first to drive and first to use a microwave.

But for some reason, we can't do what 99% of the rest of earth does: measure stuff using units of 10 instead of units of 12, 3, 9, Wednesdays, Fridays and our feelings.

Why do we insist on sticking with the yardstick? It’s as if some drunk comedian walked into a room full of Founding Fathers who were in the middle of trying to create something really big - like a country - and just began shouting a bunch of made-up words: "Inches, acres and furlongs!" And the lawmakers said "amazing" and inserted it into our Constitution.

The real story is our customary units originated in the Middle Ages, inherited from data introduced by William the Conqueror. If only his parents had the foresight to name him William the Calculator. Granted, he might not have won as many battles, but at least today's math would be easier.?

A lot of documents indicate only three countries in the world don’t use the International System of Units, aka the metric system: the United States, Liberia and Myanmar. That’s not entirely true – all international economies have some degree of the system, and the world is in fact on a progression toward its adoption. However, that progression is slow. I mean really, really slow. In 1866 Congress said we could use the metric system. Eighteen. Sixty. Six. The year the nickel was invented. Where I am writing this, Nebraska, wasn't even a state yet.

And so the metric system limps along by millimeters in the land of the free and the home of the brave and the place of the stubborn.

We are embracing more elements of the other system, and we still may get there before climate change or K-Pop kills us. But it's a confusing transition, this sometimes-we-do sometimes-we-don't metric system. It can be hard to grasp when I still don't have our own U.S. system figured out, especially kitchen measurements. For example, I had my blood drawn during a routine physical last year, and I asked the technician how much they were taking.

“About 10 milliliters."

?“And that would be ...?”

“About two teaspoons.”

“And that would be ...?”

“About the size of your finger joint to its tip.”

“And that finger would be ...?”

“Your index finger.”

“And that would--”

She stabbed me with the needle, and I could feel my life force being sucked out by the bucketful (150 megaliters if you're mathing it right now).

With all the fuss about the U.S. being a flawed system, there are some measurement units far nuttier than ours. For example, what you are about to read is 100% true ... Did you know that the unit, one Sheppey, is defined as the closest distance at which sheep remain picturesque, or about 7/8th of a mile? Anything beyond that, I guess, keeps them off your Christmas postcard.

There is one that I do find rather cool, and it's in my line of work - writing about marine biologists. It's called the wiffle measurement. A wiffle is equal to 89 millimeters (3.5 inches) in diameter, which is the size of a Wiffle ball. Scientists use it to measure corals and other objects, because the ball's round shape is perfect for quick measurements, and the holes in it allow it to avoid being crushed by water pressure.

So maybe measurements don't have to be as rigid as we think. Maybe it's up to each of us to use our own standards. I once asked an older man how many years he and his wife had been married, and he quickly replied, "Almost two Tabasco bottles." Considering it takes 20 years to go through one of those, I'd say they were doing pretty well.

If I had to come up with my own unit of measurement, it would be all about pizza. Did you know that if you lay each piece of a large Casey's Store pizza side by side, it would be about 70 inches long? Next time someone asks me how to get somewhere that's a mile up the road, I'm gonna lay this one down: "'Bout 905 Caseys" and see if it catches on.

Did you know that the average height of an NBA center is 1.2 Caseys? Okay maybe people would just be confused and hungry at the same time if we go that route, but it still works.

But America, we can do better: The land of inventions doesn't have to reinvent the wheel.

Or change the diameter of one.