JimGant Posted October 20, 2004 Share Posted October 20, 2004 Doc, Does Aussie land still use pounds, feet, gallons? For that matter, what about England? (I've been to both spots, but a long time ago, and then the only measurement I remember is jigger). Just curious. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dr_Pat_Pong Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 Doc, Does Aussie land still use pounds, feet, gallons? For that matter, what about England? (I've been to both spots, but a long time ago, and then the only measurement I remember is jigger). Just curious. All metrication in Oz now mate. Bloody awful. The Soapdodger's can tell you waht the situation is in the UK. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimGant Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 So Oz gave in. I remember in the States when they tried to convert gas stations to liters. Some did, some didn't. Guess where all the business went. No fiat ever issued, so back to gallons for all. Interestingly, here in Thailand they use yards on the golf course. Kinda nice, but wonder if yards are universally used by golfers? (He hit the ball over 300 yards somehow has a nicer ring than, he hit the ball over 274.32 meters And Robert Frost waxing poetically about, "Kilometers and kilometers to go before I sleep." Naaaa. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dr_Pat_Pong Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 So Oz gave in. I remember in the States when they tried to convert gas stations to liters. Some did, some didn't. Guess where all the business went. No fiat ever issued, so back to gallons for all. Interestingly, here in Thailand they use yards on the golf course. Kinda nice, but wonder if yards are universally used by golfers? (He hit the ball over 300 yards somehow has a nicer ring than, he hit the ball over 274.32 meters And Robert Frost waxing poetically about, "Kilometers and kilometers to go before I sleep." Naaaa. Currency went metric in 1966 and over the next few years the whole catastrophe came in. The only thing worthwhile was the currency. Dollars and cents made sense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Axel Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 Everything is a matter of training. I grew up metric and still cannot really figure out what a pint is. Although I agree, you ask for your bill and the waitress tells you that you had 3 liters of beer, sound awful. For wine, we don't order by the glass but commonly specify a quart (0.25 l) Again, when your bill comes, you had 5 little quarts sounds ok, nobody says 1.25 liter. The worst experience I ever had was in job-training, to prepare a government application following Pounds, shillings and pence, dividing, multiplying, finding piece-prices etc. I think I never finished that thing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDN Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 ....The Soapdodger's can tell you what the situation is in the UK. When kids had to buy sweets and handed over a half crown for something costing 8 pence ha'penny, they knew instinctively they should get one and nine pence ha'penny change. They knew how to multiply and divide by twelve in their heads, and they knew about fractions. All the old coins - especially the old pennies - had kings and queens on them going back to Queen Victoria. You could learn a bit of history just looking at your change. All those old coins have disappeared - even the shilling and florins went when they changed the shape and size of the new pence equivalents. I admire the Americans very much for rejecting metrication. In the UK, it is now illegal even to sell using the old weights system. Some people still resist - they are called "Metric Martyrs". Unfortunately the UK government simply does not care what it's people want. You can read about them - the Metric Martyrs - here: http://www.metricmartyrs.sageweb.co.uk/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Totster Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 ....The Soapdodger's can tell you what the situation is in the UK. When kids had to buy sweets and handed over a half crown for something costing 8 pence ha'penny, they knew instinctively they should get one and nine pence ha'penny change. They knew how to multiply and divide by twelve in their heads, and they knew about fractions. All the old coins - especially the old pennies - had kings and queens on them going back to Queen Victoria. You could learn a bit of history just looking at your change. All those old coins have disappeared - even the shilling and florins went when they changed the shape and size of the new pence equivalents. I admire the Americans very much for rejecting metrication. In the UK, it is now illegal even to sell using the old weights system. Some people still resist - they are called "Metric Martyrs". Unfortunately the UK government simply does not care what it's people want. You can read about them - the Metric Martyrs - here: http://www.metricmartyrs.sageweb.co.uk/ Regarding Metric.... Was taught metric at school... however when your parents and their generation always refer to measurements in Imperial it's easy to get confused... Another thing.... Although the UK use metric.... we order drinks in Pints, do 50 miles per hour in our cars, and measure height in feet and inches... and when a baby is born it weighs xx pounds and xx ounces, when an older person is weighed they are xx stones and xx pounds... are we METRIC in the UK...??? totster Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
medicinebox Posted October 21, 2004 Author Share Posted October 21, 2004 ....The Soapdodger's can tell you what the situation is in the UK. When kids had to buy sweets and handed over a half crown for something costing 8 pence ha'penny, they knew instinctively they should get one and nine pence ha'penny change. They knew how to multiply and divide by twelve in their heads, and they knew about fractions. All the old coins - especially the old pennies - had kings and queens on them going back to Queen Victoria. You could learn a bit of history just looking at your change. All those old coins have disappeared - even the shilling and florins went when they changed the shape and size of the new pence equivalents. I admire the Americans very much for rejecting metrication. In the UK, it is now illegal even to sell using the old weights system. Some people still resist - they are called "Metric Martyrs". Unfortunately the UK government simply does not care what it's people want. You can read about them - the Metric Martyrs - here: http://www.metricmartyrs.sageweb.co.uk/ Regarding Metric.... Was taught metric at school... however when your parents and their generation always refer to measurements in Imperial it's easy to get confused... Another thing.... Although the UK use metric.... we order drinks in Pints, do 50 miles per hour in our cars, and measure height in feet and inches... and when a baby is born it weighs xx pounds and xx ounces, when an older person is weighed they are xx stones and xx pounds... are we METRIC in the UK...??? totster I remember the shops a few years back, when it all changed. Tesco's put both metric and imperial on their labels. This was to help the older folks, but they soon stopped doing it. My granny asked the butcher for a pound of sausages. He said "They're called kilo's now" She said "Oh well I'l have a pound of kilo's then" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDN Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 ..... Although the UK use metric.... we order drinks in Pints, do 50 miles per hour in our cars, and measure height in feet and inches... and when a baby is born it weighs xx pounds and xx ounces, when an older person is weighed they are xx stones and xx pounds... are we METRIC in the UK...??? totster It's because the government haven't got the balls to go for total metrication - they know how much they peed off everyone with the part metrication that they have done so far. The weather forecasts started to use Centigrade (or Celsius) only. Then they brought back Fahrenheit to go after the Celsius figure. Don't know what they do now. And what I find really stupid, is hearing about "three hundred millimetres of snow". Why the <deleted>.ck can't they say "a foot of snow"? Stupid, stupid, people Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
350torana Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 I was born after the metric system was introduced in Aussie. But, i think it is a much more logical system 10 mm=1cm, 100 cm = 1 metre , 1000 metres = 1km . Same with ml and litres, grams, kilograms . The real logic comes to temperature, centigrade beats farenhieght(sp) hands down . Funny though, how some things are still weighed in ounces and pounds in Australia Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mango Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 As regards to Steven Thoburn i knew the guy quite well, i used to live quite near to him in the UK, he was also a very frequent visitor to Thailand. R.I.P. Steven Cheers Mango Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDN Posted October 21, 2004 Share Posted October 21, 2004 As regards to Steven Thoburn i knew the guy quite well, i used to live quite near to him in the UK, he was also a very frequent visitor to Thailand.R.I.P. Steven Cheers Mango He was a hero of mine. Dead at 39 - terrible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Abandon Posted October 23, 2004 Share Posted October 23, 2004 You know you're an 80's Brit child when: [COMPLETE] You once didn't laugh hysterically at 30 white mice pulling something heavy in unison whilst squealing ----- ----- . Nice to see you, to --- --- ---- Chigley, Trumpton and ---------- ----- . Happiness is a ----- ------ ------ . BOY I don't think I can do my exams today mum! MOTHER 'course you can ------ Nuts or hazelnuts OOH. ------'- take 'em and they cover them in --------- . Everyone's a fruit and ------- It's friday, it's 5:35, it's ---------- Was Larry or Bruce better at --- ---------- ---- . This post reminds you of the quiz show -------- ----- . You also remeber nutty bars, curly wurlys, Wales winning a rugby match, Barry Grant, You're kind of proud that you used to get slippered at school. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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