Metric and Canadians

["Kim Boydell" <boydell@domain.elided>]

Canadians have their own measuring system.  We insist on calling a 12 oz
beer a pint and a 20oz beer a quart even though 20oz is, in fact, an
imperial pint.  But it gets worse, 4 litres of milk come in a package of 3
bags.  Why, you ask?  Because bag milk use to come in quarts and the plastic
jug that holds the bags couldn't properly hold a litre bag, but it could
hold a litre and a 3rd (pretty close to an imperial quart).  It never
occurred to anyone that the friggin plastic jug costs about 3 cents, so we
ended up with weird measurements and conversions.

By the way, I have become quite adept at knowing which metric tools match
imperial measures e.g. 3/8 is about 10 mil and 7/16 is either 11 or 12
millimetre depending on the tolerances of the bolt or nut and a good 6 lb.
hammer behind the socket will make it fit any nut (just joking.)

Regards

Kim

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Centre for Economic Analysis - Canada Inc.
http://www.home.istar.ca/~boydell

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