Long live pounds and ounces!!

[matriarch]

Woohoo!! The EU has finally admitted defeat on forcing the UK to use metric measurements.

EU gives up on 'metric' Britain.

 

[English Lady]

Woohoo!! The EU has finally admitted defeat on forcing the UK to use metric measurements.

EU gives up on 'metric' Britain.

Oh, thank God -sanity at last.

I think in pounds and ounces, pints etc and I'm under thirty, I've laways thought in those measurements, I know of people younger than me who are pounds and ounces users too becauae they pick it up off their parents and grandparents more than they pick up the kilos etc in school.

 

[neonlyte]

Luddites

 

[English Lady]

Luddites

Cosmopolitan!

 

[amicus]

I hate Litre's and Metre's and 'kilo' anythings...

Amicus!

 

[Vermilion]

HURRAH!

Now if we could just get the bastards to stop trying to take the queen off our passport...

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[Vermilion]

One victory may well lead to more
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[Chantilyvamp]

woohoo, less chance for me to go through life completely confused

 

[SensualCealy]

I was in grade three when we, Canada, went from imperial to metric.

I know ounces, pints, quarts, and gallons like the back of my hand.

I also know the basics of metric, but for the life of me, I can not remember the ml for 1/4 tsp, 1/2 tsp, 1 tsp, 1tbsp, then the cups! I always have to look at the handles of my measures, its marked on there because we have to have both on our measuring devices.

Its the conversion that messes me up most times, but hey something has to!
C

 

[Vermilion]

Does this mean TV chefs can go back to Imperial too, now?

I hate when they tell me I need 173 and a half grammes of something because they'bve had to convert it from lbs and ozs

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[scorpio4uok]

Great to keep our measuring devices, good old English Pound of apples, cant beat it better than the metric crap

 

[rgraham666]

Canadian here. I grew up in Imperial. And I use metric.

I can remember that there are twelve inches in a foot and three feet in a yard. But that's it.

Metric is so much easier to handle.

 

[neonlyte]

Does this mean TV chefs can go back to Imperial too, now?

I hate when they tell me I need 173 and a half grammes of something because they'bve had to convert it from lbs and ozs

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No one uses tele-grammes any more.

 

[knitedreams]

I seem to remember that the US was trying to convert to the Metric system because all the other countries were using it. My science instructors in college were all for it. Thank god it failed because I don't think I would have survived the change.

 

[R. Richard]

I worked at a place where they tried the metric thing. They gave it up after a young lady filed a sexual harrassment complaint because, "He pcentimetered me!"

 

[Liar]

Oh you can keep your local weirdness. It's kind of quaint.

 

[elfin_odalisque]

Matriarch, EL and Ver, don't pop the champagne, you are being conned.

Also, this has nothing to do with Gunther Verheugen suddenly liking the Brits.

You have the good old US of A to thank for a minor respite in enforcing the Napoleonic code of metrication. The EU had decreed that no product sold in Europe after 2010 could state any other measurement than metric. Exporters from the US raised a storm and, after bilateral talks the diktat was dropped.

Unless the EU backed down, you would have had the crazy position that imported US products in the UK could refer to pounds, pints and inches, but not anything made in the UK.

So, the EU has given nothing back - it will still be illegal to sell products other than in metric quantities - you can just add a memo of what the imperial equivalent is.

Think the EU is counting on the next generation wanting to throw out the olde worlde imperial system. How long can we in the US stay the only ones out of step? Heck we haven't even got the same paper and envelope sizes as you.

Wanna abandon A4 for legal?

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

WOOOOO!

*high five*

Now we can also use Dollars and say "Fuck Europe in General".

Jeffersonian Democracy!!!

Who's with me!!!!?!

...


...hello?

 

[elfin_odalisque]

Joe

Think you're a bit out of touch. After the sub-prime catastrophe, I think we have to start shouting, 'rupees, renmimbi and dirhams!!'.

How are the mighty fallen.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Joe

Think you're a bit out of touch. After the sub-prime catastrophe, I think we have to start shouting, 'rupees, renmimbi and dirhams!!'.

How are the mighty fallen.

New political strategy... we should get out of Iraq and start that whole Revolution thing again.

"No Taxation without Representation!"

And then, we can have a gentleman's war like the old days where we blow up their ship and then they blow up our ship and then we meet at Lexington and take turns shooting at each other and then we can whoop the British a couple of times and blame the King for everything.

I think Al Queda would take a moment of pause if England and the US went for round 3.

 

[Guest]

I asked a Brit once how the whole metric thing was going. He said it was odd to go to the lumber hard and order 10 meters of a 2x4.

As for "Long live pounds and ounces" my excess pounds have lived long already.

 

[Weird Harold]

Unless the EU backed down, you would have had the crazy position that imported US products in the UK could refer to pounds, pints and inches, but not anything made in the UK.

Instead, they have the confusion of English Measures, US Measures and Metric Measures -- at least in fluid measurements, English units (other than ounces) are about 25% bigger than US units.

"Going Metric" is really the only rational way to manage international packaging -- not only are here more people in the world comfortable with Metric, all of the Imperial units have been redefined as metric conversions -- no more barleycorns, knuckles, toes, etc setting the standards of measurement.

 

[Vermilion]

Matriarch, EL and Ver, don't pop the champagne, you are being conned.

at least fruit and veg marketers can sell a lb of bananas without being arrested now, though. FFS.

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[elfin_odalisque]

Ver,

No they can't! That's what you miss. The rules stay the same. Selling a pound of apples is crime with a max six month sentence.

 

[Remec]

Ver,

No they can't! That's what you miss. The rules stay the same. Selling a pound of apples is crime with a max six month sentence.

Don't they just use both measurements like pretty much everything in this country does? We may remain tied to all our old, traditional terms, but I can't think of anything we carry in my store that isn't labeled in both lb/oz as well as kg/g or gal/oz vs l/ml if it's a liquid item.