THE MONKEYS RUN IN THE DARK HOURS BEFORE DAWN

We usually go to bed about ten at night and read until midnight.   After we cut the lights out, I spend five minutes coughing and rolling and tossing before I find that perfect spot and fall asleep.    At four-thirty nature calls and I get up and stumble into the bathroom for an old man pee.  

 

Back in bed I try to fall back to sleep, but usually the cat jumps on the bed and wants to snuggle between my legs.    I lie there awake, but resting.  At my age it is not particularly pleasant to dwell on the past or the future, so better to channel my mind to the obscure thoughts that inhabit the predawn.

 

I plan to move my storage shed forward twelve feet in the next couple of weeks, once the ground firms up.    Twelve feet.   One foot.  Who came up with the concept of a foot?   What a ridiculous measurement.

 

12 inches equals a foot; 3 feet or 36 inches equals a yard; 5280 feet equals a mile….   Idiocy.   If a foot is your standard of measurement, where did the name inch come from, or yard, or mile?  How were those measurement determined?

 

Instead of an inch why not call it a toe?  Twelve toes to a foot.    But wait, that doesn’t make sense, we only have five toes on a foot.   

 

 If the foot is our standard, perhaps it should go like this: 

1 toe replaces the inch standard; 

3 toes = 1 finger; 

2 fingers = 1 dick;

 2 dicks = 1 foot;

 6 feet = 1 deadman;

 1000 deadmen equal…  

That would be interesting but ridiculous, and besides it is sexist.   Why should we only use men as our measurement standard?

 

People who do a lot of carpentry often measure with their hands.  One joint of my first finger equals one inch; the three joints are three inches and the joint behind the knuckle is four inches.   My span from thumb tip to middle finger tip is nine inches.   I have a measuring tool with me all the time.   Instead of feet, we could measure in spans with nine joints to a span.   

 

But wait; 16 inches on center is the golden number for U.S. carpenters.   Why aren’t we using a joist as our standard? 

 

The metric system makes a lot more sense; except, I don’t like the word meter.   It would be great to change it a loon: milliloon, centiloon, decaloon and a loony.   Except Canada has already coopted the loony.    Also, the abbreviation for milliloon (ml) would conflict with milliliter (ml), a volume measurement.

 

Anyway, as soon as the ground firms up I have got to move my shed forward twelve feet (or two deadmen.)

  

the Ol’Buzzard