I had a few minutes today between an interview and dinner so I decided to sneak in a quick run. Being in Oxford, I assumed the treadmill was calibrated in kilometers like many countries in Europe. I did a quick mental calculation and bumped up the speed to 12 km/hour. Or so I thought. Turns out 12 miles/hour is very, very fast! For the record, the weights were all in kilograms and the scale was in stones.
I recovered from my 12mph sprint with the OSS Watch folks and Richard Melville from UKUUG with a glass of mulled wine at the Turf Tavern. I found it fascinating that it's been a tavern since the 17th century. Ross Gardler and Gabriel Hanganu took me on a short walk this afternoon and I have to say the whole city of Oxford is fascinating. (I also learned this is where my alma matter Rice University got the college system. And where the dining hall scenes in the Harry Potter movies were filmed.)
Photo by Jim Linwood.
And in Ireland the road distances are displayed in kilometres if the sign has san-serif typeface, or miles if it is serif…
There was a good QI episode where they covered this…
If the temperature is hot then we use Farenheight, but if cold then Celsius.
Distances are metric up until miles.
Speed is in mph.
Efficiency is in mpg.
Petrol is in litres.
Milk comes in pints in bottles, or litres in cartons.
All other drinks are metric except beer in pint or 1/2 pint glasses.
So yes… a mess 🙂
Then they might have one of the few populations in the world where everyone knows the difference between serif and san-serif!
it’ll take a few decades to make the full switch to metric, and for a long time it’ll be a mixture…
*Very* few road signs in Ireland still show miles, though, except for the occasional really old one out in the country. That was true even before I moved here 10 years ago.
Until the recent switchover from mph to km/h, though, it’s certainly true that all the distances were shown in kilometres, while all the speed limit signs were in miles per hour…