Weights and Measures

Jace is learning about measuring things at school. He brings home at least one worksheet each week on the subject. "How Many Paw Prints Are You?" "Your Hand is How Many Cubes Long?" "Measure These Items in Pennies." It seems anything can be used to see how long, how tall, or how big. And it's reasonable...because we all use what we know to measure what needs measuring.

Today the kids and I went to the zoo and I got chicken fingers and french fries for lunch. They weren't too greasy and tasted quite good. I'd gotten one of those little condiment cups with ketchup in it. After filling it the third time (I'm a slow learner) I just took the tray up and pumped ketchup directly onto it. I didn't want to know how much ketchup I was really comsuming, which would have been obvious if I kept going little cup by little cup.

On the way home we stopped at the grocery store for a few things. I overheard a guy talking about how his significant other determines his love for her. "Oh, she doesn't care how many things it takes...she's got a dollar amount in mind that I have to reach in candy, flowers, and other crap. If I don't spend enough, she'll start questioning my love." I felt bad for the guy...what a way to assess his feelings. By the way, happy Valentine's Day to you.

Another standard unit of measurement, that I really should address, is the chicken box. I don't even remember what I was telling my then roomie, Cathy, about. But at some point in college I was relating a story to her and mentioned that something was "two chicken boxes" worth. It didn't even occur to me that she wouldn't know what I was talking about because in my family, this was the box used for holding hand-me-down clothes, old toys, and everything else that probably needed to be gotten rid of but couldn't be parted with yet. My family took care of the chicken for the church's annual chicken BBQ which came in these very sturdy boxes that, once cleaned up, were ideal for storage. Now you know. Feel free to start using this any time...it's about yay big.

Other common units you may want to incorporate into daily use: bigger than a breadbox, up to here (hold hand accordingly), a fortnight, baby-poop yellow, a New York minute, mean like a jelly bean, and, in the spirit of the day, longer than the song of a Whippoorwill.