2001.01.26
People say you can't compare apples and oranges. But why not? They are both hand-held, round, edible, fruity things that grow on trees.
This particular assesment is backed up with SHE BLINDED ME WITH SCIENCE evidence by this analysis of apples and oranges.
Ramble of the Moment
Went to Greg + Karen's (and Joseph's) for dinner last night. Had a very nice time. Played Trival Pursuit (Millennium Edition). There was one question that I got that really bugged me, and not just because I got it wrong. It was
What's the base unit of mass in the metric system?The answer as "kilogram". Now, I'm covinced that even the most rudimentary knowledge of how the prefix- system of the metric system works would indicate "gram" is the correct answer. Which my SO and so-called friends (kidding, guys) didn't accept. So I think at least one of the following is true:
- I was correct by saying the base unit
- There's some weird 'defintion of mass' thing that explicitly uses kilogram and not gram
- The two answers were roughly the same anyway
Followup
The other day I had a reference to Bruce Sterling's 13 Ways of Looking at a Blackout (on the whole mess in California.) Greg pointed out that this is a play on Wallace Steven's 13 Ways of Looking at a Blackbird (he was a double Computer Science / English major at Tufts, in fact he probably gave me the idea.) It's funny that I my education would miss something like that. There are actually many other articles that play with that title.