Centimeters and Inches

Okay, I have to say I was completely delighted that in response to yesterday's post, almost everybody objected to the incorrect measurement conversion. Not to any of the other blatant exaggerations. Not to the 20 days of rain (actually it was four); not to the 90-HP lawnmower (that's in the high range for a  traditionally sized farm tractor); not the grass growing to the height of the roof and later, to the height of the oak trees (turf grass maxes out at about 24 inches, and it's neither healthy nor manageable when it's that long); not the sinkholes that I could allegedly drive down into and back out of again (the largest actual pothole in my yard, for which I blame the gophers that live under the shed, is actually about the size of a mixing bowl); not the Mennonite and his team of horses (there has never been a horse in my yard that I know of); not the bad back putting me in traction (back trouble did land me on crutches once, thirty years ago); and not the 4.5-inch per hour rainfall (1.5 inches in 20 minutes x 3, which considerably exceeds the heaviest rain ever measured on Earth). All of that passed by without comment, while a dozen people took me to task for "not knowing" that one centimeter does not equal one inch!

...Which I realize, though, was probably not all that funny a joke. It actually occurred to me yesterday that although I have a sense of humor that is easily piqued, and I laugh at things a lot, and am delighted by the strangeness of the world and by the behavior of humans, I'm not actually a funny guy. I wish I were; sometimes I try. But I don't think I succeed very well. Ah well, I guess it's for the best that I don't try to write amusing posts all that often. I'm not even a good joke-teller, and telling jokes doesn't seem like it should be all that difficult. I can't even remember jokes very well. ("Why can't people remember jokes?" might be an interesting question to Google.)

I like lawn
However, good news to report: I got all the grass cut yesterday, and got some more mulching done, as well as a lot of raking. I have mulching blades on the John Deere, but the regular mower, a Honda, does a much better job of mulching leaves.

As for the advice that I should turn the lawn into prairie, the problem then would be that it would no longer be lawn. The main thing I use the yard for is throwing the ball for the dog, and he already loses balls regularly in the woods and the various areas that are grown up with ground cover, and sometimes under the pool table shed. Sometimes he wanders away with the ball in his mouth and comes back without it! He forgets where he put it and can't find it again. Generally, though, I like lawn. I had one small area that the previous owner fancied to be a "wildflower garden," and it had become an impenetrable thicket of goldenrod. Three years ago I mowed it in the spring, avoiding the peonies, which had been completely invisible behind all the goldenrod. And kept mowing it. No more goldenrod thicket. It's a much more attractive little patch of ground now, although any gardener worth his or her salt would have added many more flowering plants to it by now.

And, actually, I like yardwork, too. My usual strategy with the lawn is to cut it in sections, dividing it up into about five or six areas. Every nice day I'll go out and work on one section, get it cut and trimmed and neatened. That's about the limit of my patience and energy. Then the next time it's dry and sunny I'll do another section. This strategy mostly works. This time, however, because the grass is growing so fast right now, I had to do it all in two days, which is rather a project. Now that it's done, I'm safe for a week or so.

I've had professional gardeners come several times, and that's very rewarding—they do such a nice job, and it also inspires me to do more work myself. But it's frightfully expensive. I have way, way too much yard—it was because Sara had lived in a townhouse and wanted more room for gardens. We went too far the other way when choosing this house. I wouldn't have bought this house with all its gardens if I had known I'd be living here alone. If I could, I'd build a small house on half the property and sell it. Can't sell just the land, because someone would build a monstrosity on it and ruin my house. That's one more thing I'd do with resources, I guess. As it is, I should get rid of half the gardens. But that's expensive too. Change is usually expensive.

The yard will probably be the reason I'll have to move, eventually. Know what kind of house I fantasize about? One optimized to be efficient, low-maintenance, and easy to take care of. Those are not high priorities in home building. In fact, I'm going to write a whole post on that subject one day. 

Anyway, I'm just rambling. Back to regular programming soon.

Mike

Original contents copyright 2023 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Cab: "For what it's worth, I thought the inch = cm joke was the funniest bit in the column. I was almost positive you were joking, but if you weren't, that just makes it funnier (although in a much sadder way...)!"

Jeff1000: "I realized a long time ago that you lack a sense of humor. Usually, humor comes with intelligence, but I can see that humor is not a prerequisite."

Mike replies: In the question alone, there is insufficient evidence to deduce an answer. What kind of road is it? Is there traffic on the road? Can you cite studies concluding that chickens even have a working mental concept of what a "road" is? Was the chicken being chased? Were other chickens crossing the road with it, constituting a group, in which case the chicken might reasonably be considered to have been under the influence of peer pressure? What was on the other side of the road that might have acted as an inducement to the chicken to cross over? Until we know more about the context it would be nonsensical to formulate an answer. Therefore the question is not valid on its face and the proper response is to ignore it.

Ed Hawco: "Aw, Mike. I love your silly exaggerations and faux-errors (your 'correction' that it’s actually 180HP is hilarious). Please don’t take the un-heardness of our laughter as no laughter at all.

"Regarding the comments correcting your metric conversion, that’s classic 21st-century 'commentitis' in which people have an uncontrollable urge to correct apparent mistakes via comments, no matter what the context. For example, there was a meme going around Facebook recently in which we see a close-up photo of the face of the Statue of Liberty next to a close-up of the face of actor Owen Wilson. There’s a striking resemblance. But the caption reads, 'When you realize the statue of Mona Lisa looks like Keith Urban.' It’s obviously a mind-f*ck, and a hilarious one. But check the comments on the original post. 80% of them are people helpfully pointing out that the photos are incorrectly labelled. The other 20% as basically people doing face-palms to the 80%. Lesson: many people take things at face value, completely missing the point of subtle (or not so subtle) humor. And many people have an uncontrollable urge to offer corrections in comments. What’s not seen are the many, many people who just laughed and moved on."

Scott: "'I, for one, greatly enjoyed your successfully humorous post,' Scott, Blog comment on theonlinephotographer.com, 2023-04-27."

Henning: There are various precipitation measurements that are well over 4.5 in. per hour. Here is one that is about 16" in an hour. Clearly, it's not going to be about lawn tending anymore if that kind of rain comes down. Keuka Lake would be around your knees in short order. Fun post, in any case."

Kye Wood: "Late to the party here—but here goes. You are funny. If you think you're not, then you must be stupid. Seeing as how you're not stupid, then you must be funny. It's just math.

"Next, I have a photographic memory (true). When it comes up in conversation, I sometimes say I have a 'photogenic' memory. It's an attempt to be both dry and self deprecating. Sometimes, humourless people will tell me, 'Don't you mean you have a photographic memory?' To which, I have at times replied 'No, it's photogenic—I only remember people who look good in photographs.' Which has the unfortunate side effect of them thinking that I am either shallow, or a complete idiot. Both of which I am comfortable being thought of because I'm 57, so who do I have to impress?

"Keep on being funny Mike. You have no idea how important a little brightness might be in someone's day."

Peter Croft: "The funny thing is, I believed everything you wrote. That is, until you said the centimetres thing, which being in Australia, a metric country, I knew to be just a little exaggerated."

Comments

[Daniel]

Ah yes, inches and centimeters.
Brings to mind the tale of the customer who went into the hardware store to get some copper pipe.(UK) Asked for 30 feet of pipe. Store clerk told him "it has to be metric to order".
So, he asked for 10 meters(metres?).
Right, will that be 1/2 or 7/8 inch size?

USA is metric, so says old laws on converting that somehow never seem to be followed.

[John Krumm]

I seems like most people 60 and older could use a single story, modest, mid-century modern ranch house, not too big, and not built on a steep hill. Updated, in good repair, with bathrooms outfitted for older people. In a quiet neighborhood, but a real neighborhood with sidewalks. Either that or a condo. I’m 58 and kind of wish we lived in one now.

[Thomas Mc Cann]

You should look at the specs for a passif house if you're thinking of building.https://passipedia.org/basics/what_is_a_passive_house

We moved many years ago My wife insisted she get a garden. She got 1.5 acres and really only dabbles in the beds around the house whilst muggins is left with the rest. Thankfully youngest son is still at home and is a keen gardener so he manages the ride on mower and the two greenhouses.

[Sal Santamaura]

...Can't sell just the land, because someone would build a monstrosity on it and ruin my house...

Sure you can. Just place whatever deed restriction(s) you'd like on the land you sell with respect to how it can be improved.

[DavidB]

...the heaviest rain ever measured on Earth...

Nice post at this link discussing various record rainfalls.

https://www.wunderground.com/blog/weatherhistorian/what-is-the-most-rain-to-ever-fall-in-one-minute-or-one-hour.html

[Zyni]

Someone must say this, so: where I live smallest John Deere tractor is 36KW which is 49hp. Bottom end of most powerful range is 10 times more power: 360kW or about 500hp. High end is 508kW which is nearly 700hp.

[mynameiseli]

rather enjoyed the wry humor.
the distance conversion was a clean tipoff that neatly framed the whole.
personally, not questioning _your_ sense of humor here! :)

[robert e]

I did as you suggested asked Google "Why can't people remember jokes?" which produced this entertaining article giving several reasons. The gist is that jokes (except for oft-repeated clichés) and joke-telling are by their nature confounding to the way human memory works, which I take to mean that people like us who can't remember jokes have especially human brains.

https://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/17/science/17angi.html

Now I'll go read that post I missed yesterday so I know what you're talking about today. But i seems to me that the obvious answer to your lawn maintenance problem is to build a snooker shed.

[Brian Ripley]

the 90-HP lawnmower (that's in the high range for a full-sized farm tractor)

Not at all: Jeremy Clarkson's Lamborghini tractor has 269bhp, and other are over 550bhp.

[NikoJorj]

> 4.5-inch per hour rainfall (1.5 inches in 20 minutes x 3, which considerably exceeds the heaviest rain ever measured on Earth).
4.5 inches is 114mm, it's quite a heavy downpour, but not unheard of in some regions.
The world record for 1h is 12 inches : https://wmo.asu.edu/content/world-greatest-sixty-minute-one-hour-rainfall

[Patrick Dodds]

I asked chat gpt why people can't remember jokes the answer is too boring to repeat here.

[Dan Khong]

Everything (and need to) get smaller as people (including their shrinking brains) grow old - house, land, living space, pets, toys, cars, circle of friends.....and so forth.

What's one camera that you would like to be left with to shoot as you grow old?

[Rick in CO]

The chicken crossed the road because even though it was 16 feet wide, it only looked like 5 meters. It was a French Hen.

[JimF]

Salesmen can remember jokes. Which is explained by Robert e’s comment. No offense intended but facts are facts.

[MikeR]

Heck, I just thought that you were channeling Dave Barry.

[Tony Ayling]

I lived in the Australian wet tropics for many years and I can tell you we regularly recorded much more than 4.5” per hour. When it rained heavily we would get an inch every 5 minutes or so. The highest 24 hour total was something over 850mm or 32”. Now that’s rain!

[Bear.]

I was a kid in 1974 when Australia converted to metric. My friend Colin, next door, was helping his Dad with some yard work, and his Dad was carefully pacing out the distance for a pipe. Colin called out, “you can’t pace out yards any more Dad, we’ve gone metric”. His Dad replied, “you’re right Son, I’ll start again”. And he did, solemnly adding a tiny one-legged hop after he took each step.

[John Camp]

Two (serious) comments.

Your post reflected how you felt about the lawn, not how it actually was. Perfectly legitimate, IMHO.

I'm more concerned about your flower garden. I have an extensive one (by late May or June.) If you go online for and look for wildflower seeds, you can buy a couple of pounds of mixed seeds for a few dollars. Get the 'partial shade' seeds. Rake the former goldenrod patch with a garden rake, and rake hard. Hand spread the seeds. Water occasionally, if it doesn't rain. The result will be glorious. Total work time? Maybe a half-hour.

[Robert Roaldi]

When I read it, I thought, wow, that's some serious as shit lawn mower!

[Rob de Loe]

The only thing I can add is this classic:
https://xkcd.com/386/

[Rob Griffin]

You may have heard this one, but if everyone is talking powerful lawn mowers and metric equivalents, what the heck.

A friend of mine set out to solve one of the worlds great mysteries so he posted that he had placed separate orders for an egg and a chicken from Amazon. He said he would let me know. A few years have past and I still have not heard from him! Still hoping though.

[Jeff1000]

It seems that you’re confusing “intellectual absurdity” with humor. Humor seems to be more rooted in emotion.

[Richard Alan Fox]

Thank you for the mention of Sara, I didn’t remember her name but I do recall that time in your life when you made the move to be near her. I have been reading you since your paper magazine days and find the development of your life outside of photography of equal interest to your involvement with photography.
I eagerly await your autobiography.

[xf mj]

I’ve noticed, in amateur photographer internet culture, a greater preponderance of the literal-minded than the fanciful. I think that’s just fine, though it can sometimes lead to sometimes overly rational, or rule-based, and pedantic arguments about shooting monochrome, about lens equivalence, etc. It’s a documentarian’s medium and a tech- and mechanism-lover’s hobby, too, and there’s room for all of us different sorts of weirdos, I guess. But then we can often talk past each other, and also you don’t need to lob too high to have it fly over some people’s heads either.

I just thought you were being very self-deprecating about your Imperial Unit-based American-ness, etc. having a Honda-powerful John Deere tractor and all, some sort of corrective to all those damn snooker posts ;)

[David Dyer-Bennet]

Sorry! The others were obvious exaggerations, but somehow the metric problem wasn't.

[Ken Burg]

It's funny that I've never considered you funny. I'm drawn to your blog because of your superb writing skills, something very rare to be found on the internet beyond news sites - and even they are in need of proofreaders more than you could imagine! I read somewhere decades ago that Henry David Thoreau wrote in a style absent of slang, exaggeration, etc. so that no matter how much time passes or whatever language it may be translated into he would be understood. I put you into that category. Keep up the good work - absent the humor of course. ;))