Give Them An Inch and They'll Take The Miles
Ponies from all over Ponyville gathered in the meeting room of the town hall. Voices and murmurs filled the crowd as they waited.
Mayor Mare walked up to the podium and spoke to the crowd. “Fillies and gentlecolts, Princess Twilight Sparkle has an announcement to make.”
The ponies in the crowd clapped as the young alicorn took the stage, a stack of notes floating in her telekinesis. Thankfully, Twilight had learned from her prior speeches that were far too lengthy. This time, she had prepared a reasonably-sized stack of notes: 153 pages as opposed to 154. Baby steps.
“Thank you all for coming,” said Twilight Sparkle, smiling. The applause quieted down as she began her speech.
“Since I became princess, I have hardly exercised my power at all. I felt that I needed to grow into the role. But now, nearly a year after ascending to become an alicorn and being crowned, I am ready to issue my first royal decree.”
There was scattered applause, the ponies not knowing what to expect. Most of them only knew Twilight as just the town librarian and, now that the library had been destroyed, the town alicorn with the tacky crystal castle. They weren’t used to her ordering them around. Well, except for that one time that she had hypnotized them all so that she wouldn’t be late on an assignment and disappoint Princess Celestia, and then that other time that she had demanded the town be safety-proofed to stop an impending future disaster. Other than that, though, she wasn’t too much of a control freak.
She continued, “For many years, Equestria has needed to make a change. We’ve been putting it off for a while now. As a student, I’m not immune to procrastination, but Equestria now stands alone as the last country to do this. Over the years, my friends and I have saved the land from perpetual darkness, chaos, and enslavement. Now, it’s time to save the land from inefficiency. But this inefficiency isn’t a villain to be blasted with magical beams: it will require every last one of us to alter the way we do things. So, as a princess and a scholar, I believe that it is finally time...”
She paused and took a breath. The room was so quiet, you could hear Pinkie Pie’s rapid, irregular heartbeat.
“...for Equestria to convert to the metric system.”
All of a sudden, the metaphorical valve burst, and noise and chatting flooded the room as ponies muttered.
Twilight motioned with her hoof for everypony to be quiet. “I know that it will be difficult to change, but many other countries have made the switch: Trotland, Oatstralia, even our northern neighbors in the Crystal Empire. Once we are all using metric, we would never want to go back. It’s easy, and there’s no need to remember how many hooves in a mile or how many quarts in a gallon. Everything is just in tens! Sure, it might be an inconvenience at first to learn a new system, but it’s a one-time cost, and we will continue to reap benefits from it indefinitely. But before I use a royal decree to make this change, I wanted to open this up to comment from the public.”
A hoof shot up in the back of the room.
“Yes, Cheerilee?”
Cheerilee said, “I for one, support this change. It’s always a hassle to teach students to use both the Equestrian customary measurements, and metric measurements. When we’re just using one system, then I can spend more time teaching valuable things, like lessons in how to get a cutie mark even though most students in my class already have them!”
A few of the ponies in the room nodded in approval. Another hoof went in the air.
“Yes, Davenport?”
“I’m also in support. As the proprietor of Davenports’ Quills, Sofas, and Rulers, I could sure use the extra business from ponies all coming in to buy new meter sticks.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow. “You do rulers now, too?”
Davenport chuckled. “Yeah, it was really hard to pay the bills just doing quills and sofas, especially in a small town where most ponies already have both and don’t replace them very often. So I decided to expand my offerings to another obscure, rarely-purchased product.”
“Um… good call?” said Twilight.
Two hooves shot up, from Mr. and Mrs. Cake.
“Sugarcube Corner opposes the change,” said Mr. Cake, his brow furrowed. “All of our recipes are in tablespoons, teaspoons, pints, and quarts. Our oven is in fahrenheit. Our customers buy our goods by the pound and ounce. Do you have any idea how much it would cost for us to convert all of that over? We’re bakers, not mathematicians!”
Mrs. Cake nodded. “If Equestria converts to metric, then we’ll have to change Pound Cake’s name to Kilogram Cake! And he’ll have to grow twice as big!”
“And then we won’t be able to make puns about him ‘pounding’ things, and his name won’t start with P like his sister’s,” said Mr. Cake.
“But what if tourists from a foreign country come to Sugarcube Corner and they're confused? Every other country in the world has already switched over to metric,” said Twilight Sparkle.
“If every other country in the world jumped off a cliff, would you do it, too?” asked Mrs. Cake.
Other ponies in the crowd nodded in approval. Another hoof shot up.
“Yes, Applejack?”
“The Equestrian system is tradition! Y’all can’t just go changin’ things around. It’s our national pride!”
Rarity said, “I agree with Applejack and the Cakes. I also oppose this. When making dresses at Carousel Boutique, I measure my customers’ sizes in inches. I order my fabric in hooves and yards. Ponies are reluctant to change. The system of measurement is much like fashion: it can’t just be updated on a mere whim.”
Twilight threw her hooves up. “But fashion is always changed on a whim! Remember last summer when being unseasonable became trendy, and everypony started wearing scarves and stocking caps even though it was 35 degrees out?”
Ponies muttered in confusion.
Twilight clarified, “Thirty-five celsius, not Fahrenheit.”
“Ohhhh,” everypony in the room said at once.
“I’ll only support the change if I get to make up my own wacky units! Like kilofunnies, or happygrams, or utils!” Pinkie exclaimed.
Ignoring Pinkie, Twilight said, “We have to quit using antiquated units. We’re living in the modern era, the age of science. We need scientific measurements based off of unchanging principles in nature, like the distance that light travels in a vacuum, or the mass of a fixed volume of water. I mean, do we really want to be using measurements based on the weight of Princess Celestia’s crown, or the width of Princess Celestia’s hoof? I think--”
“What’s that about my hoof?”
All the ponies turned towards the doorway. There stood the towering form of the princess, exactly one celestia tall. Twilight Sparkle turned beet red in the presence of her personal mentor: the supreme Princess of Equestria who she would never, ever want to disappoint.
Twilight stammered, “Uh… I was just… um…”
Celestia asked, “Do ponies no longer wish to measure based off of the width of my hoof?”
“Uh… we do! We do! Don’t we, everypony?” asked Twilight, grinning sheepishly.
Everypony in the crowd nodded.
"Yeah!"
"Totally!"
Princess Celestia smiled.
“That’s good to hear,” she said. “I’m glad that my subjects are happy with the measurement system I created for them.”
“Sorry about wasting your time, Ponyville,” said Twilight Sparkle, her head hung low as she left the stage. Everypony filed out of the room.
And thus, Equestria remained non-metric forever.
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Is there a canon standard of measurements? My headcanon already has them using metric.
5815697 They only ever say non-metric measurements in the show. Miles and inches have both been used.
Looks like Equestria is centimetering its way towards progress!
There was a funny anecdote in another story about how Equestrian scientists of old used Celestia's barrel as a fundamental unit of measurement, but after 300 years and the invention of cake, they quietly switched it out because according to their measurements, everything was getting smaller.
5815713 That's hilarious about Celestia's barrel and cake
Also, economists are the philosophy majors of the business world.
5815721 Whoah, whoah, that story had nothing to do with cake, that was just a footnote. It was determined by all the scientists who weren't banished that the world had begun mysteriously shrinking (except for Celestia's barrel) and thus some other unit of measurement that was shrinking at an equal rate would be a better choice.
5815729 Ah. What story was this? Now I'm curious.
5815733 It's somewhere in Starswirl and the Purple Terror, I may have misremembered parts of it, but that is a great story.
5815739 Cool, it's on my RIL list, thanks
5815721 Also, philosophy majors are cleaning up when they get MBAs, because they go around saying they have "critical thinking skills" developed by their undergrad. Not saying that is true or false, just a nice symmetry.
I will say that moving from the UK to the US that inches, yards, and feet made no sense to me. Now, I can't go back to metric.
Not to say the UK didn't have odd measurements. I mean, what the hell is a stone? As in "I weight X stone".
5815704
Pinkie Pie in Griffon the Brush Off: "Hmm. Maybe a few inches to the south. Now a couple centimeters north. Okay. One more smidgimeter to the-- "
The other references to miles and inches I could find were all more figures of speech than precise measurements. (I researched this for my story Time on Their Hooves)
Anyway a great fun story. I liked the Pound Cake jokes.
5815704 I may have to adjust my headcanon some.
Might be a good idea to do a S1-4 marathon to refresh things inside my brainpan as well.
5815785 Glad you liked the story!
Twilight Sparkle refers to a candy cane as being eight feet tall.
5815804 I have been meaning to watch them all again sometime.
5815758
14 pounds. I fail to see why using 14 as a multiplier is any odder than 1760 (yards to a mile). Personally I've always weighed myself in kilograms anyway.
The only major things which are still measured almost exclusively in Imperial units in the UK are road distances (and hence speed and acceleration), beer, and milk. Pretty much everything else is metric.
5815697
Personally when I need a measurement in a fic, I use something like "three pony lengths".
(laughing) P.
5815913 that would work in many occasions, but most of my stuff is of a more technical nature. That WILL work perfectly in an upcoming fic I have in the planning stages currently.
Horses are traditionally measured in units of 4 inches called "hands." I guess they had to retire that system because Lyra wouldn't shut up about it.
>One celestia tall.
…
I think my headcanon is being updated against my will.
Twilight: But what about Luna?
Celestia: What?
Twilight: Why are you disregarding her hooves?
Luna: *gasp* Is it true, Sister? Wouldst thou truly disregard our hoofsies like this?
...
Celestia: Let's hear three cheers for the metric system!
Okay fine, I admit it. That last gag got me. The thought of Celestia subtly telling Equestria "Don't you fucking dare convert," is really funny to me.
This. Thank you for this.
A tragic ending, if there ever was one.
Metric is better. Why do people think it's so hard to measure in powers of ten? WHY?!
I like the metric system for everything except cooking, because you're much more likely to change a recipe by a factor of 2 than a factor of 10.
And the metric system didn't start related to universal constants, if I recall correctly. The units are now tied to the things Twilight mentioned, but it's a retcon that could as easily be applied to the Equestrian system of measurement.
Also, it's much easier to use English units when writing song lyrics. Mile fits a heck of a lot better than kilometer.
Every joke just flowed right in to the next. I loved it. The best had to be the Celsius thing xD
So when will Equestria adopt a decimal monetary system? In the immortal words of Sir Terry Pratchett, the old British money is described:
5816558
I, as an American can say that the metric system makes no sense at all. I have never been able to make heads or tails of that infernal system. I should also note any math is in Klingon to me. Why it is taught out of the sciencetific circles is beyond me.
Luna is still getting used to the lack of cubits, barleycorns, and ells.
You know, if I had been a Pony in the crowd, my first question would have been "Does Celestia know about this?"
That's it.
I lost it.
Well done.
5816694
Then whats a quid? And is a coupla' quid more than two quids?
Teh british monies baffle me
5816597
Imperial/US standard units don't run in multiples of two either, so I'm not getting your point here.
It wasn't always the same constants as now, but it was still measurable constants.
The metre was one ten millionth of the distance from the north pole to the equator (or rather, it was the best measurement the French could get for it in the late 18th century, and then set as that regardless of any later measurements of the Earth).
The gram was then defined as the mass of a cubic centimetre of water.
The second was defined (using non-metric-style multiples) as one 84600th of an average (mean) day.
And then ever other measurement considered metric in the 19th century was defined in terms of these three units.
While we're comparing to imperial/US standard units, all of these units are then legally defined in terms of metric units. An inch is exactly equal to 25.4 millimetres, and so on.
5817892 Measuring cups come in 1 cup, 1/2 cup, 1/4 cup, etc. So if a recipe calls for 1 cup of flour, it's easy to cut it in half with the standard tools in your kitchen.
Celestia is now worst Princess (in this Fic)... I mean while AJ at least has a somehow good reason to keep the old system, Celestia just wanted to keep it cause they mesure things based on her Hoof, Size and Weight.
Weird how on a story about measurement, fimfiction's word count seems to have derped up and displays the word count for the story as zero words...
5817878
A quid is just slang for a pound (in Ireland, a euro can also be referred to as a quid). The plural is also quid, so it would be two quid instead of two quids. A couple'a quid can be any small number of pounds. I'd use it for anything between two and five, but I'm sure there are people who'd pick a slightly different range.
5817990 That was weird, but not the weirdest I've seen. I've submitted a story once that showed one character tag three times over. So a few folk thought I featured Berry Punch three times in the story. Weird.
I like this story by the way.
Oh my god, the minute I saw this story title, I had to read it. Well done!
Also...
rs2img.memecdn.com/lord-freedom_o_2381395.jpg
5817945
My recipes come in cups as well, but I know that a metric cup is 250mL, so it remains easy to divide or multiply even if I don't have regular measuring cups. A metric teaspoon is 5mL and a (standard) metric tablespoon is 15mL.
As an American, I know both systems. Yes, I know our system is odd and all, but what's so hard about it? Anyone with a brain can understand it.
Now, the other types of measurements (like Newtons, Watts and all) that's a different story.
5817892
In cooking, a lot of them do. A cup is 16 (2^4) tablespoons. A pint is two cups. A quart is two pints. A gallon is 4 (2^2) quarts.
Fortunately for me, between roleplaying and the time of my education (and engineering training) I'm capable of dealing with both metric and largely imperial - at least as far as any practical and mathmatical usages go...
This is definitely a cheap shot at us Americans, but I take no issue. It's only because I've grown up on the Imperial system and am so used to it that I'd rather we don't switch to metric universally. Otherwise, I'd say switching would be a fantastic idea— metric would be exponentially easier. Hospitals use metric already— they only convert measurements to imperial for the patient's benefit.
The metric system is for nerds.
*mic drop*
5819864 Super-geniuses like myself use both systems interchangeably while performing simultaneous measurement calculations in bases 6, 8, and 12.
And that's just to keep out minds busy while we're doing easy things like building a warp drive and performing brain surgery at the same time.
5819046
A metric cup is still 16 metric tablespoons, and four cups make a litre. Yours is just flooded with extra names for every in between multiple.
5821045
That doesn't follow the basic metric pattern of multiples of ten though.
I am American, offended, and upvoting this story.
5821103
That's because it isn't a standard metric unit. It is accepted very widely around the world however.