conversion

you may have forgotten—i certainly had—about multiplying by 5/9th’s, then adding 32…or is it multiplying by 9/5th’s and then adding 32 (?) to convert Centigrade to Fahrenheit. As you know, one can find it difficult to know at times whether one feels cold or warm without knowing what the temperature actually is. My brother-in-law Geoff, who has lived in NZ and Australia and now NZ again (since the 70’s) but is still ‘American’ furnished a far simpler conversion that is as close to accurate as necessary: add 15 and then multiply by 2. This means when the outside temperature reading on the dashboard says 18, you add 15, multiply by 2 then presto—yes it feels warm because it is 66 degrees F.

Much more challenging was to take this information—the Suzuki ‘Liana’ goes 100 kilometers on 9.7 liters of petrol and convert that consumption to figures my little brain can digest. The only easy part is kilometers to miles…divide 100 by 8 and multiply by 5--100 k is 62.5 miles. Now we have 9.7 liters for 62.5 miles (urban), 6.0 liters for 62.5 (ex-urban) and 7.4 liters combined. (I know you know urban=city, ex-urban=country or open road [erase interstate from your lexicon].) Now if you are aware that 4.546 liters equals 1 Imperial gallon and that 1 Imperial gallon equals 3.70 American gallons, the rest is easy. Without the guidance of a major scientific mind next to me though, I would not be able to tell you that our new little auto gets 24.23 mpg (city), 47.354 mpg (country) and 38.395 mpg combined. Incidentally, the price of petrol came down this week but last week, it was calculated that the price of petrol here was the equivalent of $4.22 a gallon (in US dollars and US gallons). Don’t ask me to help you calculate that!

Today’s amusing vignette from the life of John: It was the last degree of dusk when I walked past Lily’s room today on the 2nd floor. A new posting was affixed to her door. I really wanted to check it out…and reached for the light switch. It felt a little odd. Imagine my surprise when I realized that my fingers were fiddling with one of the myriad, omnipresent picture hangers that dot the walls. [the new sign reads: “Go away! (not including Mum and Dad) (and friend and cousens)”]

the final chapter of 'the mouse' remains to be written, but look for the first chapters in this saga soon...