“Imperial Measure” by tudedude is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0Continuing the conversation between Tim and Steve. Catch up on the first 17 installments via Steve’s author page.
“Tim….”
“Yes, Steve?”
“Is it just me…”
“Probably, mate…”
“Or are your flagpoles…”
“Getting bigger? Yes.”
“I thought so…”
“Well spotted.”
“I mean, they were big before…”
“Not really…”
“But now they must each be…”
“You can never have…”
“Let’s say…”
“A big enough flagpole, Steve.”
“Twenty metres high?”
“No.”
“No?”
“Two chains.”
“Where?”
“You’re looking at them…”
“I’m seeing four flagpoles, Tim…”
“You misunderstand…”
“Unless I’m missing something…”
“Two chains…”
“So you said…”
“Forty-four yards tall….”
“Oh…”
“Wonderful, aren’t they?”
“You’ve gone…”
“Yes?”
“Right down…”
“Flagpoles go up, Steve…”
“The rabbit hole…”
“Burrow.”
“Sorry?”
“Rabbits.”
“Er…”
“Live in burrows.”
“I know…”
“Not great builders of flagpoles, rabbits.”
“OK…”
“Thought you’d have known that.”
“What I mean is…”
“Anyway, Spaffa says they’re great…”
“I’m sure he does…”
“Says I’m reclaiming…”
“There’s a surprise…”
“The imperial measurements…”
“Go on…”
“Which are our birthright, Steve.”
“Oh boy.”
“They’re simple, instinctive…”
“Really?”
“Easy to understand…”
“Have you perchance been drinking, Tim?”
“Absolutely.”
“Thought so…”
“Warm Carling…”
“Delicious…”
“By the quart…”
“Good grief…”
“Only the best, Steve…”
“Right…”
“Only the best…”
“Hmmmm…”
“Three quarts down…”
“Impressive…”
“And tasting better by the minute…”
“If you say so…”
“Anyway, take that flagpole…”
“Must we?”
“Two chains…”
“Right…”
“One fifth of a furlong…”
“OK…”
“One fortieth of a mile…”
“Uh-huh…”
“Or…”
“I’m all ears…”
“One hundred and thirty-two feet…”
“Gosh…”
“Three hundred and ninety-six hands…”
“Obviously…”
“Fifteen hundred and eighty-four inches…”
“Trips off the tongue…”
“Or a shedload of barleycorn.”
“If you say so.”
“Easy as you like, see?”
“My head’s spinning, mate.”
“Imperial is the future, Steve…”
“It really isn’t, Tim.”
“An invaluable addition to our new sunlit uplands…”
“You think?”
“Sunlight by the bushel here, Steve.”
“Hmmm…”
“Uplands stretching out for mile…”
“Right…”
“After mile…”
“I see…”
“After mile…”
“And the empty shelves?”
“I’m sorry?”
“What do they come in, Tim?”
“There are no…”
“Perches?”
“Empty…”
“Roods?”
“Shelves…”
“Acres?”
“Empty shelves are fake news, Steve.”
“Fake news?”
“Yes, mate.”
“You sure, Tim?”
“I am.”
“Really?”
“Look, here’s a photo of a full shelf…”
“I see…”
“I took only yesterday…”
“On your phone…”
“On my phone, mate.”
“That shelf, Tim…”
“Yes?”
“Packed with Spanish goods…”
“Um…”
“With prices written in Spanish…”
“Er…”
“You sure that’s not a photo of a Spanish supermarket…”
“No…”
“You just found on the internet?”
“That’s not really the point, Steve.”
“Oh, I think you’ll find it is.”
“It isn’t.”
“It really is.”
“The point is, Steve…”
“Uh-huh?”
“That you might be happy…”
“Generally, yes.”
“To live under metric tyranny…”
“You what?”
“But some of us have woken up…”
“You’re kidding me…”
“Cast the scales from our eyes…”
“Metric scales, Tim?”
“Thrown off this yoke of oppression…”
“Oppression?”
“Yes.”
“It’s a dead cat, Tim.”
“Come again?”
“A dead cat.”
“Oppression is a dead cat?”
“Thrown in to distract you…”
“Is this one of those box things, mate?”
“From the very real supply problems…”
“Where the cat is dead if I look…”
“Caused by Spaffa’s failure to plan…”
“And not dead if I don’t?”
“Which are raising prices…”
“So that it’s simultaneously both dead…”
“Leaving vegetables…”
“And alive…”
“Rotting in the field…”
“Which melts my head, to be honest…”
“And leading to shortages…”
“Shortfinger’s cat, wasn’t it…?”
“Of foodstuffs….”
“Bet it turned up…”
“And empty shelves…”
“When it wanted feeding…”
“With every prospect…”
“Like cats do…”
“Of it getting worse.”
“What are you on about, Steve?”
“Instead of real and necessary change…”
“Eh?”
“Spaffa feeds you this imperial nonsense…”
“He doesn’t…”
“And there you are…”
“Where?”
“Stuck in a car on bricks…”
“I’ve told you…”
“Going nowhere…”
“It’s a work in progress…”
“Surrounded by flagpoles…”
“Impressive, though, aren’t they?”
“What?”
“The flagpoles.”
“Er, I guess…”
“Visible from space, I reckon…”
“Wonderful, I’m sure.”
“Imagine, aliens seeing my flagpoles…”
“Bet they measure them in metres, Tim.”
“Get stuffed.”
“Advanced civilisation, see.”
“Shut it!”
“And they don’t drink…”
“You’re so full of…”
“Room temperature Carling, either…”
“So you won’t want one, then?”
“Well, if you’re offering…”
“Cheers.”
“Cheers.”
“Here, it says 500ml on this can, Tim.”
“Old stock, Steve.”
“Pre Spaffa?”
“Fell off the back of an alien lorry.”
“Did it now?”
“Mum’s the word…”
“I’ll say nothing…”
“Good man…”
“If you won’t…”
“The truth is out there, mate.”
“It probably is, Tim. It probably is.”
