AdamSmith

A meet & fitting order of precedence.

Target pharmacy also has very good prices on some Rx's, tho not all. Weird -- no one chain seems to have best prices overall. Appears to depend on specific chains cutting deals for specific drugs. E.g., my statin is about $40 for 30 pills most everywhere except for Rite Aid where the price is $9.99.

Dowd's precise point.

Hmm. Harper Lee Lawyer Offers More Details on Discovery of New Book http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/02/09/books/harper-lee-lawyer-offers-more-details-on-discovery-of-go-set-a-watchman.html

Dowd is pretty harsh. And accurate. Anchors Aweigh Maureen Dowd WASHINGTON -- THIS was a bomb that had been ticking for a while. NBC executives were warned a year ago that Brian Williams was constantly inflating his biography. They were flummoxed over why the leading network anchor felt that he needed Hemingwayesque, bullets-whizzing-by flourishes to puff himself up, sometimes to the point where it was a joke in the news division. But the caustic media big shots who once roamed the land were gone, and there was no one around to pull his chain when he got too over-the-top, as one NBC News reporter put it. It seemed pathological because Williams already had the premier job, so why engage in résumé inflation? And you dont get those jobs because of your derring-do. When Williams was declared the hair apparent to Tom Brokaw in 1995, hailed by Jay Leno as NBCs stud muffin, I did a column wondering why TV news programs only hired pretty white male clones. I asked Williams if he was an anchor android. Not that Im aware of, he said gamely, in his anchor-desk baritone. I can deny the existence of a factory in the American Midwest that puts out people like me. Williams told friends last week that he felt anguished, coming under fire for his false story of coming under fire. Although the NBC anchor had repeated the Iraq war tall tale, ever more baroquely, for more than a decade, when he cited it on his Jan. 30 broadcast during a segment about going to a Rangers game with a retired, decorated soldier who had been on the ground that day when he landed, Williams got smacked down on Facebook. A crew member from a Chinook flying ahead of Williams, who was involved in the 2003 firefight, posted, Sorry dude, I dont remember you being on my aircraft. I do remember you walking up about an hour after we had landed to ask me what had happened. Stars and Stripes ran with it, and, by Saturday, Williams announced that he was stepping down for several days. Social media the genre that helped make the TV evening news irrelevant by showing us that we dont need someone to tell us every night what happened that day was gutting the institution further. Although Williamss determination to wrap himself in others valor is indefensible, it seems almost redundant to gnaw on his bones, given the fact that the Internet has already taken down a much larger target: the long-ingrained automatic impulse to turn on the TV when news happens. Although there was much chatter about the revered anchor and the moral authority of the networks, does anyone really feel that way anymore? Frothy morning shows long ago became the more important anchoring real estate, garnering more revenue and subsidizing the news division. One anchor exerted moral authority once and that was Walter Cronkite, because he risked his career to go on TV and tell the truth about the fact that we were losing the Vietnam War. But TV news now is rife with cat, dog and baby videos, weather stories and narcissism. And even that fare caused trouble for Williams when he reported on a video of a pig saving a baby goat, admitting we have no way of knowing if its real, and then later had to explain that it wasnt. The nightly news anchors are not figures of authority. Theyre part of the entertainment, branding and cross-promotion business. Former ABC News anchor Diane Sawyer trended on Facebook for reportedly scoring the first interview about Bruce Jenners gender odyssey. When current ABC News anchor David Muir was still a correspondent, some NBC News reporters had a drinking game about how many times he put himself in the shot and how many times his shirt was unbuttoned. As the late-night comic anchors got more pointed and edgy with the news, the real anchors mimicked YouTube. Williams did a piece on his daughter Allisons casting in an NBC production of Peter Pan. And Muir aired an Access Hollywood-style segment with Bradley Cooper. As the performers Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, John Oliver and Bill Maher were doing more serious stuff, the supposedly serious guys were doing more performing. The anchors pack their Hermès ties and tight T-shirts and fly off to hot spots for the performance aspect, because the exotic and dangerous backdrops confer the romance of Hemingway covering the Spanish Civil War. Oliver, who has made waves with pieces on financial chicanery in the Miss America contest and the corporate players trying to undermine net neutrality, told The Verge that he is hiring more researchers with backgrounds in investigative journalism. Meanwhile, in an interview with Fusion, Muir acted out the facial expressions he uses during his broadcast: the listening face, the really listening face, and the really concerned face. All that was missing was Blue Steel. With no pushback from the brass at NBC, Williams has spent years fervently courting celebrity, as The Hollywood Reporter put it, guest starring on 30 Rock, slow-jamming the news with Jimmy Fallon and regaling David Letterman with his faux heroics: Two of our four helicopters were hit by ground fire, including the one I was in, RPG and AK-47. As his profession shrinks and softens, Williams felt compelled to try to steal the kind of glory that can only be earned the hard way. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/02/08/opinion/sunday/maureen-dowd-anchors-aweigh.html?_r=0&referrer=

I forgot to denominate any choices in Green Stamps!

Agree with all that. My total expenses are about in line with jgoo's -- the incidentals tend to run half to two-thirds of what the escort's fee is. Higher depending on class of accommodation, last-minute airfare costs, etc. Typically bringing them on a trip somewhere for a hotel-based visit. Has always been inside the U.S. for me, so not quite as high a ratio as international travel. I set the poll to ask for fee-for-time as the most constant baseline, exactly because the expenses on top of that can vary so widely depending on one's mode of hiring.

Thinnin on it, I just edited the poll to be explicitly about fees paid to the escort. If people want to comment on incidental expenses, that would be good to know too.

I was just about to say fees only, but what do people think? Should it be the larger number that includes the expenses we incur because of being with the escort? That might be the more meaningful number...?

The topic of skinflint clients, raised in another thread today, got me curious. Thus this poll. Your vote in this poll is private. No one can see how any individual voted. If you want to disclose how you voted, or in any other way exercise your First Amendment rights, feel free to do so in a post.

A sunny welcome to you too! (1) Resentment at being gouged by Big Pharma has nothing to do with how one may treat one's escorts. (2) Not all of us get as much for free as Suckrates does. (3) Not everyone here who has spent the budget of a medium-size Central American country on escorts in a year is necessarily going to brag about it.

The New York Post is what it is, but makes some good points: http://nypost.com/2015/02/08/we-shouldnt-believe-williams-lie-was-an-innocent-mistake/

Just Donatella nobody! "That face -- it looks like something you'd hang off your door in Africa!" Joan Rivers

Transcript of Dylan's speech: http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/music/posts/la-et-ms-grammys-2015-transcript-of-bob-dylans-musicares-person-of-year-speech-20150207-story.html#page=1

So. What's the most you've ever paid for one?

Hunter S. Thompson Remembers Jimmy Carter’s Captivating Bob Dylan Speech (1974) Forty years ago, Hunter S. Thompson wrote Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72, which “is still considered a kind of bible of political reporting,” says Matt Taibbi in a new edition of the book. Fear and Loathing ’72 entered the canon of American political writing for many reasons. But if you’re looking for one bottom-line explanation, it probably comes down to this: Says Taibbi, “Thompson stared right into the flaming-hot sun of shameless lies and cynical horseshit that is our politics, and he described exactly what he saw—probably at serious cost to his own mental health, but the benefit to us was [his legendary book].” Thompson may have reached some journalistic apogee with his coverage of the ’72 Nixon-McGovern campaign. But his political writing hardly stopped there. The Gonzo journalist covered the ’76 election for Rolling Stone Magazine. And inevitably he crossed paths with Jimmy Carter, the eventual winner of the election. Above, Thompson recalls the day when Carter first made an impression upon him. It happened at the University of Georgia School of Law on May 4, 1974. Speaking before a gathering of alumni lawyers, Carter upset their celebratory occasion when he dismantled the criminal justice system they were so proud of. And Carter particularly caught Thompson’s attention when he traced his sense of social justice back to a song written by Bob Dylan: The other source of my understanding about what’s right and wrong in this society is from a friend of mine, a poet named Bob Dylan. After listening to his records about “The Ballad of Hattie Carol” and “Like a Rolling Stone” and “The Times, They Are a-Changing,” I’ve learned to appreciate the dynamism of change in a modern society. I grew up as a landowner’s son. But I don’t think I ever realized the proper interrelationship between the landowner and those who worked on a farm until I heard Dylan’s record, “I Ain’t Gonna Work on Maggie’s Farm No More.” So I come here speaking to you today about your subject with a base for my information founded on Reinhold Niebuhr and Bob Dylan. You can read the full text of Carter’s speech here. It’s also worth watching a related clip below, where Thompson elaborates on Carter, his famous speech and his alleged mean streak that put him on the same plain as Muhammad Ali and Sonny Barger (the godfather of The Hells Angels). http://www.openculture.com/2012/07/hunter_s_thompson_remembers_jimmy_carters_captivating_bob_dylan_speech_1974.html

Bob Dylan Dazzles MusiCares Gala With Bold Speech By Phil Gallo, Los Angeles Billboard | February 07, 2015 12:30 PM EST Bob Dylan speaks onstage during the 2015 MusiCares Person of The Year honoring him held at Los Angeles Convention Center on February 6, 2015 in Los Angeles, California. It was a well-known fact that Bob Dylan was not going to perform at the MusiCares event honoring him for, in President Jimmy Carter's words, a "lifetime dedication to human rights." Still, no one expected him to give one of the greatest acceptance speeches in the 25 years of the event. It almost didn't matter that Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen and John Mellencamp sang some of the best songs written in the 20th century or that a humbled former president was on hand to present the award. For nearly 40 minutes, Dylan "performed" in a way few have ever seen, reading a speech written in short declarative sentences akin to those in his autobiography, Chronicles. It was filled with wit and criticism, honest assessments of his artistry and stinging jabs at his critics. He also got in a few good words about the rockabilly pioneer and his friend Billy Lee Riley, the singer behind "Red Hot" and "Flyin' Saucers Rock 'n' Roll" who utilized MusiCares in the years prior to his death in 2009. Dylan, who often shies away from speaking during his concerts, took the stage at the Los Angeles Convention Center late Friday night after President Carter introduced him with praise that his words "are more precise... and permanent than anything said by a president of the United States." Onstage, Dylan was in the mood to pay homage. "Right from the start, my songs were divisive," he said, going on to name those who supported him early on: the songwriter Doc Pomus, label owner Sam Philips, Buck Owens and Kris Kristofferson. He also mentioned those who'd been in the opposite corner: Ahmet Ertegun, Leiber and Stoller, Merle Haggard and "the critics" who fault his singing style but, according to Dylan, give a pass to Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed and Dr. John. For the most part, Dylan was full of gratitude. He started by saluting the man who signed him to Columbia Records, John Hammond, and his first representatives in publishing, Lou Levy and Artie Mogull. He also expressed appreciation for the artists who have covered his songs, starting with the popular – Peter, Paul & Mary; the Turtles; the Byrds and Sonny and Cher – and moving to the iconoclasts who he greatly admired, including Nina Simone, the Staple Singers, Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Cash and Joan Baez. "The Staple Singers were one of my favorite groups of all time," he said. "They were the type of artists I wanted to record my songs. Nina Simone was an unchanging artist who validated, for me, everything I was working toward. Hendrix took small songs of mine into the stratosphere." Dylan traced the roots of some of his better-known songs to numerous traditional folk songs, noting that his work blossomed from his spending so much time playing the traditional works. "John Henry" begat "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall." Big Bill Broonzy's "Key to the Highway" led to "Highway 61 Revisited." "Roll the Cotton Down" birthed "Maggie's Farm." "The Times They Are A Changin'" is an extension of what Dylan referred as the "come all ye" songs such as "Floyd Collins." From "Deep Elm Blues," a traditional song recorded by blues artists in the 1930s, sprang "Tangled Up in Blue." "There's nothing secret about it," Dylan said. Mostly, Dylan wanted to make a singular point about music and great songwriting, whether he was referencing the work of gospel legends the Blackwood Brothers, folk legend Roscoe Holcomb or bluesman Charley Patton. "Voices are not to measured by how pretty they are," Dylan said, quoting Sam Cooke. "They're to be measured by whether they're telling the truth." Then Dylan passed the torch to Beck, Sheryl Crow, Bonnie Raitt and Jackson Browne, whom he had recruited to interpret specifically chosen songs. A dozen of the performers had a head start, having already released versions of the song they performed on Friday night. Two of the covers, Willie Nelson's "Senor" and John Doe's "Press On," appeared in the film I'm Not There; the White Stripes covered "One More Cup of Coffee" on their debut album; Crosby, Stills & Nash performed "Girl From North Country" on their 2012 tour and Young played "Blowin' in the Wind" regularly on tours in 1991 and 2014. With a house band led by bassist-producer Don Was that included pedal steel player Greg Leisz, guitarist Buddy Miller, keyboardist Benmont Tench and drummer Kenny Aronoff, the night was packed with stellar, well-rehearsed performances. Stephen Stills was ably supported by the glowing harmonies of Graham Nash and David Crosby on "Girl From North Country," and Sheryl Crow delivered a touching reading of "Boots of Spanish Leather" from a secondary stage in the middle of the convention center. Springsteen, joined by Tom Morello, enhanced "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" with striking guitar solos. Tom Jones, Aaron Neville and John Doe were vocally impeccable in their interpretations. Jones was excited to revisit a favorite Dylan track. "I listened to a lot of things that Bob had written and when I heard that one, it struck a chord with me," Jones told Billboard prior to the show. The song is the lead track to his 2010 album Praise & Blame. "It's a very important song because it's (about) what good am I if I don't so something about certain situations. So I'm happy that he likes my version of it. It seems to me that he does or he wouldn't have asked me here." A few artists provided unique twists on their songs: Beck pushed "Leopard Skin Pill-Box Hat," which he recorded for the 2009 charity album War Child Presents Heroes, into fuzzy psychedelia; Los Lobos enhanced "On a Night Like This" with a rhumba rhythm; and John Mellencamp slowed "Highway 61 Revisited" to a Tom Waits-ian dirge with just single piano backing him. Raitt, who played a slow and bluesy "Standing in the Doorway," praised Dylan for "his eloquence and his bite" in a pre-show interview. "He writes about those kinds of things that are uncomfortable and need to be truthfully spoken about," she said. "He writes them better than anybody." The audience was equally star-packed. Lady Gaga, Tony Bennett, T Bone Burnett, the Band Perry, the Arctic Monkeys, Jeff Bridges, Josh Groban, songwriter and ASCAP president Paul Williams, Valerie Simpson, Jenny Lewis, Ric Ocasek, the Grateful Dead's Mickey Hart, Desmond Child, guitarist Orinathi, classical pianist Lang Lang, the Doors' John Densmore and Richie Sambora were part of the crowd that raised a record-breaking $7 million for the charity that assists musicians in need. Set list: Beck - "Leopard Skin Pill-Box Hat" Aaron Neville - "Shooting Star" Alanis Morissette - "Subterranean Homesick Blues" Los Lobos - "On a Night Like This" Willie Nelson - "Senor" Jackson Browne - "Blind Willie McTell" John Mellencamp - "Highway 61 Revisited" Jack White - "One More Cup of Coffee" Tom Jones - "What Good Am I" Norah Jones - "I'll Be Your Baby Tonight" Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi - "Million Miles" John Doe - "Pressing On" Crosby, Stills & Nash - "Girl from the North Country" Bonnie Raitt - "Standing in the Doorway" Sheryl Crow - "Boots of Spanish Leather" Garth Brooks (via satellite from Pittsburgh) - "Make You Feel My Love" Bruce Springsteen - "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" Neil Young - "Blowin in the Wind" Melinda Newman contributed to this report. http://www.billboard.com/articles/news/6465498/bob-dylan-musicares-speech

We are in heated agreement!

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_humorous_units_of_measurement

That Brokaw now looks like a towering figure is all the commentary needed on how far the role of evening news anchor has shrunk. Not to say that, on balance, it's not easier to be better informed now than back in Uncle Walter's day. But very telling that Williams is now among the best that role seems able to attract.

Also: Time Half past a monkey's ass and a quarter till his balls.

Conventional These units may or may not have precise objectively measurable values, but all of them measure quantities that have been defined within the International System of Units. Systems FFF units Main article: FFF system Unit Dimension Definition SI Value furlong length 660 ft 201.168 m firkin[1] mass 90 lb 40.8233 kg fortnight time 14 days 1,209,600 s Most countries use the International System of Units (SI). In contrast, the humorous Furlong/Firkin/Fortnight system of units of measurement draws attention by being extremely old fashioned, and off-beat at the same time.[2] One furlong per fortnight is very nearly 1 centimetre per minute (to within 1 part in 400). Indeed, if the inch were defined as 2.54 cm rather than 2.54 cm exactly, it would be 1 cm/min. Besides having the meaning of "any obscure unit", furlongs per fortnight have also served frequently in the classroom as an example on how to reduce a unit's fraction. The speed of light may be expressed as being roughly 1.8 terafurlongs per fortnight (or megafurlongs per microfortnight).[3][4] Great Underground Empire (Zork) In the Zork series of games, the Great Underground Empire had its own system of measurements, the most frequently referenced of which was the bloit. Defined as the distance the king's favorite pet could run in one hour (spoofing a popular legend about the history of the foot), the length of the bloit varied dramatically, but the one canonical conversion to real-world units puts it at approximately two-thirds of a mile (1 km). Liquid volume was measured in gloops, and temperature in degrees Q (57 °Q is said to be the freezing point of water).[5] Potrzebie In issue 33, Mad published a partial table of the "Potrzebie System of Weights and Measures", developed by 19-year-old Donald E. Knuth, later a famed computer scientist. According to Knuth, the basis of this new revolutionary system is the potrzebie, which equals the thickness of Mad issue 26, or 2.263348517438173216473 mm.[6] Volume was measured in ngogn (equal to 1000 cubic potrzebies), mass in blintz (equal to the mass of 1 ngogn of halva, which is "a form of pie [with] a specific gravity of 3.1416 and a specific heat of .31416"), and time in seven named units (decimal powers of the average earth rotation, equal to 1 "clarke"). The system also features such units as whatmeworry, cowznofski, vreeble, hoo, and hah. According to the "Date" system in Knuth's article, which substitutes a 10-clarke "mingo" for a month and a 100-clarke "cowznofski", for a year, the date of October 29, 2007 is rendered as "To 1, 190 C. M." (for Cowznofsko Madi, or "in the Cowznofski of our MAD"). The dates are calculated from October 1, 1952, the date MAD was first published. Dates before this point are referred to (perhaps tongue-in-cheek) as "B.M." ("Before MAD.") The ten "Mingoes" are: Tales (Tal.) Calculated (Cal.) To (To) Drive (Dri.) You (You) Humor (Hum.) In (In) A (A) Jugular (Jug.) Vein (Vei.) Quantity Sagan See also: Sagan's number As a humorous tribute to Carl Sagan and his association with the catchphrase "billions and billions", a sagan has been defined as a large quantity of anything.[7][8] Length Attoparsec Parsecs are used in astronomy to measure enormous interstellar distances. A parsec is approximately 3.26 light-years or about 3.085×1016m (1.917×1013mi). Combining it with the "atto-" prefix (×10-18) yields attoparsec (apc), a conveniently human-scaled unit of about 3.085 centimetres (1.215 in) that is used only humorously.[9] Beard-second The beard-second is a unit of length inspired by the light-year, but used for extremely short distances such as those in integrated circuits. The beard-second is defined as the length an average beard grows in one second. Kemp Bennett Kolb defines the distance as exactly 100 angstroms (10 nanometers),[10] as does Nordling and Österman's Physics Handbook.[11] However, Google Calculator supports the beard-second for unit conversions using the value 5 nm.[12] Mickey One mickey per second is the smallest resolvable unit of measurement for the speed and direction that a computer mouse pointing device is moved. It is named after Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse cartoon character.[13] Generally there are two measurements sent during a mouse movement, one for the horizontal axis and one for the vertical axis. Device sensitivity is usually specified in mickeys per inch. In Canada, a Mickey is an informal name for 375 mL bottle of 80-proof liquor. Altuve Main article: José Altuve In the sport of baseball, the Altuve is an informal measurement of the distance of home runs equal to 5 feet 5 inches or 1.65 m. This is a reference to Houston Astros player José Altuve, who stands 5 feet 5 inches tall, making him one of the shortest players in Major League Baseball.[14] RCH Red cunt hair, slang for a very small amount. Smoot Main article: Smoot The smoot is a unit of length, defined as the height in 1958 of Oliver R. Smoot, who later became the Chairman of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and president of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The unit is used to measure the length of the Harvard Bridge. Canonically, and originally, in 1958 when Smoot was a Lambda Chi Alpha pledge at MIT (class of 1962), the bridge was measured to be 364.4 smoots, plus or minus one ear, using Mr. Smoot himself as a ruler.[15] At the time, Smoot was 5 feet, 7 inches, or 170 cm, tall.[16]Google Earth and Google Calculator include the smoot as a unit of measurement. Supposedly, the Cambridge (Massachusetts) police department got into the convention of using Smoots to measure the locations of accidents and incidents on the bridge. When the original markings were removed or covered over during bridge maintenance, the police had to request that someone reapply the Smoot scale markings.[17] Sheppey A measure of distance equal to about 7⁄8 of a mile (1.4 km), defined as the closest distance at which sheep remain picturesque. The Sheppey is the creation of Douglas Adams and John Lloyd, included in The Meaning of Liff, their dictionary of putative meanings for words that are actually just place names.[18] It is named after the Isle of Sheppey in the UK. Area Barn, outhouse, shed A barn is a serious unit of area used by nuclear physicists to quantify the scattering or absorption cross-section of very small particles, such as atomic nuclei.[19] It is one of the very few units which are accepted to be used with SI units, and one of the most recent units to have been established (cf. the knot and the bar, other non-SI units acceptable in limited circumstances).[20] One barn is equal to 1.0×10−28 m2. The name derives from the folk expression "Couldn't hit the broad side of a barn", used by particle accelerator physicists to refer to the difficulty of achieving a collision between particles. The outhouse (1.0×10−6 barns) and shed (1.0×10−24 barns) are derived by analogy. Nanoacre The nanoacre is a unit of real estate on a VLSI chip equal to 0.00627264 sq in (4.0468564224 mm2) or the area of a square of side length 0.0792 in (2.01168 mm). "The term gets its humor from the fact that VLSI nanoacres have costs in the same range as real acres in Silicon Valley once one figures in design and fabrication-setup costs."[21] Volume Barn-megaparsec This unit is similar in concept to the attoparsec, combining very large and small scales. When a barn (a very small unit of area used for measuring the cross sectional area of nuclei) is multiplied by a megaparsec (a very large unit of length used for measuring the distances between galaxies), the result is a human-scaled unit of volume approximately equal to 2⁄3 of a teaspoon (about 3 ml). Hubble-barn Similar to the aforementioned barn-megaparsec, the Hubble-barn uses the barn with the Hubble length, which is the radius of the visible universe as derived by using the Hubble constant and the speed of light. This amounts to around 13.1 litres (3.46 US gallons, 2.88 Imperial gallons). Mass Toyota Prius A unit of weight used to measure the total amount lifted by a weight-lifter.[22] One Toyota Prius weighs approximately 1325 kg (2921 lb).[23] Power Donkey power This facetious engineering unit is defined as 250 watts—about a third of a horsepower.[24] Time Friedman The Friedman is approximately six months, specifically six months in the future, and named after columnist Thomas Friedman who repeatedly used the span in reference to when a determination of Iraq's future could be surmised.[25][26][27][28][29][30][31] Jiffy A jiffy is a unit of time used in computer operating systems, being the interval of time between system timer interrupts. This interval varies from system to system, but is typically between 1 and 10 milliseconds. Kardashian A Kardashian is a unit of measure representing 72 days of marriage.[32][33] This unit of time came in response to the 72-day marriage of Kim Kardashian to Kris Humphries. Microcentury According to Gian-Carlo Rota,[34] the mathematician John von Neumann used the term microcentury to denote the maximum length of a lecture. One microcentury is 52 minutes and 35.69 seconds. Microfortnight In the VAX/VMS operating system the parameter timepromptwait was specified in microfortnights (unit of about 1.2 seconds). Wikiki Amount of time needed before an unnecessary and useless change to a Wikipedia page is being noticed and fixed. For example, "This change will not last one nano-wikiki". Nanocentury A unit sometimes used in computing. The term is believed to have been coined by IBM in 1969 from the design objective "never to let the user wait more than a few nanocenturies for a response".[35] A nanocentury is approximately 3.155 seconds, although Tom Duff is frequently cited as saying that, to within half a percent, a nanocentury is pi seconds.[36] Tatum A tatum is the "lowest regular pulse train that a listener intuitively infers from the timing of perceived musical events." It is named after the legendary jazz pianist Art Tatum.[37] Shake In nuclear physics, a shake is 10 nanoseconds, the approximate time for a generation within a nuclear chain reaction. The term comes from the expression "two shakes of a lamb's tail", meaning quickly.[38] New York second The New York Second (the shortest unit of time in the multiverse) is defined as the period of time between the traffic lights turning green and the cab behind you honking.[39] The idiomatic expression "in a New York minute", used in various contexts to mean an instant or a very short time, is of similar origin. Non-conventional These units describe dimensions which are not and cannot be covered by the International System of Units. Earthquake intensity Tom Weller suggests the humorous Rictus scale (a takeoff of the conventional Richter scale) for earthquake intensity, as pertains to later media coverage of the event.[40] Rictus scale # Richter scale equivalent Media coverage 1 0–3 Small articles in local papers 2 3–5 Lead story on local news; mentioned on network news 3 5–6.5 Lead story on network news; wire-service photos appear in newspapers nationally; governor visits scene 4 6.5–7.5 Network correspondents sent to scene; president visits area; commemorative T-shirts appear 5 7.5+ Covers of weekly news magazines; network specials; "instant books" appear Information flow: Dirac Physicist Paul Dirac was known among his colleagues for his precise yet taciturn nature. His colleagues in Cambridge jokingly defined a unit of a dirac which was one word per hour.[41] Beauty: Helen Helen leaving for Troy with Paris, as depicted by Guido Reni Helen of Troy (from the Iliad) is widely known as "the face that launched a thousand ships". Thus, 1 millihelen is the amount of beauty needed to launch a single ship. According to The Rebel Angels, a 1981 novel by Robertson Davies, this system was invented by Cambridge mathematician W.A.H. Rushton. However, the term was possibly first suggested by Isaac Asimov.[42] The obvious reference is Marlowe's lines from the 1592 play The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, "Was this the face that launched a thousand ships / And burnt the topless towers of Ilium?"[43] The Catalogue of Ships from Book II of The Iliad, which describes in detail the commanders who came to fight for Helen and the ships they brought with them, details a total of 1,186 ships which came to fight the Trojan War. As such, Helen herself has a beauty rating of 1.186 helens, capable of launching more than one thousand ships. Negative values have also been observed, which are measured by the number of ships sunk or the number of clocks stopped. An alternative interpretation of -1 helen is the amount of negative beauty (i.e. ugliness) that can beach a thousand ships. David Goines has written a humorous article[44] describing various Helen-units. It has a chart with the fire-lighting and ship-launching capability for different powers of "Helens". For example a picohelen (ph) (10−12 helens) indicates the amount of beauty that can "Barbecue a couple of steaks and toss an inner tube into the pool". Thomas Fink, in The Man's Book,[45] defines beauty both in terms of ships launched, and also in terms of the number of women than whom one woman will, on average, be more beautiful. One helen (H) is the quantity of beauty to be more beautiful than 50 million women, the number of women estimated to have been alive in the 12th century BC. Ten helena (Ha) is the beauty sufficient for one oarsman (of which 50 are on a ship) to risk his life, or be the most beautiful of a thousand women. Beauty is logarithmic on a base of 2. For beauty to increase by 1 Ha, a woman must be the most beautiful of twice as many women. One helen is 25.6 Ha. The most beautiful woman who ever lived would score 34.2 Ha, and 1.34 H, the pick of a dozen women would be 3.6 Ha, and 0.14 H. The webcomic Irregular Webcomic! dedicated a strip to the helen unit of beauty, in which is stated that the millihelen should not be used, because metric prefixes should not be mixed with troy units.[46] Units of Measurement in John C. Wright's Helen Beauty Scale Unit Symbol Factor Description attohelen ah 10−18 Light up a Lucky while strolling past a shipyard femtohelen fh 10−15 Burn a dinner candle and spit a toothpick into a water glass picohelen ph 10−12 Barbecue a couple of steaks and toss an inner tube into the pool nanohelen nh 10−9 Send the old man on a canoe trip and build a good roaring blaze in the fireplace microhelen µh 10−6 Christen a motor boat and start a grass fire millihelen mh 10−3 Launch one Homeric warship and burn down a house centihelen ch 0.01 Incinerate a city block and launch Christopher Columbus's entire fleet: the Niña (40 tons), the Pinta (50 tons), and the Santa Maria (100 tons) decihelen dh 0.1 Torch the central business district of Oakland, California, and launch the clipper ship Flying Cloud (1,800 tons) helen h 1 Raze one city and launch the WWI US Battleship Delaware (20,000 tons) dekahelen dah 10 Oversee the incendiary bombing of the Kantō Region in Japan and launch the aircraft carriers Theodore Roosevelt (91,500 tons) and Dwight D. Eisenhower (91,500 tons) hectohelen h 100 Instigate a major modern conflict and launch the oil platform Stratfjord B (with ballast, 899,000 tons), the supertanker Seawise Giant (624,000 dead-weight tonnage); the oil/ore carrier World Gala (282,500 dwt tonnage), and the bulk-ore tanker Hoei Maru (208,000 dwt tonnage) kilohelen kh 103 Launch the equivalent of one million Greek warships and spark a nuclear confrontation megahelen Mh 106 Launch the equivalent of one billion Greek warships and blow up the World gigahelen Gh 109 Launch the equivalent of one trillion Greek warships and destroy the solar system terahelen Th 1012 Launch the equivalent of one quadrillion Greek warships and make serious inroads on the welfare of the galaxy Bogosity: Lenat The unit of bogosity, i.e. how bogus a person, claim, or proceeding is, derived from the fictional field of Quantum Bogodynamics, is the Lenat. The Lenat is seldom used, as it is understood that it is too large for normal conversation. Its most common form is the microLenat.[47][48] Coolness: MegaFonzie A MegaFonzie is a fictional unit of measurement of an object's coolness invented by Professor Farnsworth in the Futurama episode, "Bender Should Not Be Allowed on TV." A 'Fonzie' is about the amount of coolness inherent in the Happy Days character Fonzie.[49] Magical energy: Thaum Main article: Discworld (world) § Magic The Thaum is a measuring unit used in the Terry Pratchett series of Discworld novels to quantify magic. It equals the amount of mystical energy required to conjure up one small white pigeon, or three normal-sized billiard balls. It can, of course, be measured with a thaumometer, and regular SI prefixes apply (e.g. millithaum, kilothaum).[50] A thaumometer looks like a greenish glass cube with a dial on one side. A standard one is good for up to a million thaums — if there is more magic than that around, measuring it should not be your primary concern. Parodying the introduction of the metric system later Discworld novels refer to the introduction of the newer unit Prime to avoid arguments around standard sizing of pigeons. It is more reliably defined as the magical energy required to move one pound of lead one foot. It is not to be confused with the magical particle "thaum" from the same series of novels. Obstruction: Pouter During WW2, scientists working for DMWD encountered a particularly obstructive British Naval Officer called Commander Pouter, for whom the unit of Obstruction was named, due to his implacable opposition to any work being carried out in the field for which he was personally responsible. Subsequently, the micropouter was used, as it was hoped that no individual of a similarly difficult disposition would be encountered, and the pouter was too large a unit for everyday use.[51] Pleasure and pain: Hedon and Dolor Philosophers talking about Jeremy Bentham's Utilitarianism sometimes use the conceptual unit of the hedon to describe the amount of pleasure, equivalent to the amount of pleasure a person receives from gaining one util of utility.[52] The converse unit of the hedon, used to measure pain or displeasure, is the dolor.[53] Fame: Warhol This is a unit of fame or hype, derived from Andy Warhol's dictum "everyone will be world-famous for fifteen minutes". It represents, naturally, fifteen minutes of fame. Some multiples are: 1 kilowarhol — famous for 15,000 minutes, or 10.42 days. A sort of metric "nine-day wonder". 1 megawarhol — famous for 15 million minutes, or 28.5 years. First used by Cullen Murphy in 1997.[54] Also used simply as meaning 15 minutes; as the Warhol worm, that could infect all vulnerable machines on the entire Internet in 15 minutes or less. Quackery: Canard The canard is a unit of quackery created by Andy Lewis in the need for a fractional fruitloopery index.[55] It is proposed as an SI Unit to replace the old "Crackpot Index" [56] that was presented in 1998. "Quack words include 'energy', 'holistic', 'vibrations', 'magnetic healing', 'quantum'. These words are usually borrowed from physics and used to promote dubious health claims." It scores on a scale from 0 to 10 the quantity of quackery used.[57] Twitter followers: Wheaton The Wheaton is a measurement of Twitter followers relative to celebrity Wil Wheaton.[58][59] The measurement was standardized when Wil Wheaton achieved half a million Twitter followers, with the effect that Wil Wheaton now has 5.52 Wheatons himself (as of January 2015). As few Twitter users have millions of followers, the milliwheaton (500 followers) is more commonly used. World Peace and Stability Index "World Peace and Stability Index is a measure of stability and/or volatility of the world on a particular day. It is calculated as the 'number of times CNN news channel repeats a tape'. Zero indicates a turbulent world with a lot of disturbing events going on in various parts. A high value signifies there are not many major events and the world is mostly peaceful."[60] en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_humorous_units_of_measurement