Half a croissant, on a plate, with a sign in front of it saying '50c'
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The Metric Store

North American chain store that sells metric hardware, office supplies, etc.
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In North America it's darned near impossible to find, say, A4 paper to use in place of our brain-dead "Letter Size" stuff.

If you visit a hardware store, they'll sometimes have a few metric bolts, nuts and washers relegated to a tiny ghetto with far less selection than the "standard" stuff. Metric pipes, fittings and wire are essentially unavailable.

While Canada officially subscribes to the metric system, the situation there is basically the same: You can buy a 4-liter "gallon" of milk, but The Home Depot still sells eight-foot two-by-fours and half- inch pipe.

In the spirit of the Leftorium, someone ought to open a chain of stores in North America that sell only metric items: A4 paper, meter sticks, M6x1.0 stainless socket-head shoulder bolts, and 250ml measuring cups. And all the other stuff you currently have to go to Europe to find.

frankus, Jul 22 2008

Origin of the Metre http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metre
Hmmmm .... [8th of 7, Jul 25 2008]

Info on the Nautical Mile http://en.wikipedia.../wiki/Nautical_mile
6000 ft? 6080 ft? whatever... [csea, Jul 25 2008]

[link]






       Yes, by all means let's get them to wise up. It's been years since Napoleon.
zeno, Jul 22 2008
  

       Ralax.   

       You're just 2/10ths.   

       /you currently have to go to Europe to find/   

       Ah yes, Europe + North America = whole world. Still, this is a vast improvement on UK + USA = whole world, as is the norm. Kudos.   

       As for the idea, you would have to be fairly selective in product lines. Fastening hardware is a store in itself, then you've got groceries, office supplies, clothing, technical literature, exercise equipment, paint, timber, wire, sheet metal, etc, etc.
Texticle, Jul 22 2008
  

       "In North America it's darned near impossible to find, say, A4 paper to use in place of our brain-dead "Letter Size" stuff."
Which is odd, since we sell so many A4 printers here...
phoenix, Jul 23 2008
  

       This idea is miles ahead of anything else I've seen here for a while.
MaxwellBuchanan, Jul 24 2008
  

       //Thankfully here in the good ole UK we exclusively use metric// really? I buy my bananas etc by the inch.
po, Jul 24 2008
  

       //This idea is miles ahead of anything else I've seen here for a while// - are these the metric miles mentioned by Spike Milligan in the opening lines of Puckoon?   

       Well anyway, I'd like the exact opposite i.e. a place in the UK that sells NOTHING in metric, a system of measuring devised by insects, that I refuse to use, and never will. Give me horse power, furlongs, quarts, ounces, the gunter's chain, the rood, the nautical mile, and the hundred weight etc any day.
xenzag, Jul 24 2008
  

       //a system of measuring devised by insects//
I thought frogs were amphibians?

//that I refuse to use//
Of course, the good ol' Imperial inch is defined as 0.0254 metres.
AbsintheWithoutLeave, Jul 25 2008
  

       I built my shed out of lumber that my nephew cut on a portable mill. I used centimeters instead of inches. The measurements were so much easier.
nomocrow, Jul 25 2008
  

       "I'd like a package of A4 paper, two meter sticks, 10 M6x1.0 stainless socket-head shoulder bolts, and a 250ml measuring cup"   

       "No problem, that will be 7/8 of a dollar and 1/16 cents."
phundug, Jul 25 2008
  

       // the nautical mile //   

       The Nautical Mile is a "pragmatic" measurement, derived from the physical dimensions of your planet; one second of arc subtends a distance of one nautical mile on the equator. On other planets, the Nautical mile is different.   

       The metre is also allegedly derived from a measurement on a line passing through Paris; but since it was the French that did it, they got the values spectacularly wrong.
8th of 7, Jul 25 2008
  
      
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