It started with Tristan Jones's _Ice!_, and then went on to recipes for
burgoo and lobscouse, and the origins of lobscouse, and how you just
can't talk about lobscouse without bringing up Liverpool, whose
residents carry the nickname "scouser," because it's easier to say than
"Liverpudlian."
(For the record, it's from Norwegian for "meat stew" and if you're
wealthy enough to boil water, chances are you can afford a tasty scouse
made from a lamb neck or a beef ****n or something.)
Okay, so, Liverpool. Liverpool. Liverp-- what the hell?:
http://www.superlambbanana.com
A playful take on the more eccentric dangers of genetic engineering,
this huge huge sculpture is half lamb, half banana. *Now* will you
click the link?
You can order miniature ceramic versions of the lambbanana (which looks
better with only 1 b), for about £20, which is to say "twenty pounds."
(Alt-0163 makes the £ sign.)
Well, I was sharing this tremendous bit of knowledge with Ranjit B., who
is alive and misses you all, and said "Sheesh, it'll cost me an arm and
a leg just to ****p 20 pounds of money over there, to say nothing of
where I'll get all that money."
Ranjit's a quick but fair wit, where there's potential for wittiness:
"You've already done the computations for money density. Quick, what's
the least you can spend on 20 lbs of U.S. currency?"
I can't say I was quick about it, but I was thorough. I return you to
ye old coin specs page, and direct your attention to the weights.
http://www.usmint.gov/about_the_mint/index.cfm?
action=coin_specifications
Pennies are 2.5g, nickels 5.0, and so on. According to one web
discussion that claims a yen is precisely a gram, so is a nickel
precisely 5 grams, as it was an element of pro-SI handwaving committed
by the US government during the most recent change in that coin. Use
this knowledge to calibrate scales at your own risk.
Since I'd be paying the money, the density issue is slightly altered-- I
want the fewest dollars to the pound weight, not the highest density as
usual. And we know from previous coin posts, that'll be in the penny:
2.5g/penny, and using 453g/lb, we get 181.2 pennies/lb.
20 pounds of that works out to 3624 pennies, and drop the decimal in
there to get a value of $36.24. Okay? $36.24 in pennies weighs 20
pounds. This number looked, well, it looked pretty good, actually.
Tood good.
I was a little surprised when I checked the exchange rate (midafternoon
5/20/04) to find that each GBP, Great Britain Pound, was worth about
1.77 USD (and an unusually weak United States Dollar, at that). 177
Pennies. Less than a nickel different from a pound weight in pennies.
But weren't they called "Pounds Sterling?" Sure, I suppose, back when
UK was on the silver standard. But now, now I have discovered that
according to my scientific calculations, the UK is on or just below the
"copper-coated zinc standard" 2.5% copper by weight. What does that
mean? I believe you should all change your worthless British pounds
into many many worthless pennies in order to maintain their worth
(despite their relative worthlessness). Stop throwing such valuable
currency into ponds and fountains! England can't afford it!
I think we all see that America's weak dollar, and even weaker penny,
has triumphed again over the nattering nannydom of the Bank of England,
which has undoubtedly been hoarding the lil' Lincolns in order to prop
up its paper. So that's where they all went! Another coin mystery
solved!
See prospectus for details,
LAN3 (who might have financial interest in forward-looking statements
contained above and herein)
P.S. Whoever said "A pint's a pound the world around" obviously hasn't
tried to buy beer lately.
P.P.S. It's already ceramic, and probably hollow, so why not just dremel
a slot in the top and it could be a lambbananabank?
P.P.P.S. This disclaimer is not required by Leader Kibo, the Federal
Reserve (go Fed!), Alan Greenspan (Viva!) or the SEC, as far as I know.
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