An outrageous and flagrant breach of the European Commission's Directive that all government and local authority bodies must use metric units on all official forms and in all communications has been reported to me.

It seems that when people apply to be part-time fireman in a certain Fire Service, they go on a one-day 'assessment' exercise, for which they have to be appropriately kitted out.

Well, the application form requires them to declare their (a) height (b) weight (c) chest size and (d) leg size. I think it says collar size as well.

Now, the shocking thing is that (whisper), the Fire Service applicants are asked for these measurements in...(hush) stones & pounds or inches.

I have the identity of the Fire Service concerned and will immediately report the circumstances to the Sub-Commissioner for Metrication Enforcement. It is a case that could very well end up in the European Court of Justice. This Court, which is legally required in all its judgments to advance the cause of full European integration, will no doubnt fine the United Kingdom a hefty amount in view of its failure to obey the rules. After all, as the UKMA might well say, they are 'without excuse'.

I shall of course report on this bulletin board what action the Sub-Commissioner will take to ensure that only kilograms and centimetres (or whatever S.I. units the E.U. has approved for this purpose) are used in future. Hopefully the existing Fire Service application forms will be pulped before any more damage is done.



P.S. I understand that the same form also asks that those coming for assessment, before they arrive, 'remove all jewellery'

On an unrelated note, although perversely still related, I absolutely hate the "improved" English spelling of "judgment" (as opposed to "judgement"). "dgm" looks like rubbish to me. Also, I still spell it "mileage" despite it going against all analogy (and that is, not "milage")

re (Bryan Parry): "On an unrelated note, although perversely still related, I absolutely hate the 'improved' English spelling of 'judgment' (as opposed to 'judgement'). 'dgm' looks like..."

REPLY: Bryan, you have a point. I freely confess my spellchecker picks up 'judgment' as an error. But I stick with it, partly fortified by the Authorised Version of the Bible which uses 'judgment', a word found over 600 times within its pages. Very very few words indeed in the Authorised Version have a different spelling today from then. I don't therefore follow how 'judgment' is an 'improved' version - presumably the addition of an 'e' is quite recent development

Judgment is the spelling preferred to-day. Look in a good dictionary, and you will see that it is the "better" way of spelling it. "Judgement" is generally considered the prolish way of spelling it.

One thing I do like about English, though, is how some spellings are still flexible. I use the ones I prefer- e.g. daemon, encyclopaedia, Oedipus etc. Also, I write "I'ld" for "I would/should" as opposed to the actual "I'd" (which I instinctively think of as "I had").

Do you also write "you'ld"?

Yes.

"daemon".

Originally the Unix operating system used to have "demons" running process tasks in the background - short for data/execution monitor.

Because of religious fundamentalists in the USA it was changed to daemon - which now stands for "data and execution monitor".

Just thought I'd throw my two pence worth in there.

Guess what "BASIC" stands for (but be careful, this is a trick question)

Bryan Parry wrote:
On an unrelated note, although perversely still related, I absolutely hate the "improved" English spelling of "judgment" (as opposed to "judgement"). "dgm" looks like rubbish to me. Also, I still spell it "mileage" despite it going against all analogy (and that is, not "milage")

REPLY
The 1611 King James Bible uses judgment, whereas the 1662 Book of Common Prayer uses judgement, so judgment is older.

It matters not, as "judgment" is considered etymologically better than the spelling with the e. In fact, the e spelling is trying to be phased out in favour of this e-lacking version.