In the 1970s the U.S. Congress and the Nixon/Ford Whitehouse proposed a plan for the metrification of the United States.  The plan for a “voluntary push” to metric, mostly implemented during the Carter Administration was a public failure.  The cartoons that were produced to hype kids and make what would become Generation X the first metric generation and the general campaign was mocked and scorned by the public who had no intention on doing anything it didn’t have to.  The public laughed at metric’s pretension’s for being a more perfect system and derided it as unamerican.  Many think that the only remnants of the metrication push today are a few road signs that show distance in kilometers and two liter bottles of soda, but that’s not the whole story.
Metrication in the United States has actually been going strong – but real quietlike – since the ’70s.  In a globalized world, private industry has more and more incentive to convert to metric in order to keep with international standards.  All branches of the U.S. military use metric for all measurements in accordance with NATO guidelines and government science agencies have also adopted metric.
So right now we’re living in a confused jumble of worlds.  We’re use metric for some things, like soda, alcohol, cocaine, and athletics but imperial standards for others like milk, deli meats and pot.  Most importantly we still use imperial standards to describe ourselves.  I am 6′4″ tall and weigh just under 190 pounds.  I live about a mile from Prospect Park.
This is where real change must occur.  If the government cannot or will not mandate a conversion to metric then it is up to right thinking citizens around the country to adopt it in our private lives and use it in conversation.  “hey how far is your Dad’s house in Suffolk?”  “oh, around 80km, depending on which way you go.” I am 194cm tall and weigh 85 kilograms. Prospect Park is about 1.5km from my house.

PROBLEM! Sounding real pretentious!
I haven’t worked out a solution to this, and yet it is totally crucial to my program.  The biggest problem with metric in the United States is that it has been successfully labeled by certain elements of society as a foreign system (even though the United States was one of the earliest official adopters) and effete and utopian.  A conservative commentator for CNN warned that we might get the metric system again if the Democrats took a senate supermajority.

If I were running a PR campaign I’d try to rebrand it as all-American.  “The troops use it, so do I.”  Get motorcyclists (motorcycles generally have metric measures) to campaign for it.  This wouldn’t be to push for government action of any kind, this would be entirely to get people using metric for their day-to-day.  Complete conversion would follow once a large number of actual Americans – no matter how small a percentage of population as total – start using it.
And then one day, one fine beatiful day I can have the following interaction…
“Number 157!??! 157???? OKAY!158?!?!”
“Oh hi, that’s me! Can I get a quarter of a kilo of the Boarshead Salsalito Turkey, half a kilo of the Applegate Farm bacon – cut thick please – and, hmm, I guess a tenth of a kilo of the Land-o-Lakes Yellow American???”
and the deli-guy will say….
“Heyyyy! Comin’ right up!!!!”

Some people were born utterly driven.  They are tireless.  They are productive.  They never slow down.  I am not one of these people but I was once more ambitious.  I don’t know what eroded that ambition -  defeats along the way, more ambitious competition or complacency – but at some point it felt like I was to comfortable and didn’t have more strive in me.

Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood says “I have a competition in me; I want no one else to succeed.”  I need to regain my competition.  My father would often watch these huge epics where men walked over the Earth in search of treasure of some sort or another, or would trudge on these vast military campaigns – being pawns in huge global dramas, and he’d say “wouldn’t they have been happier if everyone stayed at home?”

Yes, everyone probably would have been happier if they had all just stayed at home.  Far fewer people certainly would have been hacked to death.  There’s also something to be said for leaving your mark on the world.  It’s hard to get ambition if you don’t got it, but sometimes a small spark can really set off a huge conflagration.  All that dead wood that’s built up in my head and my life over the past few years – I think – will set off a most wondrous era.

A couple of weeks ago a friend recommended that I read My Confession by Samuel Chamberlain describing a soldier’s life in U.S. Army that occupied northern Mexico during the Mexican American War of 1847.  There are two things that are mind-blowing about this book.
1)What went on is really intense.  There were two U.S. Armies that invaded Mexico, the first one invaded from the north and marched down through Monterrey the other one landed at Veracruz and captured Mexico City.  The army in Monterrey basically stayed stationary for most of the second half of the war and was subjected to boredom and brutal guerrilla attacks.  Forces allied with the army like the Texas Rangers would often brutally retaliate on the guerrillas and the local population.   It shows the awfulness of our conquest of the continent and the destructive and creative forces that went in to expansion.

2) The other thing that this had me think of is the nature of conquest.  The Americans invading Mexico were very influenced by a book that had just been written on the Spanish conquest of Mexico and conquistadors were very much on their mind – everyone was already talking about the “Halls of Montezuma.”  The second American army landed in Veracruz and marched on to Mexico City, following a similar path to Cortes when he conquered the Aztecs.  There were many reasons why the US was able to conquer Mexico so quickly including superior technology and infighting within Mexico, however it’s really interesting to see the similarities and differences between the US invasion and Cortes’s invasion.  Both invasions were wrapped up very quickly.  The more I read about the conquistadors the more I’m shocked at how quickly the Spanish took over everything. In 1492 no one had any idea that there was anything going on over here.  It took them ten years just to figure out that they weren’t in India.  But just 10 to 25 years after that they had conquered the major civilizations in Mexico and Peru.  It blows my mind because they had no maps, no supplies, no communications and no conception of the people they were encountering.  How did they do it so quickly??

I also have been thinking a lot about American unity.  Making all the countries in the Americas a little bit closer and have it be that when we say American we mean all Americans from Tierra del Fuego to Nanuvut.  Are there any organizations already doing this? Does anyone have any thoughts about this?

I really want to get out of the United States more often in this stage of my life.  It’s true that tuition eats up a lot of my income but I think I can still make it happen and should use my two weeks vacation to further the goal of going abroad.  There’s a lot to be nervous about when traveling however and I thought I should write out a pro and con list of world travel
PROs
1) being able to tell good stories
2) eating strange new and possibly delicious food
3) brushing up on my foreign language skills (I took three years of Russian, four of Spanish and two of Ancient Greek for a reason – right???)
4) seeing wonderful sites
5) meeting new people
6) depending on the situation – helping people  (although my last attempt at volunteering abroad wasn’t so amazing)|

CONs
1) feeling like a tourist
2) having that feeling of shame about being an American (usually experienced when Americans are present – especially when they are high-fiving college kids and or conspicuously dressed missionaries), because I really want to love my country
3) the expense, length and ecological impact of air travel
4) “express” kidnappings
5) deciding whether to purchase international health insurance

So now that I’ve gotten that down I should prioritize where I want to go.  I have a desire to see the United States – besides the Northeastern states, I’ve only ever been to Atlanta, the Rockies and Los Angeles.  I need to road trip and make destinations through my own country, but this is an international travel post.

Top Five Places I Want to Visit
1) Mexico (specifically Mexico City, Oaxaca, Puebla and Vera Cruz)
2) Turkey (Istanbul and the Turkish Aegean)
3) Quebec (I’ve never even been to Canada! Can you believe it?! I must go to Montreal – it’s only six hours away!)
4) Berlin (it’s supposed to be the greatest place on the planet)
5) Hong Kong (maybe it’s the allure of John Woo’s movies, the aroma of Cantonese cooking or maybe it’s the desire for an amazing tailor)

Now I just need travel buddies….