Context from everyday units
From @JohnDonoghue64 on Twitter
From the Guardian, a few years ago
Perhaps, as with metric and imperial measurements, such comparisons should be given convenient abbreviations: SoWs (size of Wales), SoBs (size of Belgium), OSPs (Olympic swimming pools), DDBs (buses) and so on. Thus the Kruger national park in South Africa measures 1 SoW (Daily Telegraph), as do Lesotho (London Evening Standard) and Israel (Times), whereas Lake Nzerakera in Tanzania is 2 SoBs (Observer).
…
At times the most carefully calibrated calculations can go awry. So we learn that Helmand province in Afghanistan is “four times the size of Wales” (Daily Telegraph, 2 December 2009) only to find a few weeks later that it has apparently shrunk to “the size of Wales” (Daily Telegraph, 29 January 2010).
For the benefit of NZ readers, a badger appears to weigh about the same as three female North Island brown kiwi, two typical merino fleeces, or half a case of Malborough sav blanc. That should help you get a grasp on the size of the Lindisfarne Gospels.
Thomas Lumley (@tslumley) is Professor of Biostatistics at the University of Auckland. His research interests include semiparametric models, survey sampling, statistical computing, foundations of statistics, and whatever methodological problems his medical collaborators come up with. He also blogs at Biased and Inefficient See all posts by Thomas Lumley »