Have you ever had an experience of reading something, having it stick in your mind, but being unable to track it down years later?
When I was in college, I worked at a university library for a couple of summers, and one task I ended up with at one point was going through these big, thick Congressional Record books to literally check the pages and make sure they were all there.
(I can't remember why I needed to do this. Maybe the books had been ordered and bound recently or something? For some reason I had to check the pages and make sure that none were missing.)
As you can imagine, this was not a very mentally engaging task.
And the books I was going through were not even the main ones with all the speeches and legislation. They were like, some supplemental ones with just a bunch of dry records in them.
But every once in a while some speech or whatever did get stuck in them, and if it looked interesting, I'd take a break from flipping through pages one-by-one and read.
And I remember seeing this one speech (or possibly a written argument that was submitted for the records, but I think it was probably a speech) that has stuck with me forever afterwards.
I can't remember who the person was. I can't even remember what time period it was.
It was an argument against the US adopting the metric system.
But not for the usual reasons!
The speaker made no arguments about "tradition" or "the Anglo mind" or any of the other specious arguments that have gotten thrown about in the long history of the US not getting with the program.
No. This person argued that we shouldn't adopt the metric system because it would only further entrench the decimal counting system in our society. And he further argued that what we really should be doing is adopting a duodecimal counting system.
Presumably, he would have been ok with a metric-like measuring system just so long as all the units were multiples of 12 of each other.
But he was against the actual, existing metric system because everything is base 10.
So he made this speech extolling the virtues of a base 12 system, and how we shouldn't adopt a measurement system that would only make it harder to adopt the far, far superior duodecimal mathematical system.
It was one of those strangely beautiful arguments that was correct in a way, but that ultimately sounded like parody given how impractical his proposal was.
I mean, if we can't even adopt a measurement system that's used in most of the rest of the world, we certainly aren't going to change our entire language about math and relearn all our basic arithmetic in base 12!
Like, cool idea, buddy, but it's not happening.
(And honestly, who knows. The guy may have just been a crank. Maybe he was making absurd arguments just to gum up the works and stop metric adoption because he hated the French but didn't want to say that out loud. It's totally possible. Like I said, I have no idea who this person was, or how serious he was about his proposal.)
So yeah, I remember this random Congressperson McGee and his logically-sound-but-still-absurd proposal to this day.
Viola is a gifted soccer player who's school has just cut girl's sports. When her twin brother Sebastian decides to go to London to chase a gig, Viola decides to enroll in his new school as her brother. "His" roommate Duke is both a complete hottie and the captain of the soccer team. In order to score a place on the team "Sebastian" agrees to help Duke get with his crush Olivia. However Olivia is totally gone for "Sebastian"! Shenanigans ensue as the difference between girls and guys in both love and sports is explored.
This is a hilarious and irreverent take on Twelfth Night starring Amanda Bynes and Channing Tatum. It's incredibly quotable, tons of fun, and a great modern adaptation.
Shirtless Channing Tatum. Positive messages about masculinity! Very quotable. Random acting part for Vinnie Jones. Amanda Bynes at her comedy peak! The shoehorning in of a Shakespeare quote at the end from a play that isn't twelfth night! Peak 2000s romcom
A high school take on the Malvolio Gulling subplot. Sixteen-year-old Marshall Gardner is 1) straight-laced, 2) exacting, 3) judgemental, and 4) perfectionistic. And below the surface, kept hidden from the rest of the world, he’s 5) controlled by his obsessions and compulsions, 6) fixated on the number twelve, 7) hopelessly in love with his best (only) friend, and 8) horrendously imperfect. He’s also 9) universally disliked, 10) the self-made enemy of the former GSA president, 11) just a little too easy to trick, and 12) in trouble.
This book is sooooo fucking good it’s my comfort read!!! Max asks the brave brave question of what if twelfth night was about a high schooler who i want to squeeze like a stress ball and it makes me feel insane. 12/10 book of all fucking time please read it
THIS STORY FUCKS. extremely hard. i read it before i even read twelfth night and let me tell you it works just as well as a stand-alone story as a retelling. it uses the subplot of twelfth night revolving around the servants (which deserves more attention, as a side note) to explore gender and neurodivergence and the inherent horror of being sixteen and it executes every theme extremely well. if you have maybe half an hour to spare honestly sit down and read the whole thing right now. it's so good. sir toby is a lesbian. what more could you want
i love doing redraws of old art 💛 anyway here’s marshall gardner from @goose-books’s duodecimal ‼️‼️‼️ everyone read it nowwww
[id: a drawing of marshall gardner, a teenager with short blonde hair and glasses. he’s wearing a white button down, a yellow skirt, and fishnets. he looks mildly annoyed. the background is yellow. end id]
the great gatsby game vs duodecimal by max goosebooks
gatsby game
duodecimal
Voting ended onSep 10, 2023
GATSBY GAME:
based on: the great gatsby, f scott fitzgerald
medium: video game
propaganda: you play as nick and you throw your hat at enemies and collect margaritas for points. there is a level that takes place on a train. it slays tbh.
DUODECIMAL:
based on: twelfth night, william shakespeare
medium: short story
propaganda: 'It’s so fucking good! It has symbolism! It delves deep into the Malvolio Plot—which is often brushed aside due to its messiness, but Goosebooks dives fully into that messiness and emerges from the other side with a heartbreaking, hopeful, and humorous story about mental illness, neurodivergence, and gender. It has OCD neurodivergent queer Malvolio what more do you WANT from me guys. Go read Duodecimal I am sending you psychic waves to go read Duodecimal.'
sorry this is stupid ranting hours. i am PISSED rn thinking about the fact we use a base ten/decimal system. its SO STUPID!! duodecimal/base 12 is so much BETTER!!
like, yknow how we dont have exact thirds in base 10 so every 1/3 FUCKS UP your math problem bc its 0.33333333???? THATS NOT A PROBLEM IN BASE 12. WANNA HEAR WHAT A THIRD OF ONE IS IN BASE 12? ITS POINT FOUR. FUCKING POINT FOUR. THATS SO SIMPLE!!!
"oh but we use base ten to count on your hands-" ok sure but you can count on ONE HAND in base 12. just count your knuckles. you have 3 on each finger (not including thumb - thumb is what you use to count) 3 x 4 is 12.
and its not like we'd have to significantly change our language. we already have names for 11 and 12. wanna hear what they are? ELEVEN AND TWELVE. it honestly makes WAY MORE sense that way language wise.
