Use the below calculator to determine how many SAMs you are. A SAM (200m·kg) is a unit of measurement consisting of both stature and mass.
When stating my dimensions, I commonly round myself off and say I, Sam, am about 6'7" and 220lbs. But, more accurately, and using the units any responsible Canadian should, I am 2m and 100kg. What a wonderfully exact set of dimensions! In celebration of this, I propose a new unit for use in quantifying length and mass henceforth to be known as the SAM (equal to exactly 200m·kg). Note that the SAM is a metric entity and thus all the standard prefixes apply. For example, there is the MegaSAM (MSAM), kiloSAM (kSAM), milliSAM (mSAM) etc.
There is a SAM calculator at the beginning of this article. But if you want to do it manually, simply take the product of mass (in kilograms) and length (in meters) and divide by 200. Or, if working in imperial, take the product of the mass (in pounds) and the length (in inches) and divide by 17359. So, for example, I am:
The most obvious application for the SAM is for relating human dimensions when it is the combination of stature and mass that is relevant. For example, “she is somewhat petite, only about a half SAM”, or, “that football player is gargantuan, he must be at least 2 SAMs”.
Yet another use is for quantifying a person’s Clydesdaleness (tall and/or massive people, cyclists for example, are known as Clydesdales in honour of the well known and rather large beasts used as drum horses by the British household cavalry). There has previously been no exact definition of what constitutes a Clydesdale person, partly owing to the confusion of two separate units of measure and the ‘and/or’ condition. My research into the matter leads me to propose a single SAM to signify the point at which a person becomes a full fledged Clydesdale. Anything significantly in excess of this, shall we call Mammoth? These and other landmarks on the SAM scale are in the chart below. This chart is a work in progress and open to suggestions. SAMs may also be useful for calculating a cyclist’s handicap as both mass (due to gravitational forces) and stature (do to aerodynamics) are detrimental to cycling prowess.
Other applications include anything where the combination of length and mass is what is important. An example is for shipping of goods where the compensation for service is correlated with both longest dimension AND mass. With larger objects, this may bring on the opportunity to use a “kiloSAM” or maybe even a “MegaSAM”. I like that one.
Though SAM stands for stature and mass, the unit is really named in honour of me and my 2m, 100kg measures. If it really irks you that some egotistical blogger thinks a unit should be named after him, or even if you just find this utterly bizarre, then check out the Wikipedia article, “List of Humorous Units of Measure“. You will see that, in comparison to some of these, SAM is sensible. So, without further ado, how many SAMs are you?
For more height related calculators, check out the calculator“>height calculator page.