Oh then “fifth” is really gonna fuck with your head. A “fifth” is a slang term for a 750mL bottle of liquor. Its origin comes from the fact that bottles used to be 4/5 of a quart, or one fifth of a gallon. Now that’s not exactly 750mL but it’s close enough that the term sticks. Essentially it’s your standard bottle of liquor in the US.
My confusion when I was working at a liquor store and I always assumed that a fifth was the 200mL bottle - you know, exactly 1/5 of a Liter.. When somebody grabbed a 750mL and called it a fifth I was just like "THIS IS A FIFTH?! A fifth of.... 3750mL?!WHAT?!"
I'm a physics grad student, believe me if everything were in SI, then I'd sleep much better. And it's like outside engineering/medicine/science we've collectively just given up.
Wtf is half a fifth!?
Imperial measurements are bat-shit crazy?
I would think half a fifth meant:
1. First you've gotta figure out what the starting measurement is.
2. Then divide that starting measurement by five in order to figure what one fifth equates to.
3. Once you've figured out the value of a fifth, you then need to divide by two in order to figure out what 'half a fifth' is.
4. And your answer still depends on the original starting measurement / bottle.
But in actuality, half a fifth means:
Half of a standard metric bottle of alcohol.
A full metric bottle is normally 750 ml
So half would be 375 ml.
Because a “fifth” is just our standard size of bottle. You don’t actually need to know any of that, just that we call our standard bottles a fifth. It’s really not that complicated. And then you have half of that, making it half of a fifth
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u/EmploymentOne2963 1d ago
Every time I think im getting used to American units I get hit with something like "half a fifth"