Shirt sizes are in Roman numerals. Observe my evidence.
Shirts usually come in sizes of S, M, L, and XL. The numbers get smaller as you move along, but the shirt gets bigger. Clearly this is a sign. S must be a very large number. M is 1000, but L is only 50, and XL is 40. Sometimes I see other constructs XXL and XXXL, but we'll just assume that this is an attempt at further subtraction from 50 in increments of 10.
My theory is that the number corresponds to the amount of energy used by a shrinkray to reduce the full size shirt to the desired size. After all, how else could the stitching and weaving be so precise? Exactly.
Further research, however, reminds me that S stands for half, as in semi. What were the shirt companies thinking when they designed this system? Clearly half is complete nonsense in this case. They had plenty of other numerals to choose from, such as I, X, C, and D. I wonder if it was the marketing department's idea...
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But if that's the case, the amount of energy required to shrink a shirt is extremely nonlinear. Perhaps it takes an exponential amount of energy to shrink a shirt by a certain amount. Or, maybe it's asymptotic, and S is for aSymptote, and it takes an infinite amount of energy to create a size S shirt.
ReplyDeleteIf we create a new method of shrinking shirts (say, an industrial-scale dryer), would we have to redo the sizing scheme?