Seconds

Well, I'm up. Might as well ramble on and then post it online for posterity, right? Amiright?!

Anyway, I'm thinking about how weird time is. Let's not even worry about the fact that it's hilarious that when you think about it time is less of something we measure in the sense of something continuing so much as it is a measurement of how long it has left. And let's strictly focus on how stinkin' ridiculous it is that so much can get done.

Let's take a look at Niagra Falls, shall we? Niagra Falls is a pretty big deal. So big, in fact, that 750,000 gallons of water pour from it every second (That video you watched was 75,900,000 gallons of waterfall, yo). Which is pretty impressive. Do you know how long it would take you to drink all that? NO! Because you're asleep, probably!

Well, I'm not and I like math and challenges so let's diggity-do this. Another fact: 20,000 Coca-Cola products are sold throughout the world. Every. Second. So let's use that as our basis for how much you drink every second. Now, calm your face. You aren't the world. Even though you mean it to me, you just scientifically aren't, and you're gonna have to deal with it.

So let's widdle that down a bit. First, we'll say that most Coca-Cola products being bought are the cans because even though everyone knows the bottles are better, cans are what I always see people drinking. Cans hold 12 ounces of fluid, and there are 128 ounces per gallon, meaning that it would take 10.66666666666667 cans to make a gallon. Conveniently: 20,000/10.66666666666667 divides one digit away from 1,875. Don't trust me? Get a calculator.

So great. 1,875 gallons of Coca-Cola bought world-wide per-second. But you still don't drink that much. I hope. Not in one second at least. Besides, the current population is 6,973,738,433. Out of all those, you are only one. Which is about .00000001434% if I round up. So we can somewhat safely say you drink that amount of the world's Coca-Cola. Which is .000002868 gallons. Which is .000367104 ounces. Per second, of course.

Now, that's just how much you purchase. As for how much you can drink? Let's say you are half as good as the record holding fizz-drinker, who I don't know. So instead, here's the average time of several competitors divided in half, then rounded: 3.5 seconds per-can. So we can fairly safely say you get about 4 ounces on a good gulp. So at that rate, it would take you a minute of solid, 4-ounce a second chugging to get almost 2 (1.875) gallons down. We won't worry about how you keep it down. This isn't REAL science.

1.875 gallons in a minute? It would take you about 10,667 minutes of non-stop sipping, and you'd have had the entire world's share of soda. For a second, anyway. You'd also be sick, but for oh so much longer than a second. Let's round that up to 11,000. So, that took you 183.3 hours. Let's say 183 because I'm tired of all these decimals. And let's face it... you can't even do that, bro. Thats just under 8 days, so 8 days is what we'll go with.

So yay! You're done, right? WRONG! We're trying to drink Niagra Falls! But the rest is easy. 20,000 gallons in 8 days. 750,000 Gallons flowing from the falls. Divide 750k by 20k you get 37.5, you multiply that by the time it takes you to drink the 20, aaaand you get 300 days. To drink one second of Niagra Falls. Have fun, champ.

Now, why you would even do something like that just seems silly. When you already have so much more you can do in a second. In fact, I dare say that humans can do the most amazing thing in a second. Decision-making. In fact, thanks to split-second decisions, we can do it twice! And thanks to being able to multi-task like no other, we do it without even knowing sometimes!

Now, I know. It seems corny, but it's true. Niagra Falls is amazing, but it's pretty set in it's ways. It can't just say "Y'know what? I'm just gonna... not be a waterfall today". Nope. It's a waterfall. We, however, can decide that kind of stuff. Every second. We can completely change everything. Literally every step you take, no matter how mundane they may sometimes seem is a decision. You ever stop and think about that? Because guess what? Stopping to think about making a decision is a decision. We can even decide on sets of decisions to make!

Okay, let me just breathe and calm down. ... Okay. Okay. Let me... okay.

Here's an example. You are talking to a person. Normal conversation. They're talking about something that's actually pretty interesting. What are your choices? You could respond with something related, or change the subject, right? WRONG. Options are pretty re-stinking-diculously limitless. You could punch them in the face. You really could. It'd be just plain wrong of you, and it would definitely change your life. You could also just slowly back away. Maybe not as life changing, but they wouldn't ever look at you the same.

So I guess I'm just stuck here. Being awake. Thinking about all of the options I've ever had, have, or will have. It's incredible how the slightest difference in action could have and still can drastically affect my life. Obviously, it's not that big of a deal if I order white or wheat at Subway. What's important is that I went to Subway instead of Firehouse Subs like some kind of idiot. My life suffers for that.

Seriously, though. Next time you're bored think about all the things you could do. Don't worry about what you could have done five years ago, because hindsight is 20/20 and it's like being in high school and thinking doing your kindergarten letter-tracing over again will help you understand Shakespeare.

That's about all I have on my mind tonight. A bunch of math for no reason, and an attempt to be philosophical while I have a migraine probably. So... see you next time I can't sleep.

Thanks for reading!
~Kyle