To my shock and amazement a few Tuesdays ago, I realised the appalling inefficiency of the humble pencil. The typical pencil is about 15cm long, and its lead is about 2mm thick. I’ve noticed, in my own pencil usage, that when the tip is more than about 0.75mm across that I will sharpen the pencil. This means that the outer 1.25mm of the pencil lead is wasted in the sharpening process. And because it’s the cross-sectional area that matters, this amounts to 86% of the pencil lead. Coupled with the fact that the last 3cm of the pencil is unholdable, that means that about 90% of the lead in a pencil is wasted! Isn’t that shocking!?
I, for one, am outraged. Protests are being organised. Potential slogans are invited. So far, I’ve come up with:
Don’t pencil me in
Lead is dead
Not 2B – that is the answer
Make pencils disappear
That last one is a bit dark.
Not sure Luke, I think this crusade may be 2H.