IU Football and Meters 4

... continued from yesterday
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"Oh, I see," Stefanie cleverly responded as they arrived at the ticket booth, where her other sister Stacy was waiting.  But of course no one had paid any attention to Ken's lovely explanation. There were the usual hugs and greetings to Stacy and soon they were all sitting not far from the solid wall of Indiana University students at the game.

Going to IU football games was always a great family time. Stefanie and Stacy rarely went to the games when the rest of the family wasn't visiting. Tom and Sophie especially enjoyed all the chants and rituals that the whole IU crowd knew and did.

Everyone was especially pumped today because IU was playing Purdue, their arch-rival.  And IU was doing well.  First down after first down, the announcer would say in a booming voice, "FIRST DOWN, HOOOSIERS!"  Then came the first touchdown.  Purdue only managed to get into field goal territory going the other way.  7 to 3, IU was on its way.

Everything was going just fine until after another IU first down, Stef's step-dad suddenly interrupted the pure bliss.  He turned to Sophia and asked, "Do you know how many yards it takes to make a first down?"

OK, that wasn't too bad a question. After all, it was a question about football.  A few moments of silence, and Stacy leaned over to Sophie and whispered, "ten," in her ear.

"Ten," Sophie repeated with a smile.

Then came the inevitable.  "OK, Stef, how many meters is that?"

At first she pretended not to hear him, but a time out on the field gave her mom just enough distraction to repeat the question.  "Stef, how many meters are 10 yards?"

"Less than 10," she said glibly, hoping something exciting would happen down on the field.

"That's right!  That's right!" her step-dad said excitedly.  "A yard is a little less than a meter, so 10 yards will be a bit less than 10 meters.  To be honest, I can't remember how much bigger a meter is than a yard," he said.

Stef looked at him in disbelief.  "You mean you're asking me a question you don't know the answer to?"  He smiled at her annoyingly in response.

"A meter is about 1.1 yards," Stacy interrupted, having just looked it up on her smart phone.

"Rats' I wish we were asking how many yards 10 meters is," Ken the step-dad said.  "That would be easy.  You would just multiply 10 meters times 1.1 yards per meter, 10 times 1.1."

"That would be 11," Tom said without looking up from the game he was playing on his mom's cell phone.  No one knew he had been listening.

"That's right!  That's right!" Ken annoyingly said again.  "To multiply anything by 10, you just move the decimal one place to the right.  So 1.1 becomes 11 when you multiply by 10.

By now the game was back on and no one at all was still listening, but Ken continued the problem on his own, muttering softly to himself.  "10 yards divided by 1.1 yards per meter would be the same as 100 divided by 11.  9 times 11 is 99 with a remainder of 1/11.  That's around a tenth, so it's going to be about 9.1 meters.

"Yes, there are about 9.1 meters in 10 yards," he said, but he was drowned out by everyone jumping up in the air as IU scored another touchdown...