Яг хоёр метр

Grandad's new boat must go into the shed before the winter storms arrive. The doorway looks much too narrow. Dad holds a steel tape across the door and writes his first measurement on an old envelope. “Two metres exactly,” he says. “That number is precise, so the boat will never get through.”

Ben measures the boat instead. He walks round it twice and writes down his own estimate. “Two metres and five centimetres,” he says. “The hull will exceed the gap by a little.” Sara is not convinced. “Your tape is bent, so the number is not accurate,” she says.

Grandad comes out of the shed with a length of old string and no tape at all. Dad shakes his head at the string. “That boat is absolutely massive.” Grandad is not worried. “The old shed isn't very big.”

He looks up at the beam. “The gap above the step is very wide.” He drops a knotted string down the door frame and measures the depth of the old stone step. “The maximum width is up at the beam, not down here on the floor.”

“And the minimum is at the step. This doorway is absolutely tiny.” Sara asks the question that nobody else wants to ask. “Is it absolutely impossible?” “Not at all,” Grandad answers. “You turn the hull and bring it through at an angle.”

They tilt the boat, lift the front and push. It slides in with two centimetres to spare. Dad looks at the string in Grandad's hand. “Your measurement was absolutely perfect.” “Mine was accurate,” he adds. “It was also completely useless.”