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EU to determine exact dimensions of fun

The European Union will rule later this month on the exact dimensions of "fun", we can reveal.

And under sweeping legislation, double-decker buses, grapefruit and guinea pigs will be standardised for the first time.

The move comes in direct response to widespread abuse of generic terms of measurement, such as "fun-sized chocolate bar" and "a tumour the size of a grapefruit". An official told The Rockall Times: "It's common for confectionery manufacturers to produce a miniature version of a full-size chocolate bar and call it 'fun-sized'. They might then put an assortment of these in a bag and stamp it 'party pack'. This is without any regard for the amount of chocolate actually required to generate fun, or any proper understanding of how much fun it requires to provoke a party."

"Indeed," he continued, "Is it not reasonable to suggest that a full-sized chocolate bar — being three times bigger than its fun-size equivalent — is in reality three times as much fun?"

The committee charged with fixing the fun standard will also be examining ways to eliminate confusion surrounding other commonly-used yardsticks.

"People will insist on saying that, for instance, 'when they opened him up, they found a tumour the size of an grapefruit'", noted one expert. "This is said with a cavalier disregard for the actual mean circumference of a grapefruit grown in normal conditions and during a climatically-average season. The figure is, in fact, 11.2cm. Any tumour less than that will have be described as 'slightly smaller than a standard grapefruit'. Growths between 4cm and 8cm may be described as smaller, equal to, or greater than a free-range egg (medium). Between 8 and 10cm, a melanoma is said to be 'the size of a very small grapefruit', and so on."

Meanwhile, tabloid newspaper editors and producers of television science programmes are said to be "alarmed" at the prospect of facing heavy fines for contravening the new guidelines. One journalist told us: "Everybody knows that a dinosaur can be swiftly measured using double-decker buses. We will now have to state the model and year of the bus, and whether the buses are standing bumper-to-bumper, or we have allowed a small gap between each for safety reasons."

Likewise, broadcasters will no longer be able to quantify the destuctive power of weapons according to the number of football pitches they might lay waste, without first giving the exact dimensions of said pitch. This figure will be established by Arsenal coach Arsene Wenger, who is the country's leading authority on football pitch dimesions and the subsequent psychological effect on an ill-tempered rabble of over-paid professionals.

The final part of the legislation will lay to rest once and for all the polemic surrounding the exact toxicity of killer viruses. "In future, it will not be permissible to say that one teaspoon of Ebola could wipe out Manhatten. Rather, ill-informed pundits must state that one eurospoon (.01dl) of Ebola is enough to kill X guinea pigs. The guinea pig in question must be a healthy Peruvian adult male, raised on a balanced diet of soya protein and mixed nuts, and no heavier than 211.5g.

When the current round of standardisation is complete, the EU will move towards a unified height standard. "We were hoping that by 2005 anything tall or any long distance might be expressed in multiples of the World Trade Center," mused one scientist. "Unfortunately, that's a bit too short now."

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