LF: Twelve

["boffin1" <boffin1@compuserve.com>]

As an old man I still use the good old units.  There was nothing special
about a cosen standard used in Paris and the metre was based upon the
division of what was thought to be the distance from the pole to the
equator.  They got it wrong and in any case one can't carry it around, 
unlike the thumb and the long step and so on.
Fred Hoyle tried to persuade the authorities to use a duodecimal system
when the UK went crazy and chaged to metric.  His reasons were exactly
those which you state , the simplicity of factorization of the numer 12.
73, Roger.