Centimeters and inches are so 20th century, from now on, we're using hamsters for measurement. 


The centuries-long battle between Americans and the metric system took a turn for the bizarre this week after media giant CNN opted to report on a record-smashing kidney stone – one clocking in at 5.26 inches and 1.76 lbs – in arguably the strangest imaginable means.


Instead of describing the kidney stone, which broke two Guinness World Records upon its removal earlier this month, through traditional measurements, the media giant opted instead to tap a piece of fruit and a quartet of rodents in conveying its mammoth scope.



“The world’s largest kidney stone has been removed from a patient in Sri Lanka,” they captioned the story on their official Twitter page. “It’s about the size of a grapefruit, as long as a banana, and as heavy as four hamsters.”



Yet, more than marveling at the absolute monstrosity of the calcium deposit before them, several readers flocked to the comments questioning why, exactly, CNN used these terms to convey the magnitude of this biological horror.



“When did we start weighing things in hamsters?” mused @coolname77.


“Wake up babe, new units of measurement just dropped,” joked hey_staj.



As @UnderpantsAnton so aptly put it – “Americans will avoid the metric system at all costs.”