Originally posted at Tall Guy’s Blog.
Welcome to The Tall Quiz, or How to Tell if You Are Really a Tall Person. Please take a couple of minutes and think about your answers to the following questions, and then tally your score to find out how tall you really are.
The Quiz
- Who hits their head more on low-hanging objects, someone who is over 6′4″ or someone who is under?
- The tall person
- The short person
- If you are exactly 6′10 3/8″, how tall do you say that you are when asked?
- Six foot, ten and three eighths inches.
- 6′2″
- Bigger than a breadbox
- About 7-ish
- It depends on what gas station I am entering or exiting at the time
- After you tell someone how tall you are, the next question they ask is if you have ever played basketball. Your answer is:
- What is this “basketball” that you speak of?
- Yes (and then give them a detailed history)
- No, it got in the way of my career as a jockey
- I wanted a bigger challenge, so I took up miniature golfing instead
- Who is taller, Mugsy Bogues (5′3″) or Spud Webb (5′7″)?
- Spudd Webb, obviously
- Mugsy Bogues plays so much taller despite his smaller stature
- Who? or who?
- Does it matter? They are both chihuahuas
- When someone on the street that you have never seen before comes up to you and says: “Hey, you’re really tall”, your response is:
- And you’re really smart
- What!? Holy shit, that must have just happened overnight!
- Well thank you. You’re quite…medium-sized, I would say. Extra-medium even
- Ah shucks. Hey, if you ever want the first word on the weather, come talk to me
Ok, now that you have had time to think about your answers and write them down, it’s time for the answers. After this, you will be able to tell everyone you know what your personal Tall Quotient is…
Answers:
Question 1: despite the obvious theory that tall people will invariably find more things that are head height to them, and that they could possibly run into, the answer is the shorter person. Tall people learn very quickly that they are tall, and thus they are inevitably bound to find things to run their heads into. Let me rephrase that, tall people learn very quickly, or suffer from multiple concussions and are required to wear padded helmets everywhere they go. Tall people always have their “headar” on (thats ‘head radar’ for all the pormanteauly challenged people out there), because they don’t like hitting their head on the multitude of low-hanging objects (on a totally different subject, has anyone else noticed that most cities trim the trees along sidewalks to a constant height of 6′2″? So, if you are taller, you’re on your own). Shorter people don’t learn this at the early age necessary for it to become second nature, and are thus more likely to smack into things that hang down that low. If you chose answer A, you get 0 points. If you picked answer B, give yourself 2 points.
Question 2: I’ll let you in on a secret, this was a bit of a trick question. The only wrong answer is option A. A tall person never tells someone to the exact 1/8th of an inch how tall they are. More than likely, they don’t even know. After you reach six feet tall when you are still in middle school, you start to think of height in relative terms. Like bigger than a breadbox (it’s true, you are). Only when you are short do you strain for every little piece of the pie that you can reach, and the shorter you are the less pie you get. So if you answered A, give yourself -2. If you answered B, give yourself 5 points. If you picked E, give yourself 3 points because I like Ron White. If you chose C or D, you get 2 points.
Question 3: Sorry, but another trick question. Everyone who has ever been considered tall at some point in their life has heard this question: “So, have you ever played ball?” Or, if the person is old and trying to be hip: “Hey there sonny boy, do you ever hoop it up?” Honestly, this is the most ridiculous question to ask someone. Tall people don’t walk up to women who are more than normally endowed (ie, big breasted) and ask “How’s life at the strip club?” or “Man, I bet you get a lot of milk out of those puppies!” even though we may really want to ask those very questions. Just because someone is tall doesn’t necessarily mean that they are in any way physically competent enough to play basketball. So, if you answered B, sorry but you get another -2 points. If you answered A, give yourself 1 point for sidestepping the question, but a lack of creativity. If you answered C you get 3 points, and if you chose D you get 4 points (any time you can add “miniature” into a conversation about tall people, you get bonus points).
Question 4: Lo and behold! Yet another trick question. These are mostly tricks because it is easy to lie on the internet and say you are tall. This quiz could have consisted of one question (How tall are you?), but it’s too easy to lie to boost your fragile height-based ego when you are short. Anywho, if you are female and chose answer C, give yourself 1 bonus point for having a good sense of humor. If you are a guy and chose answer C, you get another -2 points. Even short guys should know and revere these two guys for having beat the NBA system, and having pretty good careers despite the obvious fact. If you picked A, you get 1 point. Because technically it is true, 5′7″ is taller than 5′3″. If you picked B or D, you get 2 points (I hope you are keeping track).
Question 5: The trickiest of the tricky questions, because it requires that you have read 6′2″ before now, specifically the beginnings of 6′2″. Basically, since all tall people run into this situation multiple times that they are out in public, they get tired of it. Honestly, it is a statement, so there is no response required. But obviously the person that walks up to you wants to start a conversation, otherwise they wouldn’t have said anything at all. So the taller the person, the more creative the responses are to this invasiveness (again, tall people don’t walk up to fat people and yell out things like “350! No wait, 375!” It’s just rude). If you answered B or D, give yourself 1 point for coming up with something (although not that creative. The “how’s the weather up there” is just about as old and tired as the “ever played ball” question). If you picked A, you get 2 points for the sheer pluck of it. And if you answered C, you get 4 points for not only the most creative (extra-medium is genius), but the bonus points of being a 6′2″ faithful.
Ok, tally up your score, and here are the results.
- 0 or below to 5: you are obviously well under 6 feet tall. More than likely, you are so short that you would have looked up to Napoleon.
- 6 to 10: your Tall Quotient is 6′1″ to 6′5″. You’re tall, but not that tall.
- 11 to 15: now we are getting somewhere. Your TQ is 6′6″ to 6′10″ (Hey, did you ever play any college ball?).
- 16 to 17: your TQ is 6′11″ and above (because the sky is the limit tall guy). Or, you have the option of saying that you are 6′2″ and proud of it.
Hopefully this answered some questions about how tall you really are.
Editor’s Note: I have a new one for when someone comes up to you and says, “Wow, you’re really tall.” My response (in perfect English with heavy midwest acdcent): “What? Oh! You mean ‘alto’. Sorry, I only speak Spanish.”
Editor’s Note #2: This past weekend at a local Golf Show (you haven’t lived until you’ve jacked a bucket full of range balls into the upper deck of a domed stadium) I had the following conversation with, yes, that’s right….a certain Ms. Minnesota (didn’t catch her first name).
Her: “Wow, you’re really tall.”
Me (thinking): (“Crap. She’s hot. AND Ms. Minnesota. Should I try any of my usual smart ass lines? Will she even get them? She’s hot.”)
Me: “Thank you very much! I’ll take that as a compliment.”
Me: “You’re very medium.”
(long pause)
Her (with confused look): “Hunh?”
Her (same confused look, or worse): “What do you mean?”
You win some, you lose some.
Other editor’s note: Kaiser might remember this story the too, in which case he can back me up. On our way from Boulder, CO to Northfield, MN after college nationals (frisbee), I was in the back of the plane with Josh and my then gf. Now I’m 6′4″-ish, and he’s 6′10-ish, giving us a combined 13 and 1/2 ish feet of person in two seats. Right in front of us was the exit row, and about 5′8″ of whiny, must-be-a-trust-fund-child, PMS-ing, annoying man who couldn’t stop complaining about the lack of leg room the whole flight long.
In. The. Exit. Row.
Finally, at the end of the flight, when he stood up (hardly even having to bend his neck to fit under the overhead compartment), he noticed me bent over at the waist to stand up behind him. The kicker, and the thing that really shut him up, was him then looking next to me to see Kaiser in the fetal position in the seat. Yes, with his feet on the ground, and yes, with his knees up by his nose. The look on his face was pretty priceless.
