Durations - The Encyclopedia of How Long Things Take

An excerpt from the book Durations - The Encyclopedia of How Long Things Take by Stuart A. Sandow, a look at what takes fifteen seconds.

DURATIONS--THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF HOW LONG THINGS TAKE by Stuart A. Sandow, with Chrissie Bamber and J. William Rioux. New York: New York Times Books, 1977.

About the Book: How long did it take the Titanic to sink? How long does it take for a 10-year-old to outgrow his shoes? How long to glaze a ham after baking? All the answers are in this book, and thousands more to questions you never thought of asking. Beginning with 00000000000000000000001 of a second and ending with 10 billion years, the authors tell us how long it takes to do everything from watch the movie I Was a Teenage Werewolf to hatch a bedbug.

From the Book:

FIFTEEN SECONDS

-The pasteurization of milk at 161 deg. F

-Black and white Polaroid film to produce print

-The "Happiness Boys" to sing the interwoven sock jingle, the first singing commercial

-The number of burglaries committed in the U.S. to increase by one

-Bees to communicate by dancing

-To reduce pressure in a pressure cooker by placing it under cold running water 15 to 25 seconds

-The shortest change cycle time on record changer

15 to 30 seconds

-The germicidal action of chlorine to kill organisms

-Minimum onset time of vaginal lubrication following sexual stimulation in women under 50

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