[greenavocado]

I find multiples of the amount of energy needed to vaporize our oceans a useful unit of energy because 8.5 x 10^27 joules is too abstract.

It's just like 1 AU being the average Sun-Earth distance. It is easier to comprehend than 149,597,870,700 m when talking about large distances.

Many discussions recently have centered around processes which require tremendous amounts of energy and the vaporized oceans unit provides some more tangible if absurd perspective.

[nandomrumber]

And remember, 1 AU is about 997.3 billion bananas laid end to end.

[greenavocado]

How do you define the major axis of a banana?

[nandomrumber]

The longest dimension.

[jaeckel]

In a straight line?

[nandomrumber]

Yes, laid end to end, after they've been bent.

If you were to lay them end to then, then bend the them, you'd have a coil of bananas about three to four bananas (bent) in diameter.