# Dozens

One of my main aliases online is _dozens_. I picked it out rather arbitrarily a
long time ago when I needed a username for something. Only somewhat
arbitrarily, I suppose, because I've always liked the number 12.

Base 12, or _dozenal_, or duodecimal, is an interesting idea to me.

There are remnants of base 12 counting in English (and in German) in the way we
count. We have special words for the numbers 11 and 12 that don't quite make
sense in the base 10 system that we use for counting. i.e. why are they not
"oneteen" and "twoteen"?

We have a special word for a grouping of twelve = dozen.

We have a special word for a dozen dozen = gross.

Twelve is much more convenient than 10 to divide into fractions. Half, third,
and quarter are all regular fractions.

Furthermore, it's really easy to count in base 12 on your fingers if you count
the individual finger bones of each finger. Three to a finger, four fingers to
a hand = 12. If you count on your right hand, and keep track of each dozen you
count on your _left_ hand, then you can count to 144 (a gross) on two hands.