Could the fifty million of you please, please be quiet

The Town of Vincent – almost certainly the 14th finest local government jurisdiction I’ve ever lived in – recently sent us our rates assessment. I note that our reference number is something like 000000203857.

From this, I deduce a couple of things. Firstly, it suggests there are a little over two hundred thousand residential and business units in this fine part of Skinny City. I haven’t counted every office, shop, house and flat, you understand, but this tallies with my estimation. If one then deducts the commercial properties, but allows for more than one occupant per residential unit, it is clear that the reference number equates to the number of residents (for the mathematically inclined, the formula I’ve used is {∂⅞ x 4.86Ω + √ 6∑ ≠ ∞↓ less a derivative of 7Δ/13 x 0.0056θβ}).

So, there are about 204 000 people residing in the Town of Vincent. 'bout what I would have said.

The second point is that, ever the forward thinking local government (did I mention it is nearly the 14th finest local government jurisdiction I’ve ever lived in?), the Town has allowed for future population growth. The twelve digit reference number shows that the Town of Vincent expects that at some point in the future it will be home to a thousand billion people.

Cool.

This works out as approximately 4.8 million people per building (commercial and residential – and don’t you worry about the maths I’ve used here; it’s impeccable). Again, I’m down with that, though I expect that for my part I may have to remove an internal wall or two. I shall be applying for planning permission rather soon.