Whenever anything really big does anything in the universe, the most common object to compare it to appears to be Texas.
This occured to me this morning when I was listening to Headline News (I hadn’t quite worked up the entergy to watch at that point) and they called Hurricane Frances “the size of Texas”.
So what else is big enough to merit this distinction? Let’s ask Google.
The asteroid in Armageddon is the only one that’s actually the size of Texas. Everything else that comes up, Texas is simply used as a reference.
Why is there such a fascination with the size of Texas? It’s not the biggest state, hasn’t been for over 50 years. I think it’s just something that everyone recognizes as fucking HUGE.
And how big is Texas? According to a random site, it’s 660 miles wide and 790 miles long at its longest points.
Or, it’s half the size of Alaska.