well aksually: Colorado is technically a hexahectaenneacontakaiheptagon.
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/is-colorado-a-rectangle
it’s a non-euclidean rectangle.
Colorado be like “what if we were a rectangle without any parallel lines in it?”
That it isn’t a perfect rectangle is something that annoys me greatly.
Polygon would be more succinct
If you get the chance to watch “How the States Got Their Shapes” I highly recommend watching it.
As if anyone outside those states could distinguish between unlabelled outlines of Virginia, Kentucky, and North Carolina.
Or New Hampshire and Vermont.
I guess Connecticut pulled a pro gamer move by being a tiny rectangle.
Kentucky looks like fried chicken, that’s how I always remember it
It’s also carried by the chef that spans from Louisiana to Minnesota.
Virginia has a similar shape tho, if not more chicken-like because it’s larger on the meaty portion
Virginia isn’t curved in on the bottom right like the chicken.
Virginia looks like a half baked cookie that is lopsided.
I do tend to ignore the flat bottoms of both KY and VA, I’m thinking more of the “divot” before the meaty part of the leg occurs being more prominent in VA, whereas KY is a uniform-ish slope.
Maybe a 1a and 1b situation for “States shaped like poultry” ranking lol
I guess I’m just too familiar with the shape of Virginia? The hole where West Virginia broke off gives it away too.
I feel like that’s what enhances it? Lol I think of a chicken leg as like…skinny bone with a bulb on the end, and VA has more of that imo. KY ends up being more like a uniform line until it gets to the think part. 🍗 shape. I also just mean I’m reference to the shape itself, not as a memory tool. I’m from WV so I loooove the void we left in VA lol
“I’m bad at geography, so everyone else must be too” is a take for sure XD
Are you sure “Americans aren’t bad at geography” isn’t more of a take?
As if anyone outside those states could distinguish between unlabelled outlines of Virginia, Kentucky, and North Carolina.
Self-reporting, because this is shit we learn in like 3rd grade in the US and that adults should (albeit aren’t expected to) be able to do. NH and Vermont I could tell you but mainly because I reassemble their little 69 in my head as a memory aid. (A sane memory aid without needing to remember “big end bottom” or “big end top” is that NH’s small vertical end is super narrow compared to its large one.)
Whereas Wyoming and Colorado – presented separately in a void with no scale – I could only tell because Wyoming is nearly a perfect rectangle while Colorado is an isosceles trapezoid (just very slightly). That’s one you basically have to just memorize via a top/bottom relationship.
It was mostly a joke, I didn’t think people would get so worked up.
But yeah, I’ll stand by the assertion that most Americans aren’t great at geography, and some states have non-distinct shapes that aren’t rectangles.
I’d say I can kind of see someone getting Kentucky and Virginia mixed up, so I guess here are some general tips, throwing spaghetti at the wall so maybe it helps someone:
- Virginia’s hump is a lot taller (absolutely and proportionately) than Kentucky’s.
- Virginia is a Sonic the Hedgehog OC with
peninsulasspikes coming off the back of its hump. - If you get it in the outline, Virginia has a small peninsula off its main east coast, called the “Eastern Shore of Virginia”, which forms the tongue of the Delmarva Peninsula.
- The elongate part of Virginia is sharp like a knife, while that of Kentucky is pretty blunt and bumpy like a fist. So Kentucky do the grabbo, Virginia do the stabbo.
When i was in school, there was a web game that we were allowed to play where you had a blank map of the US and had to drag the states to the right spot. The states did not snap into place.
It was jarring how many students couldn’t even get the states surrounding us right, and I’m in Texas. Like, I didn’t get it 100% right because New England is a bitch, but I could get over 90%.
I think I played that same game back in the day. And yeah, when you have the context added by building out from the distinctly shaped border states, it’s fairly easy to get almost all of them, but I don’t expect the average American to be sure if they’re looking at Indiana or Illinois based on nothing but the shape of its outline.
I play Statele every day and I’m not from the US. I’m usually wrongthough so I guess
Vermont looks like a V!
None of those states look anything alike though
Borders along rivers make no sense, fight me.
Borders don’t make sense
Rivers clearly demark the boundary for anyone without GPS or other means of determining a precise location. Same as hills and mountain ranges, which are also common boundaries.
The fact that some rivers can wander and people tend to bold cities across rivers is a thing against them, but people build across any kind of boundary.
Rivers are natural points for cities, almost every city not on the coast is on the river because that’s how it was originally settled. So to have half the city in one state and the other half of the city in the other state is absurd. People build across anything but again cities are naturally on rivers.
Economically the immediate area on both sides of a river are going to be similar, so you should have the same administration. It’s when you get away from the river that this changes and you might want different administration.
