microcentury

English

Etymology

From micro- (“1 millionth”) +‎ century (“100 years”).

Noun

microcentury (plural microcenturies)

1. (humorous) A unit of time equal to one millionth of a century or approximately one hour (52 minutes and 35.8 seconds).
   • 1997, Gian-Carlo Rota, “Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught”, in Indiscrete Thoughts, Springer Science & Business Media, published 2008, →ISBN, page 197:

     After fifty minutes (one microcentury as von Neumann used to say) everybody's attention will turn elsewhere even if we are trying to prove the Riemann hypothesis.

   • 2014, Christoph Schiller, Motion Mountain, edition 27.06, volume IV, page 204:

     Translate: I was caught in such a traffic jam that I needed a microcentury for a picoparsec and that my car’s fuel consumption was two tenths of a square millimetre.

Usage notes

The microcentury is not a formal unit of measurement and is chiefly used for humorous hyperbole emphasizing the subjective feeling of an hour having taken an eternity, as during a boring lecture.

Further reading

• list of humorous units of measurement § Microcentury on Wikipedia.Wikipedia