Ahh, physics joy. :-) I managed to remember what stress is, but couldn't get further than 'something to do with elongation' for strain. Now I must resist the temptation to go and experiment on my housemate's slinky.

I first encountered the centimeter-gram-second system in my first stellar physics lecture. My lecturer made some comment along the lines of, "When faced with some of the largest distances ever measured, scientists have for some reason decided to measure them in centimetres." I don't think she liked it very much either. We stuck with SI for the rest of the course.