Latest BBM podcast thing #28 Jordan mentions the belly button measurement at around 29:50.
The Doc-Who-Lifts-D1-Wrestler-Doctor-Spencer-Guy podcast mentions the hips at the ilium ???
(or maybe it was the BBM facebook post that delt with the episode).
And over 40" you were almost certainly in a bad bad place.
Is it the hips or navel?
The correct place to measure the waist is right above the anterior superior iliac spine (ASIS) at the level of the iliac crest. For some, this will be at the level of the belly button and for others this will be below it. There’s a precise tension measurement for the spring loaded tape, but I forget what it is off hand.
seems like a person with a belly button that low would be very very rare:
https://web.duke.edu/anatomy/mbs/Lab05_MBS/images/figure_2.02%20(real%20abd%20surf%20anat).jpg
https://web.duke.edu/anatomy/mbs/Lab05_MBS/images/Tank%20&%20Guest%205-01A.jpg
Not really rare, per se’. The average variation between the waist measurement point referenced and the center of the umbilicus is a few inches in lean subjects and even greater in obese subjects.