Re: The English/French counting system (WAS: number systems fromconlangs)

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003, John Cowan wrote:

> Phillip Driscoll scripsit:
>
> > My mother (born 1926 in the midwestern USA) always said "of the" hour
> > for "till the hour." ("School starts this year at a quarter of nine." =
> > 8:45)
> > despite my protestations as a teenager that it makes no sense.
>
> I say "of" too, despite being born in 1958.
An American I talk to (he's I think a junior in college*) over MSN does
that. He has to leave at a quarter of nine, he'll tell me, oblivious to
the fact that it's total nonsense. It's one of those differences I can
never seem to remember... Does it means quarter to or quarter past? (I can
see very well from the above quote that it means quarter to, assuming you
Americans aren't being _really_ confusing and are treating 'till' as
'past', rather than 'to'.)

*ANother confusingness of you northerners is that you insist on starting
the school year half way through. Gah, calendars were invented for a
reason! :)

_Another_ oddity of Americans and time-telling is the way they use seasons
for time, in spite of the total absence of a relation between what they're
saying and the weather. This means that 'fall' may translate into either
'autumn' or 'spring' depending on context, and usually the latter.

--
Tristan                  <kesuari@...>

Yesterday I was a dog. Today I'm a dog. Tomorrow I'll probably still
be a dog. Sigh! There's so little hope for advancement.
                -- Snoopy

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