Telling time in U. K. English

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by DMB

It's ante and post meridiem. Latin for "day" is "dies" as in "dies irae". So meridies is midday and am is before midday and pm after midday.

See, I already lost you with the word "Latin". I don't know Latin!

And I still think it's After Midday and Past Midday...

[elcreative]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

See, I already lost you with the word "Latin". I don't know Latin!

And I still think it's After Midday and Past Midday...

Seems reasonable until you realise After is similar to Past so they'd be the same...

PS latin is probably modern speak for arriving home after the time you were supposed to...

[Phogg]

Originally Posted by wodin

Government forms are incresingly going to the date format of 20010911 for September eleventh, 2001.

Blame it on computers, the numerical equivilent of yyyymmdd sorts much easier than any other format, except of course "Julian dates". But then if we used Julian dates, only computers would know what day it is.

US Military supply, and Communications fields used Julian dates during my tours. You could always keep a young Comm Tech around to ask. (I think they even have more attractive curvy ones now)

[kennyc]

They have TIME in England?????

[Xanthe]

Originally Posted by SeaBookGuy

"Across the Pond" is a British idiom, meaning "the English speaking people 'over there'." Many Anglophilic Americans, myself included, do use the expression as well.
.......
I've seen reference to "dove" being the technically correct form in the States, but it sounds a bit highfalutin' to me -- I'd say "dived", too. Then again, I prefer "pleaded' to "plead" and "snuck" to "sneaked".

Oh, I know what it means, and that it is used over here - I just never hear it being used in my area or circle of acquaintances. They'll say they're going to England or the UK, not across the pond. To my way of thinking, "across the pond" said by an American sounds pretentious, and if said by someone who's British, sounds demeaning - sort of as if we are still their colonies and they're just taking a jaunt across a lake to visit us. But then again, that's just me.

Count me as one of the people who prefer "dove" instead of "dived". "He dived in after the man who fell overboard" sounds awkward to my ears - "he dove in..." just sounds better to me.

How about "pled"?

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by elcreative

Seems reasonable until you realise After is similar to Past so they'd be the same... .

See, that's why it's confusing to use AM and PM... Too many possible equal words to the abbreviation...

[amward]

Originally Posted by Bookworm_Girl

I use the expression gifted. According to my dictionary, it is acceptable to use gift as either a noun or verb. To say you gifted something is shorter than to say that you gave something as a gift. It's meant to emphasize that you gave something as a gift and didn't expect anything in exchange for your act of giving. I can't say when or where I learned (or learnt) the expression. I think it's something I've picked up more recently.

Thanks for that info.

I checked my Macquarie (Australian) dictionary and it also says gift can be a verb, however it seems to be used here in a more formal sense as in gifting something to a museum. I can't recall ever having heard it in conversation. If we say we gave something to somebody it is understood that nothing would be expected in exchange. Gotta love the English language.

[orlok]

Originally Posted by kennyc

They have TIME in England?????

'Course we do:

Spoiler:

[TedJ]

Originally Posted by kennyc

They have TIME in England?????

Of course, although for most of them it stopped when the British Empire peaked in 1922...

[Seli]

Originally Posted by issybird

...

A question with that in mind: Here in the US, 9/11 is shorthand for the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. I assume the ROW knows what we mean. But what kind of shorthand is employed elsewhere, assuming one is? Do others say 11/9? 9/11, following US form? Or something else entirely?

Personally I read nine-eleven, which is just a strange word coupled to a date. Or the 11 September attacks*, never the date on it's own in this context. Just using the numeral for the month is not usual in Dutch (I cannot recall it ever being used in spoken form).

* or similar term

[Billi]

Originally Posted by amward

One of the things I have noticed on this forum is people using the word gifted instead of gave, as in "a Kindle, gifted to my mother" I wasn't sure if it was tongue in cheek, bad grammar or a usage like gotten that has died out here in Oz.

To my German ears that always sounds a litle bit like a "greek gift" as the German word "Gift" means "poison".

[Xanthe]

Apropos of the various conversational tangents, an article on the BBC News website today:

Why do some Americanisms irritate people?

[SeaBookGuy]

Originally Posted by Xanthe

Apropos of the various conversational tangents, an article on the BBC News website today:

Why do some Americanisms irritate people?

Ugh -- how whiny are many of his criticisms:

I've never seen the word "faze" -- I thought it's written "phase"?

I had thought he was complaining that "hospitalized" was spelled with a "z", but it appears he disliked the verb-ing aspect. I find the British "in hospital" grating vs. "in the hospital". Hospitalized is so common in the States though that I'm quite used to it. Power "outages" is very common; "cuts" would imply a deliberate loss of service (rationing).

He may take some consolation that as "elevator" appears there more, in the States, "flat" is becoming the new posh/trendy term for apartment, almost used interchangeably.

The flow is not quite as one-way as the author suggests -- many Americans would use the term "Onslow" to suggest it's time for a shave.

[orlok]

Well I didn't even know "outage" was considered an Americanism. I've used it for many years, and "power outage" is common parlance here.

[Geoff H]

You could try the twenty four hour clock, ie 1835, but it might just be as easy as
after the hour -late, and before as - early.
I hope this helps.