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Comment by nerdile | Hacker News Reader

Native US English speaker here, and this is the first time I have ever heard of this. TIL

Every time I hear it, it befuddles me just like the first time. It seems like a syntax error or something. My mind literally reels, like the idea is a fish and I can nearly feel the fishing line drag but the syntax and grammar isn’t rigidly applied, and so I can’t increase the tension or the line will snap, as it isn’t rated for this hefty and impactful of an idea as when something occurs specifically. I don’t know if that fish story adds anything, but I realized that there was some potential for wordplay that helps explain how it feels perceptually to hear these English words in nonstandard order from someone to whom it is standard. It’s strange.

It's like saying "half ten" instead of "ten thirty". There's a missing word, it's "half past ten", it's "friday next week".

How do I know the missing word isn’t [up]coming, as in “Friday (coming [up] (this)) week”? As opposed to next week, which would be “Friday (next) week” in this syntax.

For that matter, the missing word could be this, as in “Friday (this) week” versus “Friday (that (as in the next one after the one contrasted with via the word this) week”. I have no way to disambiguate this, so I ask something like “Friday after tomorrow” or “Friday the 13th” or something. It’s hard being me at times, I’ll admit.

In Norwegian that means 9:30. It is indeed very common, that’s how we say every x:30. It’s «halfway to ten» or something.

I hear this in the US when people say "a couple things" instead of "a couple of things". The word "of" is missing!

In Dutch the literal translation is "half tien" which means 9:30 in Dutch. This can be quite confusing ;)

In Germany it‘s even more confusing. In the West people say „Viertel nach Neun“ and “Viertel vor Zehn” which is pretty much „quarter past nine“ and “quarter to ten”, while in Eastern Germany people say “Viertel Zehn” and “Dreiviertel Zehn” which rather means “quarter of ten” and “three quarters of ten”. Even though they are meaning exactly the same times.

My English-speaking father with German heritage said both “quarter to ten” for 9:45 and “quarter of ten” for 10:15. He’s the only person I’ve heard say “quarter of ten”. Now I know that could be from his German heritage even though he never learned German.

Reasonably commonly used in Commonwealth countries.

Next Friday is sometimes too ambiguous, you can never be sure you share the same definition with the other person. Is it the same as This Friday (the very next occurring Friday), or Friday Week (ie next week's Friday).

I always thought of "Friday week" as "Friday plus a week" rather than "next week's Friday".

yeah, that's a better way of expressing it.

I heard it used this way in Australia, and I’ve heard it now and then in British TV programs. Only have heard it among very old timers in isolated areas in the US a few times when I was very young previously.

Never seen or heard this in New Zealand from native speakers.

We must move in different circles then ;)

Maybe I should ask my kids...

My kiwi teenage daughter and her friend didn't really use it, but did hear it used occasionally.

Interestingly they both had different definitions of Next Friday though, and both thought there was only one way of defining it.

I’m Australian and I’ve heard this a lot

Likewise. I'm Australian and have used it regularly for a long time. My parents have always used it.

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