3 ms·

> “Friday week” is surprisingly unambiguous. It always means “count forward from today until a Friday, then add a week”. Well, no, the typical case would be th

> “Friday week” is surprisingly unambiguous. It always means “count forward from today until a Friday, then add a week”. Well, no, the typical case would be that it means nothing at all and the other person thinks you're having a stroke. Zero potential meanings isn't actually better than two potential meanings. You know what's really unambiguous? "Friday the 8th".

defrost 1y ago
I've been using Friday week type constructs for many decades .. never had an issue. > You know what's really unambiguous? "Friday the 8th". Sorry, of which month in which year under what calender?
- thaumasiotes 1y ago
  > Sorry, of which month in which year under what calender? Whichever could be a theoretical possibility for whatever you're describing the date of. In almost all cases, there will only be one choice. But in other cases, the speaker will provide the rest of the date.
- _carbyau_ 1y ago
  I suspect if you are running off a different calendar than most people you interact with then you would be used to clarifying these things!
  - defrost 1y ago
    Exactly the point, requires clarification, doesn't stand on it's own, is hardly unambiguous. Moreover most people are surrounded by by people using the same calendar and don't clarify, it's an issue for travellers and data reconciliation across boundaries. That said, it's the month and year that are most lacking from a simple { Dayname, day of month } pairing.
retsibsi 1y ago
That's just a spicy way of saying "I am unfamiliar with this idiom". Nobody is saying you should unilaterally start using it in the US, or in any other context where nobody would understand you. They're saying that, for those who do have this idiom, it is unambiguous.
- thaumasiotes 1y ago
  There's a little bit more to it than that. I am unfamiliar with the idiom, and the idiom does not appear to be grammatical English, suggesting that something has gone wrong rather than that the speaker is using a foreign vocabulary item. Most idioms don't look like word salad, but this one does. "Friday week" would ordinarily mean a week characterized in some way by Friday, but of course there can be no such week. There could be a "Good Friday week".
  - retsibsi 1y ago
    Your original complaint was that the phrase is meaningless. To people who are familiar with it, it's obviously not meaningless! For those who are unfamiliar with it, I'd say the bafflingness is more feature than bug; you'll immediately know that you've encountered an unfamiliar phrase (or missed a word), rather than trying to piece it together logically and coming away with an illusion of understanding. (Yeah, it would be even better if it just made sense transparently and unambiguously to all listeners. But that leaves us with a complaint about idioms in general, not this one in particular.)
  - aspenmayer 1y ago
    > "Friday week" would ordinarily mean a week characterized in some way by Friday, but of course there can be no such week. There could be a "Good Friday week". I think there was that one or maybe two times the Catholic Church changed the day or date? I don’t know much about it but that may have resulted in a week without a Friday, which would make the next one pretty good, when it happened.

defrost 1y ago

I've been using Friday week type constructs for many decades .. never had an issue. > You know what's really unambiguous? "Friday the 8th". Sorry, of which month in which year under what calender?

thaumasiotes 1y ago
> Sorry, of which month in which year under what calender? Whichever could be a theoretical possibility for whatever you're describing the date of. In almost all cases, there will only be one choice. But in other cases, the speaker will provide the rest of the date.
_carbyau_ 1y ago
I suspect if you are running off a different calendar than most people you interact with then you would be used to clarifying these things!
- defrost 1y ago
  Exactly the point, requires clarification, doesn't stand on it's own, is hardly unambiguous. Moreover most people are surrounded by by people using the same calendar and don't clarify, it's an issue for travellers and data reconciliation across boundaries. That said, it's the month and year that are most lacking from a simple { Dayname, day of month } pairing.

retsibsi 1y ago

That's just a spicy way of saying "I am unfamiliar with this idiom". Nobody is saying you should unilaterally start using it in the US, or in any other context where nobody would understand you. They're saying that, for those who do have this idiom, it is unambiguous.

thaumasiotes 1y ago
There's a little bit more to it than that. I am unfamiliar with the idiom, and the idiom does not appear to be grammatical English, suggesting that something has gone wrong rather than that the speaker is using a foreign vocabulary item. Most idioms don't look like word salad, but this one does. "Friday week" would ordinarily mean a week characterized in some way by Friday, but of course there can be no such week. There could be a "Good Friday week".
- retsibsi 1y ago
  Your original complaint was that the phrase is meaningless. To people who are familiar with it, it's obviously not meaningless! For those who are unfamiliar with it, I'd say the bafflingness is more feature than bug; you'll immediately know that you've encountered an unfamiliar phrase (or missed a word), rather than trying to piece it together logically and coming away with an illusion of understanding. (Yeah, it would be even better if it just made sense transparently and unambiguously to all listeners. But that leaves us with a complaint about idioms in general, not this one in particular.)
- aspenmayer 1y ago
  > "Friday week" would ordinarily mean a week characterized in some way by Friday, but of course there can be no such week. There could be a "Good Friday week". I think there was that one or maybe two times the Catholic Church changed the day or date? I don’t know much about it but that may have resulted in a week without a Friday, which would make the next one pretty good, when it happened.