415
votes
Accepted
Why 11 am + 1 hour == 12:00 pm?
ᴛʟᴅʀ: Virtually all style guides tell people to stop using the irresolvably ambiguous twelve o’clock ᴀᴍ and twelve o’clock ᴘᴍ in favor of twelve o’clock noon and twelve o’clock midnight. That solves ...
- 8,127
92
votes
Why 11 am + 1 hour == 12:00 pm?
PM, also written as P.M., pm, and p.m. is an initialism for the Latin expression post meridiem whereas the English adjective, postmeridian, is derived from the Latin word postmeridianum. The older ...
- 26.5k
89
votes
Accepted
Two thousand seventeen VS twenty seventeen: What is the rule for year pronunciation?
I am a native speaker with a careful ear. From my experience, I can tell you that when the millennium turned from 19xx to 20xx, we said "two thousand" plus the remainder throughout the aughts (01, 02, ...
- 14.4k
79
votes
Can any time on clock be spoken as it is in numbers only (hour + minutes)?
Admittedly, I'm answering a BrE question as an American, but your source is suspect.
9.36 twenty-four minutes to ten
This is grammatical, but nobody in their right mind would actually say ...
- 10.3k
79
votes
Would it be "went to sleep at one yesterday" or ”...today"?
This is not a matter of grammar but of semantics and idiom. I don't think most native speakers would use either "today" or "yesterday"; we'd say
I went to bed at one o'clock last night or
I went ...
- 175k
65
votes
Accepted
What does "at 19.45 hours" mean?
It means the same as 19:45 or 7:45PM
There seems to be several elements in the original text that are confusing.
At approximately 19.45 hours...
The dot
The dot in the time notation is not a ...
- 671
51
votes
How to refer to particular years in a specific century in one expression?
The clearest and most concise way would be "in the 1970s" (pronounced "nineteen seventies").
- 10.2k
47
votes
How can I say "a period of four months" in one word?
It isn't common to speak of a four-month period, at least in the United States where I live. Thus, although others have suggested words for this, my recommendation is to not use them. Very few people ...
- 1,779
46
votes
Why 11 am + 1 hour == 12:00 pm?
I agree that for the precise moment of 12:00, adding PM or AM is a bit arbitrary.
However, imagine we add another minute: 12:01. If this is the time that is 1 hour, one minute after 11:00 AM, then ...
- 24.9k
44
votes
Accepted
Can I say: “The train departs at 16 past every hour“?
I have seen this written many times on bus timetables etc. and find no reason why someone wouldn't understand it.
To be extra clear, I would make one amend::
The train departs at 16 minutes past ...
- 4,258
38
votes
Accepted
Do "once a year" and "once in a year" mean the same thing?
There is a slight, but meaningful, difference.
"Once a [time period]" implies frequency observed over a range of time greater than [time period]. "Once in a [time period]" implies an observed ...
- 531
35
votes
How can I say "a period of four months" in one word?
It's not in the most reputable dictionaries, but Wiktionary has it: quadrimester. It is a cousin of the more commonly used trimester, which means three months. It is composed of the Latin/French words ...
- 14.7k
31
votes
Accepted
Do I need to say “o’clock”?
No. When it is clear you are talking about a time (as it is here) "o'clock" is optional, and often omitted.
So "From 9 to 10" would be the common way of reading that.
Your second example is most ...
- 73.7k
27
votes
Why 11 am + 1 hour == 12:00 pm?
What knowledge am I missing?
It's actually the opposite. You have knowledge that the Babylonians and Romans did not have. They did not know of this strange number 0.
12 is congruent to 0 (mod 12), ...
- 379
25
votes
How can I say "a period of four months" in one word?
One-third of a year could work:
"For the first third of the year, sales were down. They picked up in the second period, but fell flat again in the final third."
It is works ok in this context, but ...
- 1,374
25
votes
Accepted
Am I telling the time correctly on the analog clock?
Those are nearly right, but when it's not a multiple of 5 minutes we almost always say the word "minute(s)".
So:
It's two minutes past one.
It's twenty-six minutes past one.
It's twenty-...
- 73.7k
24
votes
Can we say "I'll be there one hour later" instead of "I'll be there in an hour"?
"I'll be there in an hour" denotes arrival in one hour from the time the words are said. "An hour" is also generally used to be a bit vague, whereas "I'll be there in one hour" is generally used to be ...
- 746
23
votes
How do I start a sentence with a date?
Just add a was or is after the date. Practically speaking, it doesn't really matter which one you use. Either one will work equally fine:
August 22nd, 2012 was the day my life changed forever and ...
- 37.5k
22
votes
Accepted
"In my early 20s, ..." or "In my earlier 20s, ...."
"In my early twenties" is a common, idiomatic expression and refers to the early part of your twenties, as a whole.
But I see nothing wrong with "in my earlier twenties" in ...
- 96.2k
22
votes
Am I telling the time correctly on the analog clock?
As a native Londoner, here is what I am most likely to say (and hear) at those times (given below in 24 hour format):
1302: "Two minutes past one." "It's just gone one."
1305: &...
- 389
20
votes
"Last night at 9 PM, I ate dinner" -- Does this sentence mean that it began at 9 or finished at 9?
As a native speaker, I'd argue that the statement is generic enough to say that the answer is "all of the above".
What this is realistically saying is "Last night, around 9 PM, I ate dinner." - ...
- 25.4k
19
votes
Why 11 am + 1 hour == 12:00 pm?
In traditional time, we have two times that are labeled 12:00. We define 12:00 A.M. to be midnight and 12:00 P.M. to be noon. The latter is of course technically inconsistent with the original Latin ...
- 31.9k
19
votes
Day vs 24h day?
Yes, the word "day" can mean the entire 24-hour period. But it can also mean just the part where the Sun is above the horizon. It can also mean the part of the day during which work and other "daytime"...
- 2,840
19
votes
Can any time on clock be spoken as it is in numbers only (hour + minutes)?
In spoken English, you can always state the time as the hour and minutes (aside from the top of the hour), and you would only state minutes if you need to be explicit or if you are deliberately ...
- 17.7k
17
votes
Accepted
Since..of - used when the month name is absent
There is nothing wrong with using the day by itself:
He has been absent since the 4th.
Of course, one would hope that context or prior knowledge within the conversation would ensure the listener ...
J.R.♦
- 109k
16
votes
Accepted
decade, century, millennium, what is next?
There is presently nothing that comes next.
Some terms referenced do have year values assigned to them (Epoch at 1,000,000 years and Aeon at 1,000,000,000 years) but common usage relates to ...
- 333
16
votes
Two thousand seventeen VS twenty seventeen: What is the rule for year pronunciation?
You can't easily establish how the year component of C21 dates is spoken by searching online, because hardly anyone would actually write, say, two thousand [and] sixteen or twenty sixteen. Note also ...
- 68.7k
16
votes
Two thousand seventeen VS twenty seventeen: What is the rule for year pronunciation?
As a native American English speaker, both "two-thousand seventeen" and "twenty seventeen" are acceptable ways to say the year "2017". Generally, I consider "two-thousand seventeen" to be more formal ...
- 378
16
votes
Am I telling the time correctly on the analog clock?
These are all grammatically correct.
Some of them sound unnatural. You would probably say
"one oh two" not "two past one" and "one twenty six" rather than "twenty ...
- 7,103
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