Comment on At what point do you stop calling the years "two thousand and X" and start calling them "twenty X"?
stinerman@midwest.social 5 weeks ago
For me it was
2000: Two thousand 2001: Two thousand one (or less formally “oh one”) 2009: Two thousand nine (“oh nine”) 2010: Twenty ten
And from there on.
I think this is because of the amount of syllables. That’s why we switch to “twenty” instead of “two thousand”.
I personally say “o one” “o two” etc. all the way up to “o nine” After that it just seems weird to say “ten” or “eleven” instead of “twenty ten”
Even referring to 1910 as “ten” seems weird and wrong, though. In my mind, it doesn’t make sense to leave the nineteen off until the 40s. For example, saying: “Back in forty-five” sounds right, but “Back in thirty-five” sounds wrong to me for some reason.
Simple as.
takeheart@lemmy.world 5 weeks ago
You’re on to something but I doubt it’s the syllables. Rather it seems about phonetic ambiguity.
“twentynine” could mean both 29 and 2009, so it’s better to use “twothousandandnine” for the latter. “twentyten” cannot be interpreted as 30, only as 2010.
stinerman@midwest.social 5 weeks ago
You can do “2009” as “twenty oh 9”, but that feels kinda awkward. “Two thousand nine” has the same number of syllables (4). “Twenty ten” is 3. “Two thousand ten” is 4.
Even “1900” is “nineteen hundred” (4) vs “one thousand nine hundred” (6).
erev@lemmy.world 5 weeks ago
Twenty aught nine