'woollen' or 'woolen'

[w***@gmail.com]

How about this for a spanner in the works... I am Canadian/Scottish (currently residing in Scotland) and in Scotland it is woolen, while in England it is woollen... no wonder North Americans can't decide what's right!

[Robin Bignall]

On Sun, 10 Apr 2016 08:42:07 -0700 (PDT),

Post by w***@gmail.com
How about this for a spanner in the works... I am Canadian/Scottish (currently residing in Scotland) and in Scotland it is woolen, while in England it is woollen... no wonder North Americans can't decide what's right!

COD11 (which presumably covers Scotland) gives 'wool', 'woollen' and
'woolly'. I suspect 'woolen' to be an American spelling.

[GordonD]

Post by Robin Bignall
On Sun, 10 Apr 2016 08:42:07 -0700 (PDT),

Post by w***@gmail.com
How about this for a spanner in the works... I am Canadian/Scottish (currently residing in Scotland) and in Scotland it is woolen, while in England it is woollen... no wonder North Americans can't decide what's right!

COD11 (which presumably covers Scotland) gives 'wool', 'woollen' and
'woolly'. I suspect 'woolen' to be an American spelling.

I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.

[RH Draney]

Post by GordonD
I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.

There was a joke to that effect in a 1939 jokebook I inherited from my
grandmother, in which a man asked to give his full name began spelling
it: "O double T I double U E double L double U double O D"...after
several cycles through the "how was that again?" routine, he said his
name was "Ottiwell Wood" and spelled it once again....

I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

[Peter T. Daniels]

Post by RH Draney

Post by GordonD
I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.

There was a joke to that effect in a 1939 jokebook I inherited from my
grandmother, in which a man asked to give his full name began spelling
it: "O double T I double U E double L double U double O D"...after
several cycles through the "how was that again?" routine, he said his
name was "Ottiwell Wood" and spelled it once again....
I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

How did the Car Talk guys put it? It always went by too fast to catch.

[RH Draney]

Post by Peter T. Daniels

Post by RH Draney
I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

How did the Car Talk guys put it? It always went by too fast to catch.

"Two two seven, eighty two fifty five"...that spells CAR-TALK, so you
can reconstruct it by working backwards....

They did once screw around with it, something like "double two seventy
eight twenty five, five"...just for grins....r

[Peter T. Daniels]

Post by RH Draney

Post by Peter T. Daniels

Post by RH Draney
I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

How did the Car Talk guys put it? It always went by too fast to catch.

"Two two seven, eighty two fifty five"...that spells CAR-TALK, so you
can reconstruct it by working backwards....
They did once screw around with it, something like "double two seventy
eight twenty five, five"...just for grins....r

You left out the area code. It was 888 or 855, and they said it with many
"double"s every week.

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

Post by RH Draney

Post by GordonD
I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.

There was a joke to that effect in a 1939 jokebook I inherited from my
grandmother, in which a man asked to give his full name began spelling
it: "O double T I double U E double L double U double O D"...after
several cycles through the "how was that again?" routine, he said his
name was "Ottiwell Wood" and spelled it once again....
I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

They could give it the traditional French style: forty eight, zero
eight, four twenties ten, four twenties ten, four twenties nine.

[Mike Barnes]

Post by Athel Cornish-Bowden

Post by RH Draney

Post by GordonD
I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.

There was a joke to that effect in a 1939 jokebook I inherited from my
grandmother, in which a man asked to give his full name began spelling
it: "O double T I double U E double L double U double O D"...after
several cycles through the "how was that again?" routine, he said his
name was "Ottiwell Wood" and spelled it once again....
I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

They could give it the traditional French style: forty eight, zero
eight, four twenties ten, four twenties ten, four twenties nine.

I thought it was "four twenty" (etc), not "four twenties". Not that I
can hear the difference.

[James Hogg]

Post by Mike Barnes

Post by Athel Cornish-Bowden

Post by RH Draney

Post by GordonD
I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.

There was a joke to that effect in a 1939 jokebook I inherited from my
grandmother, in which a man asked to give his full name began spelling
it: "O double T I double U E double L double U double O D"...after
several cycles through the "how was that again?" routine, he said his
name was "Ottiwell Wood" and spelled it once again....
I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

They could give it the traditional French style: forty eight, zero
eight, four twenties ten, four twenties ten, four twenties nine.

I thought it was "four twenty" (etc), not "four twenties". Not that I
can hear the difference.

four-twenties (quatre-vingts)

[Peter Moylan]

Post by James Hogg

Post by Mike Barnes

Post by Athel Cornish-Bowden
They could give it the traditional French style: forty eight, zero
eight, four twenties ten, four twenties ten, four twenties nine.

I thought it was "four twenty" (etc), not "four twenties". Not that I
can hear the difference.

four-twenties (quatre-vingts)

But only for that one round number, n'est-ce pas? You go back to the
singular for the range 81-99.

When some French acquaintances were confused by my "septante" and
"nonante", I realised that I was speaking Belgian style, and tried to
correct my numbers back to the French versions. Unfortunately I
hypercorrected, and ended up with a number called trois-vingt-dix.

Russian has something unusual about the number 40, but since I've
forgotten nearly everything I knew about Russian I don't know what it
was. Having to use a different case, perhaps?

[Mike Barnes]

Post by Peter Moylan
Russian has something unusual about the number 40, but since I've
forgotten nearly everything I knew about Russian I don't know what it
was. Having to use a different case, perhaps?

And IIRC some Japanese numbers come in different forms depending on what
sort of thing you're counting.

[David Kleinecke]

Post by Mike Barnes

Post by Peter Moylan
Russian has something unusual about the number 40, but since I've
forgotten nearly everything I knew about Russian I don't know what it
was. Having to use a different case, perhaps?

And IIRC some Japanese numbers come in different forms depending on what
sort of thing you're counting.

Many languages (of different and unrelated groups) only count using
classifiers. One common shape is a morphological pair (prefix + suffix
with nothing in between) where the prefix indicates number (and sometimes
other things) and the suffix a class of countable objects. Classes tend
to be things like "long slender object".

[Ian Jackson]

Post by James Hogg

Post by Mike Barnes

Post by Athel Cornish-Bowden

Post by RH Draney

Post by GordonD
I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to spell the
word at primary school, she responded with "double-you, double-o,
double-l-e-n", which for some reason displeased the teacher.

There was a joke to that effect in a 1939 jokebook I inherited from my
grandmother, in which a man asked to give his full name began spelling
it: "O double T I double U E double L double U double O D"...after
several cycles through the "how was that again?" routine, he said his
name was "Ottiwell Wood" and spelled it once again....
I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone number as
"four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine" (480-890-9089) but as far
as I know they never took me up on it...(they're both deceased now and
the number has gone back into the pool at the phone company, so don't
bother trying to call it)....r

They could give it the traditional French style: forty eight, zero
eight, four twenties ten, four twenties ten, four twenties nine.

I thought it was "four twenty" (etc), not "four twenties". Not that
I can hear the difference.

four-twenties (quatre-vingts)

While 80 is quatre-vingts, 81 is only quatre-vingt un (or so say all the
online translators) - and not quatre-vingts et un, quatre-vingt et un,
or (again minus the 'et') quatre-vingts un. 91 is similarly
quatre-vingt-onze. This is unlike (say) quarante et un, cinquante et un,
soixante et un, soixante et onze - which DO have the 'et'. Confused?

[James Hogg]

Post by Ian Jackson

Post by James Hogg

Post by Mike Barnes

Post by Athel Cornish-Bowden

Post by RH Draney

Post by GordonD
I remember my mother telling me that when she was asked to
spell the word at primary school, she responded with
"double-you, double-o, double-l-e-n", which for some reason
displeased the teacher.

There was a joke to that effect in a 1939 jokebook I
inherited from my grandmother, in which a man asked to give
his full name began spelling it: "O double T I double U E
double L double U double O D"...after several cycles through
the "how was that again?" routine, he said his name was
"Ottiwell Wood" and spelled it once again....
I used to tell my parents they should give out their phone
number as "four eighty eight ninety ninety eighty nine"
(480-890-9089) but as far as I know they never took me up on
it...(they're both deceased now and the number has gone back
into the pool at the phone company, so don't bother trying to
call it)....r

They could give it the traditional French style: forty eight,
zero eight, four twenties ten, four twenties ten, four twenties
nine.

I thought it was "four twenty" (etc), not "four twenties". Not
that I can hear the difference.

four-twenties (quatre-vingts)

While 80 is quatre-vingts, 81 is only quatre-vingt un (or so say all
the online translators) - and not quatre-vingts et un, quatre-vingt
et un, or (again minus the 'et') quatre-vingts un. 91 is similarly
quatre-vingt-onze. This is unlike (say) quarante et un, cinquante et
un, soixante et un, soixante et onze - which DO have the 'et'.
Confused?

I must have known all this forty years ago.

(And for Peter: forty in Russian is like any other number over four,
taking the genitive plural. What's odd about it is that it isn't a
compound of the word for "ten" but a word meaning a bunch of 40 sable
pelts.)

[Peter Moylan]

Post by James Hogg
(And for Peter: forty in Russian is like any other number over four,
taking the genitive plural. What's odd about it is that it isn't a
compound of the word for "ten" but a word meaning a bunch of 40 sable
pelts.)

Thanks. I knew it took the genitive plural, because for some silly
reason the phrase сорок слов is stuck in my head. (Perhaps that was how
many Russian words I knew at the peak of my knowledge of Russian.) I
couldn't remember which other numbers take the genitive plural, although
it makes sense that it should be most of them.

I didn't know about the sable pelts.