this post was submitted on 14 Dec 2023
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No Stupid Questions

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Similar case in point: "bimonthly" means "twice a month." That makes sense.

But the definition for "bi-weekly" does not make sense.

What do you think?

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[โ€“] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago (3 children)

Lmao I'd interpret that as every two weeks. Semi meaning "almost", so "semiweekly" would mean almost weekly, hence, every two weeks. I guess you could think "almost" the other way but I feel like semi is usually used in a way that is "quite but not as good", twice a week would be more than once a week so I semi would have to be every two weeks in my mind.

[โ€“] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Semi just means half. Semifinals, semester, semi-truck, etc.

[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Right, so half the frequency, meaning every two weeks, yes?

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago (3 children)
[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Yes, so the frequency being weekly: Half that frequency is every two weeks.

[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

We meet once a month (monthly)
We meet once a week (weekly)
We meet once a semiweek (semiweekly)
We meet once a day (daily)

See the pattern here? Half the interval, not half the frequency. I hope you were just being cheeky.

[โ€“] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

I'm not being cheeky. That's how I perceive the thing, but I'm not a native English speaker and french has a way to distinguish between both cases without using semi(which is confusing too imo). Bimensuel => 2 times a month Bimestriel => every two months

[โ€“] [email protected] -2 points 11 months ago

Yes. But really no.

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

I agree. If someone told me they wanted to do something semi weekly I'd assume they meant about once every week or even maybe less.