...but lately I have seen many of its friends. Since my arrival last Friday I have been inundated with numbers for various and sundry purposes. A partial list:
- My National Insurance number (like a Social Security number in the US)
- My new mobile phone number
- My new mobile phone voice mail password
- My Employee Number
- My inital computer password (14 digits!!)
- Door access codes for:
- The main department office
- The mail room
- The photocopy room
- The video recording lab
- My office phone number
- My office phone voicemail password
Of course then there are the phone numbers of friends and colleagues. While these usually go directly into my phone, the way phone numbers are grouped here sounds very different than in the US.
In the US, a number like XXX - YYY - ZZZZ, tends to have the cadence of the numbers in the first 2 groups tending to be rise from 2nd number in the first two groups and fall and stop briefly on the last. (I know sound patterns like this are hard to explain in writing!) It tends to sound like:
da Da Dah, da Da Dah, DA da DA dah
Well phone numbers here are in 2 groups of five: XXXXX YYYYY. My ear wants to hear 2 groups of three, then a group of four, so it takes a while to get used to and to process. (Also if there are two of the same number, like 411, people tend to say 4-double-1 (with three, 444, it can be treble 4. Again having my ear and brain used to oen pattern with opnly numbers it gets thrown when a word like double is in the mix!)
Ahh well, off to the pub to catch up with yet another friend. That's the 411 from here...
Peace out!
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5 comments:
right! anywho not much is going on here except I have you on my favorites between my gmail and the Morgan Stanley account for Milton. Going to Chicago in May, hopefully I will remember to actually go online and get a ticket. long walk otherwise.
Hey Robert!
My first trip to Boston without you here :( Will drink a toast at Brasserie Jo, hopefully on Saturday, wishing you a happy birthday with a Hendricks and tonic.
Already my eating habits have relapsed into the mundane...
Betsy
Aussie phone numbers are bewlidering too. Mobile numbers go XXXX XXX XXX. Land lines can be XXXX XXXX, or XX XX XX ... or another combo/amount of digits that I can't recall right now. So there's like 5 different rhythms/numbers of numbers to expect, and just when I start writing down a number in one series' tempo, it turns out to be a different one and all thes extra digits are all over the page (or I sit there waiting for more).
It makes my job (academic assistant at a college again) ... interesting, when taking messages.
... erm, and by "bewlidering" I mean "bewildering". Though "bewlidering" does sound like it could be a neat sort of word to bandy about.
"Peace out"???
Darling, do the Brits really think that everyone from the U.S. is some manner of rapper or otherwise hip-hop affiliated person? I do hope not... but then again, if they do I will gleefully blame Madonna.
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