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telling someone numbers


Alpo

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When you are giving someone a series of numbers - telephone number, address, zip code - do you say zero or O?

 

I said O for years and years and years, but lately I find myself saying zero. I also do individual numbers. If, for example, I was telling someone the number 1492 or 1776, I would say one four nine two, or one seven seven six.

 

I have not yet heard myself say niner, but it would not really surprise me.

 

One time, after spelling my name three times on the phone, I gave it to them in police letter code. He was impressed that I could rattle it off that quickly, but he didn't understand what I was saying.

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It depends.  I generally ask the listener to repeat what I said back to me.  If they don't get it right, I will say, "zero".  Sometimes, however, I will say zero if a telephone connection seems a bit fuzzy.  As far as spelling my name goes, if they don't get it right (and it isn't that complicated), I will use the military phonetic alphabet for each letter.  If I get someone who served in the military, they often chuckle. :)

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I say “zero”. Mostly due to training and it became a habit. When communicating on radios in transportation using zero has been mandatory. 

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I'm inconsistent.

 

With phone numbers, I say zero EXCEPT for area codes, when I say oh (I'm in Washington, so two-oh-six and five-oh-nine are here).

 

Addresses?   Zero.   Except for street numbers, like 204th (two-oh-fourth).   

 

Freeway numbers?   Oh (like the four-oh-five).

 

How much interest do I have in certain topics?  ZERO.

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14 minutes ago, Bart Slade said:

I'm inconsistent.

 

With phone numbers, I say zero EXCEPT for area codes, when I say oh (I'm in Washington, so two-oh-six and five-oh-nine are here).

 

Addresses?   Zero.   Except for street numbers, like 204th (two-oh-fourth).   

 

Freeway numbers?   Oh (like the four-oh-five).

 

How much interest do I have in certain topics?  ZERO.

+1

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0 is zero, unless I'm reading a micrometer or calipers, then it's "point oh two five" or "point four oh six."  Dates are the common "twenty twenty-two" unless I'm being a pompous jerk and proclaim "In the Year Of Our Lord One Thousand Nine Hundred and Fifty-Seven."

If I have to spell my last name a third time for someone it's Lima Oscar Victor Echo Lima Lima. Email, second spelling is Sierra Union Bravo Delta .......

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Zero, not O. And when my people tell me a number it had better be zero point zero five. Not point O five. We deal with the EPA. Details matter!

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I noticed in a couple or three of the responses they mentioned "point". As in 1.7 - one point seven.

 

In British - as opposed to in American - they say "decimal". "Tune your wireless to one decimal six seven four."

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6 minutes ago, Alpo said:

I noticed in a couple or three of the responses they mentioned "point". As in 1.7 - one point seven.

 

In British - as opposed to in American - they say "decimal". "Tune your wireless to one decimal six seven four."

'Point' has one syllable. 
'Decimal'' has three.  

I'm lazy.

 

Like "bonnet" has two, "hood" has one.

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7 minutes ago, Forty Rod SASS 3935 said:

'Point' has one syllable. 
'Decimal'' has three.  

I'm lazy.

 

Like "bonnet" has two, "hood" has one.

 

Also "point" is easier to hear over machine noise than "decimal."

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My son would say one dot seven. Irks me no end when we do math homework together. And I usually say Zero, not OH. But then I still use parentheses and hyphens when typing phone numbers.

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14 minutes ago, Springfield Slim SASS #24733 said:

My son would say one dot seven. Irks me no end when we do math homework together. And I usually say Zero, not OH. But then I still use parentheses and hyphens when typing phone numbers.

There's a cowboy shooter when running the timer always gives the time as 23 DOT 7 (or whatever it is) Pretty annoying! :P

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Tell him that he is not on the internet, and it's not 23.com. It's numbers. 23 point 7. And if he can't understand the difference, he needs to give the timer to someone who can.

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1 hour ago, Forty Rod SASS 3935 said:

'Point' has one syllable. 
'Decimal'' has three.  

I'm lazy.

 

Like "bonnet" has two, "hood" has one.

 

What about "lift" that has one syllable and "elevator" that has 4....all the time you saved with point and hood has now vanished.

 

 

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Mostly O. Except on bad connections. Or as above, to say zero interest.

 

Reminded me of a DNS debug I did many years ago. Some IP dresses were not resolving.

 

My sharp eye noticed capital O is wider than 0 on the screen. A few quick edits and everything worked automagically. Apparently someone was reading the numbers, and the trainee accurately typed in what he heard :o. And the trainer did not notice :lol:.

 

Something like: 192.129.32.1O9

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Actually (and I only found this out a couple years ago) "ought" is "should", as in, "I ought to cut my grass before it gets any higher."

 

"Zero", as in "30/06" is "aught".

 

And you really should pull a Jethro on them, and say "double naught", like James Bond was a "double naught spy".

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2 hours ago, Alpo said:

I noticed in a couple or three of the responses they mentioned "point". As in 1.7 - one point seven.

 

In British - as opposed to in American - they say "decimal". "Tune your wireless to one decimal six seven four."

They also say Zed and Nil. That confused me when my grandma did it.

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1 hour ago, Rye Miles #13621 said:

There's a cowboy shooter when running the timer always gives the time as 23 DOT 7 (or whatever it is) Pretty annoying! :P

That’s just ignorant.

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3 minutes ago, Larsen E. Pettifogger, SASS #32933 said:

Most of the rest of the world writes it with a comma.  3,067.

It's like metrics, or driving on the left side of the road - the rest of the world is wrong. Simple, right?

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6 minutes ago, Larsen E. Pettifogger, SASS #32933 said:

To make matters even more confusing we write decimals with a dot.  E.g., 3.067".  Most of the rest of the world writes it with a comma.  3,067.

When I was still working some blueprints were U.S. some were European and were spoken as 3 comma 067 so everybody knew they were metric numbers.

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“Zero” is a number.  “Oh” is a letter.  That’s just how I roll.

 

And if navigating a car with anybody and they ask me if the next turn is a right or left, I respond with “correct” as an affirmative answer.  Using “right” with two distinct meanings is asking for trouble.

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2 hours ago, Larsen E. Pettifogger, SASS #32933 said:

To make matters even more confusing we write decimals with a dot.  E.g., 3.067".  Most of the rest of the world writes it with a comma.  3,067.

Most of the rest of the world is confusing....and generally wrong.

 

Do they use a comma, like in 1,000...and what in hell is a milliard?

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PLEASE DON'T START SAYING NINER!

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I have no trouble with niner, but I want to hurt them when I hear someone say fiver.

 

Fiver is not how you say "five" over the radio. Fiver is a £5 note in Britain.

 

 

And on the subject of niner, I learned this on the internet. They say niner because, after World War II and the Germans joined the international group of aviatiors, if you just said nine the Germans would think you were saying the German word no, so they changed it to niner so it would not confuse the Germans.

 

That makes sense - right? I can just see the Lufthansa pilot now, receiving word from the tower to land on runway "four no". Oh the confusion. Oh the humanity. :P

 

Oh the stupidity of the internet. :lol:

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Got to thinking about it on my way home from w**k.  

 

If I'm talking with the guy running the lathe or mill it's, "OK, drawing calls for eight point two oh five, plus or minus five thou.  You're at you're at eight point two four oh, so you need to come down thirty-five thou to be on nominal. "

 

If I've got my head in a machine calling off measurements for someone else to write down I say, "Eight point two zero five."

 

If I didn't catch something someone said I say, "Say again, please."

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9 hours ago, Bart Slade said:

Freeway numbers?   Oh (like the four-oh-five).

 

5 hours ago, Pulp, SASS#28319 said:

I say “ double ought” instead of “zero zero”. Confuses the heck out of some people.


Okay, I lied…I did say “4-oh-5” when speaking about that fu…freakin’ freeway in that place I no longer live. 
 

Also, I love to use “aught” especially when I just know it will screw with someone. Instead of saying “back in 2002” I will say “back in aught two…”. It usually gets a look of confusion. 

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Can’t remember how long ago but I was talking to someone on the phone and gave them my phone number using “zero” and she said “you mean O” and I said “no I mean zero, that’s what it is” and she said “oh”.

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