Today is the 4th. Is two days ago the 1st or the 2nd?
The day before yesterday
The 2nd. One day ago is yesterday, the 3rd. Two days ago is one day before one day ago, hence the 2nd.
The 2nd. The 1st is three days ago. The 3rd is one day ago, a.k.a. yesterday.
Two days ago = 48 hours ago.
What about next Monday? When is that? This Monday?
Not if today is Monday, then next Monday would be a week from now and this Monday would be today. (Of course, I can’t imagine anyone saying “this Monday” to mean “today”.)
But today is Friday. So when is next Monday? When is this Monday? I am pretty sure this Sunday is the 6th and next Sunday is the 13th…
If it’s Friday, then most people just say “on Monday”, or “this coming Monday”.
Yes, this Sunday (which I want to believe is shorthand for saying “this coming Sunday”) is the very next Sunday you will experience. As of today, it is not tomorrow, it is two days from now.
“Next Sunday” is ambiguous. I tend to use it if it is already the weekend - today being Friday, I might say that I will go visit my parents “next Sunday” and not mean the one that is this weekend, in two days. But if I said “next Sunday” on Monday, then it would be the soonest Sunday. Though I probably wouldn’t say that. I’d just say “this Sunday”. Or even simply “Sunday”.
Usage of ‘next’ with regard to weekdays varies by region. Here in the UK, ‘next Monday’ is most commonly understood to mean the monday after ‘this Monday’ - which is also known as ‘Monday coming’. Unless the statement is being made on a Monday, in which case it is ambiguous, but probably means the Monday 7 days away.
“Next week’s last week is this week’s this week!” - Daffy Duck
But seriously, imagine being told on Mon you have a test next Weds, but the foreign prof is even more confused over English, not to mention English idioms. I agree, though…I always found this gosh dang ambiguous!
I don’t understand how it could be anything but the 2nd. Yesterday is the 3rd. Two days ago is the 2nd. How can you possibly get the 1st out of that?
I would normally think of “next Monday” as the second Monday from Friday. However, I always specify this in conversation with the convoluted phrase “not this Monday, but the following Monday.”
I always specify in conversation as well, but to me “this monday” and “next monday” are synonymous.
This monday = this coming monday.
Next monday = the next day that equals monday. Next monday is helpful to me only if today is monday, and where just saying “it’ll happen on monday” might confuse someone into thinking it will happen today.
I’m guessing he’s thinking that since there are two numbers between 1 and 4, the 1rst is two days ago.
If precision is important, I never say “next Monday.” I always say either “this coming Monday” or “a week from this coming Monday.”
I’m a little anal like that. I also always give the day of the week when giving a relative day in e-mails – “tomorrow (Sunday)” or “today (Saturday)” for two reasons. First, who knows when they’ll be reading their e-mail? Second, I often answer e-mails late at night, when the line between “tomorrow” and “two days from now” gets a little fuzzy.
I wouldn’t call that sort of thing anal; I’d call it just being clear and precise.
Anal would be if you said, “a week from this coming Monday, asshole.”
Think of “ago” as the same as “minus.” 4 minus 2 equals 2, not 1.
I also use ‘this’ for the upcoming day and ‘next’ for the week after. ‘This Sunday’ is 1/6 and ‘next Sunday’ is 1/13.
Now, what trips me up is ‘The Sunday after next.’ I don’t know why my internal dictionary does this, but while ‘next Sunday’ is completely unambiguous to me, I have to clarify whether ‘the Sunday after next’ is 1/13 or 1/20, because in that context ‘next’ could mean either 1/6 or 1/13.