Biconfusing Tip of the Day

By -
Biannually and Semiannually both mean twice a year, biennialy mines every two years, and it just gets more confusing after that:
biannually and semiyearly
occurring twice a year
semiannually
occurring every six months or twice a year
biennially and biyearly
occurring every two years
semimonthly
occuring twice a month

Now comes the fun part!

bimonthly
occurring every two months
occurring twice a month
semiweekly
occurring twice a week
biweekly
occurring twice a week
occurring every two weeks
Yes, Bimonthly and Biweekly mean two completely different similar things. So my only question left is what does "ennial" mean?

Comments

Jay said…
Very useful info, indeed. I never really knew what things like that meant, so I vowed never to use them unless I had to. Is something really a shortcut if no one knows what it means? One clue for the "ennial." Flowers that return each year are called "perennial," so maybe "ennial" means "each year." Although that doesn't really work with biennially. Hm.
20 April, 2007 17:41
Anonymous said…
Its a Latin suffix that means year.
20 April, 2007 20:23
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