this weekend and half-past vs half-to

[Millie Webb]

I hope I am not bringing back up something that had been "decided"  :-)    I
noticed this right away when I lived in Germany too, with German
("naechst/dies").  I do not think it is regional there either, but personal.
I spent ALL of my initial time becoming fluent in German in the Northern
part of what used to be called West Germany, and I noticed neighbors even
using it very differently, in the same way as in English.  Always
forward-looking, by the way.  When the weekend was past (as in my English),
one would use "laetztes"/"last"), or perhaps the German equivalent of "this
past weekend".  I have heard "this past weekend" expressed as "this weekend"
too (in English), but I would never use it that way, because of the source
of confusion.

This reminds me of telling time.  In German, you say "half-seven", and it
means "halfway TO seven".  When my British friends in Germany would say
"half seven", I never knew if they meant "half-PAST seven", or "halfway TO
seven".  They usually used it the German "standard" way when they were
speaking German, and the British "standard" way when they were speaking
English, but woudl occasionally mix them.  It caused some missed
appointments!  I had never even considered anyone using "half-seven" to mean
half-PAST seven" until I met these Brits in Germany.  And my langauge usage
is usually quite flexible.  :-)  Anyway, they explained it as just leaving
out the word "past" in the phrase.  As a speaker of Northern "standard"
American English, I had never heard anyone say "half-seven" until I learned
German in high school, so I must have assumed that it always meant the
German sense of halfway TO seven.

It sounds to me like speakers who woudl say "this weekend we went..." are
likewise just leaving out "past".  Have any of you who use this ever heard
the time-telling "half-seven" in English?  if so, did it mean halfway TO or
halfway PAST?  Just curious.  -- Millie