10/24/2026
While trying to quiet my brain last night to sleep, I instead found myself questioning our entire number naming system.
We start out normally. 1-10, fine. But then we hit the “teens” and it all goes sideways.
Why do tens numbers 1-5 get special names? Why “eleven” and not oneteen? Why “twelve” and not twoteen? Threeteen, foUrteen, fiveteen. Then 16-19 are suddenly fine.
And while we’re nitpicking, Why aren’t the “teens” onety one, onety two…? No other number sets stray from the format beyond the teens.
And then we hit twenty. Why not twoty?
Why Thirty and not threety?
Why Forty and not fourty?
Why Fifty and not fivety!
Yet again, 60-90 are fine.
When they get out out of the tens, it goes back to normal, three hundred, not thir hundred.
Or for that matter why the -ty instead of ten? Why is 235 not two hundred, three ten, five?
2,325 would be Two thousand, three hundred, two ten, five.
Could I Google it? Sure. Will I? Probably. But not before posting this prime example of dull thought here for you lot to pick apart.
*please accept these nearly-banana-shaped cheese (flavored) puffs in lieu of actual banana
ETA: I realized in my overthinking that I forgot how to spell 14. One of the many dangers of boarding the runaway-brain at 1AM.