"I had yester-even a presentiment"

[muckefuck]

I've found other European languages much more scrupulous about distinguishing "last night" from "yesterday evening" than English. In German and French, for instance, "night" begins after you've laid yourself down to sleep; anything which happens before then occurs during the "evening". Perhaps the relative length of the expression is to blame. "Yesterday evening"--even if you need only two syllables for the second word--is a mouthful compared to "gestern Abend", let alone "hier soir". And why is that anyway? Why did our ancestors feel a need to lengthen "yester" to "yesterday" and "even" to "evening"? Who can think of contexts where "even" would be truly ambiguous in this usage, let alone "yester"?

Speaking these other languages has made me more prone to port over the distinction (much as I now carefully distinguish "friends" from "acquaintances" due to German) and I'm getting tired of that six-syllable monster. So I'm resurrecting "yestere'en". Feel free to emulate my commendable commitment to economy and accuracy.

Comments

[moominmolly.livejournal.com]

Yester! Natalie went through a phase a few years ago of saying things like "yesterweek" and "yesternight". I loved it, but I alone could not make it stick.

As economical as "yestere'en" is, I don't think I could actually say it out loud. "Yestereve"?

[my-tallest.livejournal.com]

Yeah, you say "Yestereen" out loud, and it sounds like a mouthwash or a Doctor Who villain race. Which, given the NewWho's trend towards beasties like the Weeping Angels and the Silence, may already have a spec script with 'em in it.