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To me (native English a la USA) apples are in a sort of uncanny valley between things that could in fact be measured by the physical handful, like peanuts, and
by jmkb 4y ago
To me (native English a la USA) apples are in a sort of uncanny valley between things that could in fact be measured by the physical handful, like peanuts, and things that couldn't -- buildings being way off the charts, obviously.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- thaumasiotes 4y agoContext will make the difference. If you say "grab a handful of apples", no one will believe you meant to say it, because that doesn't make any sense. "There are a handful of apples" is a different usage, which people will accept.
- jmkb 4y agoWell maybe. I've literally grabbed handfuls of wild apples, about the size of ping-pong balls. (Maybe better described as feral apples? Old orchards with trees unpruned for decades.)
- staunch 4y agoFYI: anyone eating wild apples should take care to avoid "beach apples" cause they're highly toxic. https://www.google.com/search?q=beach+apple&source=lnms&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=beach+apple&source=lnms&tbm=... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchineel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchineel
- egypturnash 4y agoSame. A single apple, as found in the grocery store, is about one handful. Once you start talking about things much bigger than what an average human hand can hold then "a handful" does work as a synonym for "a few things" - probably less than ten.
- fbdab103 4y ago>..."a few things" - probably less than ten. Now those are fighting words. "A few" is obviously 3-5, six in a dire emergency.
- rayiner 4y agohttps://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=A%20couple%20few https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=A%20couple%2...
- derefr 4y agoI feel like, when talking about things which you'd usually expect in large quantity, "a few" means "any less than makes a pile." E.g. for grains of rice, even 23 or so of them could still constitute "a few grains stuck to the sides of the bowl." Similarly, in databases, "a few rows" is any amount that's not Big Data ;)
- DonHopkins 4y agoWhile "a handful of testicles" means exactly two. https://twitter.com/jimmykimmel/status/327276064009240577?lang=en https://twitter.com/jimmykimmel/status/327276064009240577?la...