Up, Down, Across

Kosmiche

Kosmiche

Kosmiche

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Joined
3 Oct 2009
Posts
14,033
Location
North Wales
I often hear people say they're "coming down" to go somewhere, I was wondering what they mean when they say this.

Do they mean coming down in a literal geographic sense, moving down on the map to get to a location?

But some people seem to use "coming down" regardless of the direction they're moving in.

You do definetely get the literal geographic people I think.

What about "coming up"? Would you say "coming up" to say you had moved in a upwards geographical direction from a location to get to a destination.

Would you go as far as to use "coming up" regardless of which direction you had moved in?

What about "coming across?" I think this is usually reserved for overseas trips, but possibly could be used when having moved in a general horizontal direction from a location to a destination? Or not.

Help me out here, lets take the EXTREME example - north pole to the south pole.

Would you say "coming down", "coming up" or "coming across" with the knowledge that you could move down, up or across geographically the same distance for each.

Or would you use "coming down" again regardless of which direction you had moved in.

Thanks guys, really interested to hear your responses.
 
You're reading too much into it.

I remember times when I would tell my mate who lived in Uxbridge at the time I would come down soon. But I live south of him.

I just meant go see him. It's not literal :/
 
I was just wondering if there were any personal preferences with this phrase, I think most people just say come down all the time don't they.
 
If I'm heading somewhere outside town, I'm either heading up or heading down whether I'm heading north or south. If I'm heading somewhere into town, regardless of the direction I'm heading across.
 
Wikipedia said:
In British practice, railway directions are usually described as up and down, with up being towards a major location. This convention is applied not only to the trains and the tracks, but also to items of lineside equipment and to areas near a track. Since British trains run on the left, the up side of a line is on the left when proceeding in the up direction. The names originate from the early railways, where trains would run up the hills to the mines, and down to the ports.
Click to expand...
 
I say up for north, down for south, and across for east/west. It also annoys me when people don't comply with my guidelines for this, but I'm a pedant.
 
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