The Boss, Tony, posted an interesting link about language the other day. It was really about defining someone's age and it was something that hadn't crossed my mind. You should check it out. I'll wait.
Also, he's just a really good writer and makes a hilarious joke about "et cetera":
http://tonythev.tumblr.com/post/33042231075/linguistics-lessons
It struck me, because it is the same in French. You "have" an age or number of years as opposed to "being" a certain age. I am twenty-six (for at least a couple more weeks), but really I'm about to complete my twenty-seventh year. I knocked off and have been toting around more than twenty-six years with every passing day of the last year. The Italians do it the same way. I kinda like that system. I'll be saying "I have twenty-seven years" when I get back. Well, by then I'll have finished twenty-eight of them...
In Fulfulde, in case you were wondering, they say "age how many?" and you respond "twenty-six". Actually, they say "twenty five one". Assuming you're as old as me of course. No time for verbs here.
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