Re. Drawn and quartered (was "quadrants")

[Geoff Hart <geoff-h -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA>]

 Thanks to the many (many = more than a dozen and no longer
 counting) folks who responded to my quadrant question. The
 summary: No one defended the author's use of such oddities
 as "in the sixth quadrant". Unfortunately, the story
 doesn't end there: our "arbitrator" decreed that the author
 gets to keep his quadrants in the French, and I get to keep
 them as "regions" in the English, a qualified victory. I
 didn't argue this any further because, in the final
 analysis, no one is likely to be confused for long by the
 odd word, and my French isn't strong enough to rank me as
 an authority on correct usage. Other notes:

 * nobody liked sextant: although correct, the engineers I
 work with all got smirky looks and asked me just what kind
 of tent that was and where they could get one <grin>
 * sector doesn't work for the same reason as quadrant,
 since it refers to a pie slice of a circle. Although usage
 has broadened it to include the generic "area", largely
 through Star Trek and its spawn, I'm not keen on this
 usage.

 Once again, thanks. You folks are a truly incredible
 resource.

 --Geoff Hart    @8^{)}
 geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca

 Disclaimer: If I didn't commit it in print in one of our
 reports, it don't represent FERIC's opinion.