Everyone now seems to be saying "when you're DONE with that, please see me about your next task. I always say "when you're FINISHED"...... I reserve "done" for baking in the oven. Am I just old fashioned, and behind the times, or, are the kids changing the language? David
They changed it long before you and I got here, David.
There's a funny bit in a British movie from the mid-60s in which Freddie and the Dreamers play the chefs at a seaside resort. Throughout one musical number, someone keeps opening an oven door to find Freddie inside complaining "I'm not done yet!" At the end of the song, they all suddenly realize they haven't checked on him in a while, and when they rush to open the oven door there's a charred smoking roast saying (in Freddy's voice) "I'm do-o-one!"
(Sorry, glitch in my browser caused message to be posted twice.)
I agree with Ron that "done" has long been accepted in the usage about which you complain. But I continue to use it in only your "old-fashioned" way as well, so keep it up. On a note that both posters have touched on, I heard long ago -- I forget from whom, and I might be getting the exact quote wrong -- that "cakes are *done*; people are *finished*."
I thought it was end-tables that were finished. Sometimes they're even refinished.