@Twitcher and @Debbie , I am curious about the timing of dinner when you have lunch and when you don’t. I am finding out that this is even more complex than I was aware of.
Now we are retired and very flexible. If we have a light lunch, say a sandwich around midday we may have a larger meal for dinner, around 6pm. If we are out during the day and have a bigger meal for lunch then we may have a light dinner or supper around 7pm.
When we were working the timings were a bit more regimented.
Now Autumn/Winter is on the way my soup maker will be working overtime!
Thanks for your explanation.
It’s this what I find puzzling
If dinner is the meal that follows breakfast, then what time would you have it.
In my native language, meals are named according to the time of day they’re eaten, so it’s a bit difficult to grasp. I had the idea that dinner was the main meal of the day and was mostly taken in the evening except for special occasions. It seems that it’s not that simple. 
@Newpetlover as a working single parent, with sons who take part in a variety of activities after school / college, meals occur when we can fit them in! This means that from a practical point of view, our main meal is almost never at lunchtime.
I work in a school. When the children eat in the middle of the school day, they either have school dinners (hot meals from the school kitchen) or a packed lunch (cold food like sandwiches etc brought from home). Same time, same venue, different name! Timing is determined by the school timetable, so in our school either 12:15 or 12:45 (2 sittings). At my sons school it is a bit later.
Close friends who are staying get ‘tea’ even if it’s a nice cooked meal and I’ve made an effort (
), not so close friends who come for a meal in the evening come for - well I was going to say ‘dinner’ but actually I think I just say ‘a meal’!!! (It doesn’t happen that often…)
School dinner/packed lunch - that is SO true!! I’d completely forgotten about that. It’s been many years since I had school dinners.
Do you mean “tea” is a more colloquial term, used for gathering with people close to you?
It’s definitely casual but it’s also regional (Midlands and further north).
Thanks. That’s useful to know.
This reminds me of a situation where a friend of mine, German, wanting to practice the new words she had learned, asked the head teacher how her wee’ns were. Everyone laughed except both of us, who were not aware of the excessive familiarity that expression entails.
wee’ns - also regional, predominantly Scotland but also possibly Northern Ireland and the north of England.
Yes, this was in Northern Ireland.