I was alone for the weekend in London and had just visited (or in a German accent "wisited") ye ol' Buckingham Palace. On the fountain outside its gates, I sat and ate a sub-par sandwich, or perhaps they call that a sub-par-sub, and drank a particularly large bottle of water. (The bottle of water is instrumental to the story, I promise.)
Since Buckingham Palace didn't appear to be accepting visitors to use their facilities (rude), and since I had just drank a particularly large bottle of water (see?), I set out to find a restroom. Now here's one area where America is definitely winning— first, we call our public restrooms "restrooms" instead of the more blatant alternative- "toilet"- and secondly, they actually have them in public places. One is sure to find Diagon Alley through the non-existent Platform 9 3/4 faster than a nearby restroom in London.
As my search headed into its second half hour, I became a little frantic. I took a 360 view of my surroundings and saw a slightly obscured sign with the words "TO LET" showing in big bold letters. Certain that the "I" just happened to be missing on this particular sign, I began to speed walk to its location. You can imagine my disappointment when I came to both a very empty apartment building AND the realization that "To let" in British English means "To rent" in American English. I suppose you really do learn something new everyday; or to put an applicable twist on that -- you forget things you already know when you need a restroom.
I laughed out loud to myself and wondered if "doofus" translates similarly.
*Note: For those still concerned, I somehow managed to shortly thereafter find every tourist's European-restroom-saving-grace -- Starbucks.
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