What a difference a letter makes.

Question

I stumbled into this during a conversation, and after my confusion had cleared it turned out to be kind of funny.

This is what I thought I heard: La mujer estuvo cantando al policía que pasó. This is what my friend really said: La mujer estuvo contando al policía que pasó.

Of course, as my mind is racing to try and understand why he said this, I have this picture in my mind of a woman singing to a cop in front of her dented car. Why in the world is she singing, I kept asking myself.

As an act of mercy, Dennis saw the look on my face and knew that I was clueless. I asked him what he meant by "a woman singing to a policeman" and he busted out laughing.

Wow, as many times as I've said "cuentame", I've never had occasion to say "contando". I get to use different forms of "cantar" a lot because I play in the worship band at church, so I guess that was why I thought I heard what I did.

Kind of embarrassing, but I don't think I'll forget it

Answer 1

Oh, that's really funny!

Answer 2

We had a previous post here on similar misunderstandings, many leading to comical faux pas. Thanks for sharing.