Oops

Good thing we have friends or colleagues who can double check us sometimes. I was preparing a note to a client the other day where I described some work we had to do with templates (called "maler"). So I referred to it as a "malerjobben" which I thought meant a templates job. My colleague politely held back her laughter and pointed out that a "malerjobben" is actually a painting job, like painting a house! Because "maler" is also a verb form of "to paint." And today I said I was looking forward to seeing the figures, referring to some business numbers related to our sales. Apparently "figuren" does not mean "figure" as I hoped. It means more like someone's body shape. So my colleagues got a good laugh about me looking forward to seeing the sales team's figures! I had to laugh at myself.