Sunday, March 7, 2010

¡Qué tonto soy!

Hopefully you won't need to use this expression much.  But on occasion, I think we'll all find ourselves using it at some point.  In fact, I'm posting about this because I found myself needing it today.  But more on that later.

First let's talk about tonto.  And I'm not referring to the Lone Ranger's faithful Indian companion.  If you don't know who the Lone Ranger is, and don't mind learning a bit about old American TV shows, you can check out this link. Or maybe you just want to take a walk down memory lane.  Anyway, I digress.

Let's get back to the word tonto in Spanish, which is what we're here for. 

Tonto means silly or dumb, which can be an insult, heavily dependent on the context of how it's used, and your tone of voice.  There are a number of phrases that involve the word tonto, like no seas tonto - don't be silly or no te hagas el tonto - don't act stupid.  Tonta if you're talking about a woman.

Now that we know something about the word tonto, let's get back to our expression.

¡Qué tonto soy!
I'm so stupid

Our translation sounds a bit harsh, but it's meant to be used in those situations where you make a silly mistake, and you say to yourself "I can't believe I did that" or "I'm so stupid". 

Pan comido (easy), right? We're almost done here, just one more thing to talk about.

Remember in the beginning of this post I said I actually needed this phrase today?  Well I'm about to tell you why.

I just posted about a very witty phrase "¡Ya llegó para quien llorabas!".  Well, that's what I wrote.  It should've been "¡Ya llegó por quien llorabas! ".   ¡Qué tonto soy!

I corrected the original post, but I want to make sure my faithful readers are aware of my blunder.  Learning Spanish is hard enough, and you don't need me to make it any harder for you!  If you haven't read about "¡Ya llegó por quien llorabas! ", you can find the entry here

¡Adios!

4 comments:

  1. Rodney, puedes decirme mas sobre "pan comido"? Es como "easy as pie" en inglés, o no? Gracias por su blog, es interesante y simpático.

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  2. Hola y gracias por tus comentarios.

    ¡Atinaste! (you got it, you guessed right, etc)

    Pan comido es una manera de decir algo es super fácil. Easy as pie, easy as 1,2,3, piece of cake, etc.

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  3. ¿Atinaste? No sé si se dirá en Sudamérica, pero nunca lo había escuchado en España. Atinaste se entiende, pero atinar significa más... like when you are pointing at something, with a dard, or a gun, or something similar, and then you hit it right where you wanted, tu has atinado, but "¡Atinaste!" As an expression meaning you guessed right... I've never heard that xD it's completely understandable though.
    Anyway, it's just a little contribution of mine for your knowledge: in Spain we say more "¡Acertaste!" , which is more or less the same as "atinaste" but atinaste is never said like that... I don't know why, because it sounds really good xD

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  4. Gracias por tu comentario. "Acertaste" muy interesante.

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