Dear internets

[trixtah]

English is not a subset of US English. It's the other way round. Kthxbai.

PS. US English speakers out there - I know that using the word "toilet" is deemed somehow impolite, but is it true that it's only ever used to refer to the plumbing fixture? (If you're not using terms like "commode" instead) That is, it's not used to refer to the "smallest room" at all?

Comments

Re: Actual Conversation

[mmegaera.livejournal.com]

Washroom is generally Canadian. Bathroom (even sans bathtub or shower) is American. Restroom is the public version of same, to the point where those roadside places with picnic tables and public restrooms are called rest areas. Possibly because you really do rest there in addition to going to the bathroom [g].

I've never in my whole life called the whole room the toilet. It sounds -- bizarre -- to my American ears.

Re: Actual Conversation

[seeker66.livejournal.com]

Agreed. It sounds like you might as well say, "I need to expose my genitals and expel waste" when you talk about the toilet (as opposed to the Euphamism).

Re: Actual Conversation

[trixtah.livejournal.com]

Well, yes...? I mean, does anyone seriously "powder their noses" these days? Or bathe in the bathroom? Or rest in the restroom? Heh.

Probably just as well I'm not intending to visit the US again until you get rid of your Chief Moron and hopefully the stupid fingerprinting regime for all criminals tourists entering the country. :-)

Re: Actual Conversation

[coalboy.livejournal.com]

Chief Moron will be gone January 21st. Inauguration Day of the New Chief, who I pray will be Obama.

Re: Actual Conversation

[trixtah.livejournal.com]

Speed the day! :-)

Re: Actual Conversation

[coalboy.livejournal.com]

WE WON!

Re: Actual Conversation

[mmegaera.livejournal.com]

Or at least the bathroom [g].

Re: Actual Conversation

[jekni.livejournal.com]

I guess we call it that because in most houses there's nothing else in there. Just a toilet. When you come out of the toilet you go next door to the bathroom to wash your hands. It is very rare in this country to find the main toilet actually inside the bathroom - at least in a modern house anyway - it is almost always a separate room (hence "littlest room" as a euphemism).

Unless it's an en-suite - which usually contains a toilet, a washbasin/vanity unit and a shower. But that's part of somebody's bedroom, so you wouldn't expect guests to use it.

Re: Actual Conversation

[mmegaera.livejournal.com]

The toilet isn't in the same room as the sink??? I would not like that. At all.

Even the fanciest houses here don't have a separate room for the porcelain throne all by itself. The only place I've ever run across that is in England, in very old-fashioned B&Bs, and I always assumed it was a function of separating out the facilities in a shared bathroom to make them more accessible to the folks who were using it.

Re: Actual Conversation

[coalboy.livejournal.com]

When I lived in San Francisco in a residence club the porcelain god had its own nothing-else-in-it room. But it depended on which building you were in - some of the rooms had ensuite entire bathrooms; most had everything communal, though only one occupant at a time.

Re: Actual Conversation

[trixtah.livejournal.com]

What Jackie said about it being fairly common that the toilet being off in a little room by itself. So you have the wee room, public toilets/restroom, and "toilet blocks" in schools, campgrounds and sports grounds - the latter often has shower and change facilities as well, and I think the word there has more emerged from the old sense of "doing one's toilet".

Re: Actual Conversation

[mmegaera.livejournal.com]

That is just -- odd. Really odd. Sorry [g].