Ladie’s Room in NYC


Ross writes:

Spotted this the other day at a cultural institution in New York City. I can’t be more specific without getting in trouble. Thought you’d appreciate the thought that went into putting the apostrophe in the wrong place. Surely it couldn’t be “Ladies’”?

I like the random capitalization and punctuation. (And, how on earth would Ross “get in trouble” for describing where he took this picture?)

  1. #1 by john on December 15, 2007 - 5:33 pm

    I’m guessing by “cultural institution” he means “strip club”

  2. #2 by phaedrus on December 15, 2007 - 7:29 pm

    Since the ladies’ room is out of order, you must instead use the second floor. There’s not much privacy on the second floor, but if you’ve gotta go…

  3. #3 by Signs&Wonders on December 16, 2007 - 6:35 pm

    that was my first thought (what phaedrus said.) It didn’t say to use the “2nd floor RESTROOM”–just “the second floor”. Messy!!!

  4. #4 by Eva-Sensei on December 16, 2007 - 6:40 pm

    Wow, this gives me a huge flashback to a time when some guy came onto my college campus to hand out fliers to a local bar. Like most ladies who passed him, I accepted the paper as it was offered to me. Upon discovering that the flier said “Tuesday is Ladie’s Night,” I turned around and gave it back the guy, telling him that I’d never patronize a bar that couldn’t use apostrophes correctly. Poor guy was dumbfounded.

  5. #5 by john on December 16, 2007 - 6:44 pm

    Eva-Sensei, you are my hero.

  6. #6 by Blue on December 17, 2007 - 6:01 pm

    Eva-Sensei is my hero too!!

    Second floor might start to flood fast!

  7. #7 by Gez on December 19, 2007 - 12:57 pm

    Eva-sensei, I hope you said that in the most patronising voice possible for maximum irony.

    John, I agree. It has got to be a strip club.

    This phenomenon is frighteningly common. It’s almost as though the writer is thinking “I know how to spell ladies, but I have to put an apostrophes somewhere!

  8. #8 by Gez on December 19, 2007 - 12:58 pm

    Oops, I forgot to close quotation marks. They’ll have my Grammar Nazi card off me for this.

  9. #9 by Anonymous on March 17, 2008 - 6:11 pm

    He is probably worried about getting in trouble because he works there. Maybe his boss wrote the sign.

  10. #10 by Meaghan on April 12, 2008 - 2:28 am

    Or it’s somewhere in NYC that has banned photographs? Is that still in effect?

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