What stupid things have you believed/said/assumed before finding out to your embarrassment you were wrong?

I remember seeing an ad on TV in America for a fast-food place called "Pope yes" and thinking that was a really weird name for a chicken restaurant.

It was really Popeye's.

Another time I saw a postage stamp with some tall buildings and the word Banking. I asked my dad where "Bahn -king" was, thinking it must be in Asia somewhere. Uh, no, it was just a stamp honouring the banking industry.

Headlong by Queen has a line:

"she used to be a woman with a hot dog stand.."

I heard it as "hot downstairs"
hmmmm

DS3 : "look at my hairDude!" (instead of hair-do)

I thought the lyrics to Band Aid were "Fever, woaah" ... until about 3 yrs ago when DH corrected me, he still finds this hilarious.

A guy at work thought the words to A town called Malice were "Animal House" which barely even fits?

Also that is brand new info re: dandelions!

Until recently I used the term 'Head Poncho' instead of Honcho - nobody ever corrected me.

Me too Horry! My DH still takes the piss when talking about "type 2 dandelions".... Git

I thought the Wombles of Wimbledon were common

Ok, please help me avoid making a fool of myself: a friend commented on how clever the word play in Peppa Pig can be, like "Madam Gazelle" / mademoiselle. Another one said, "Yes, I've only just got that. Like "Grandpa in my pocket"." ok, I should have asked there and then what they meant by Grandpa, but I didn't. Can anyone enlighten me?

The hymn book we used in church when I was a child had the year of birth and death of the author beside each hymn. For years I thought this was how long it took them to write the hymn. That was an embarassing conversation!

Until this year I didn't realise yellow dandelions and dandelion clocks were the flower and seeds of the same plant. I think I thought they were different varieties that just happened to grow together.

Up until the age of 16 I though God made the earth. Couldn't understand how it got here otherwise.

I was absolutely convinced that Matt Perry from Friends and Luke Perry from the original 90210 were brothers.

Oh, and that the Beegees were in charge of all other popstars because I once saw them in gold, shiny cat suits in the 80s (?!).

BudgieGirlBob the change from black and white to colour in The Wizard of Oz is to show the contrast from boring regular Kansas where Dorothy lived (black & white) to the magical wonderful world of Oz (colour).
When she eventually wakes up from her dream/unconsciousness/returns from Oz, the film reverts back to black and white as she is back in Kansas.

When I was a little kid I pronounced 'souvenir' as 'sovven year'. I was told that wasn't how you said it so I called it 'sou-ven-year'. Took a while to get it correct afterwards. I also thought 'washing line' was 'wash me lion' and a 'lounger' was a 'lunjer'. 'Gloves' were 'glubs'

I asked my dad how electric windows worked in the car and he told me there was a cable under the road which sent power through the tyres. I believed him for a while.

A friend of mine worked in a superstore with me. She told me that someone had asked where the 'elbow grease' was and she couldn't find it... she later realised she'd been had. On the same night she was asked where the 'sugar free sweets' were and she said 'hah! very funny!' to the presumably surprised customer.

It's my fault really but my ds is nearly two and not speaking much yet so he uses some makatin signs he's picked up from mr tumble, today he heard the icecream van coming got giddy and when he heard the music start signed "all gone" looked dissapointed and walked off.
I was joking a while ago that when they play the music they've run out, damn you Jason manford!
I suppose it'll be cheaper in the long run lol

Well, this isn't quite the same but I will never forget the time when I had my first proper date with DH.

I told him that I had met the Pope, he asked me where and I replied with "Outside Asda" he looked at me for ages then started questioning me and I swore blind I met the Pope outside Asda when I went for some celebration that we were invited to with my quit smoking group.

It took me ages to remember I was getting the Pope mixed up with the Lord Mayor He never lets me live that down.

My DH fully believes that werewolves and vampires exist....

He won't listen to me when I say its all rubbish...he also thinks dragons were are real...I only wish I was joking...let's hope our children get their intelligence from me and not him or they are going to seriously embarrass themselves when they're older!

I know this is an old thread, but my sister-in-law's sister thought oral sex was just talking about it

Jaywalking is when you cross the street in a random place, not at a designated crosswalk or at the corner. It's one of these ancient laws that are on the books and used (by the police) to catch people on a slow day, like spitting on the sidewalk, etc.

Crocodilehunter, I'm sure you'll never see this, but 'stave' is correct. Stave is an old word for staff (or cudgel), and can be a verb as well, meaning to break or crush. Stove should be the past tense.

www.thefreedictionary.com/stave

MrsGrowbag, I remember getting worried when my best friend announced we were going to the rec for a while before tea, because I didn't have my swimming costume. I was very relieved to be led into a large empty field to play, rather than the recreation centre I was expecting.

I thought the song band of gold was by a band called 'free the pain'

and I thought the sayings were:

'that's put the knockers on it' ( mockers )
and '...like a damp squid' ( squib )
both of these were my mums fault, obviously from a really intelligent family

My dad used to think that the way a baby ate in the womb was just opening it's mouth and catching the food that dropped down that my mother would eat.
He also asked why scuba divers couldn't just take a hose down to breath through instead of all these air tanks etc....
I have a childhood friend who asked why my newborn didn't smile much in pictures...he thought they came out able to smile on command.
My DH thinks if you have freckles you are born with them.
Another childhood friend asked why i keep cutting DD's hair so short (she is nearly 2 but is a baldy).

I thought ponies were baby horses and that they'd grow up to be proper horses.

I found out last year the truth. I'm 30.

Nicknamefail, my dad's the same. We also have to be careful to lock all the doors in case of 'fieths'

My sister told me if you cried for too long you could get dehydrated...I believed it for YEARS! She obviously wanted me to stop crying one time she'd done something mean to me.