OMG I'm thick as mince

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I was just doing an online trivia quiz and one of the answers mentioned that zebra crossings are so-called because the black and white stripes resemble a zebra's coat. I can't believe that not once in my 40-odd years on this planet did I twig the connection!

What else have I missed...?

Axl Rose started Guns and Roses with Tracii Gun who then formed LA Guns. LA Guns wasn't a person.

"Be there or be square means you won't be 'a-round'"

Um, no it doesn't. A square in the 60s meant a really uncool person. Be there or be uncool

My friend, in her thirties, was shocked when she realised that raisins were just dried grapes. She’d thought all her life they grew on raisin trees.

During a conversation with my sister in law recently she was surprised to discover that grapes are poisonous for dogs. She knew raisins were toxic bur had been merrily feeding her dogs raisins!

Just in case:

Adam Ant got his name from the back of the toilet... His story is longer, but ends up with him going to the loo in an old fashioned loo in an old fashioned institute of and deciding that he was indeed adamant, the make of the loo, that he would not succumb to his mental health issues.

@CountessOfNowhere I didn't say LA Guns was a person, I said they joined forces

My 17 year old daughter suddenly realised today, that the mum in the song ‘I saw Mommy kissing Santa Claus’, was kissing Daddy, and not, as she’d thought ‘a bit slutty’.

These are all great but I really laughed at this one

@LoveAScaryTaleMe I remember being baffled by the "up" and "down" lift buttons as a child: not all lifts had the numbers showing you where the lift was now, how would you know whether to make it go up or down? Realisation dawned when I noticed that on the top floor, there would only be a "down" button.

When people on TV would discuss an accomplice, I thought it was "she was his coke and spiriter". Should be: co-conspirator.

Of course, everyone knows where Leeds Castle is, the clue is in the name.

On a topical note, in the song Last Christmas I thought George Michael had ‘friends with tie dyes’ as in wearing tie-dyed clothes when in fact they had ‘tired eyes’.
Misheard lyrics is another thread entirely.

I don't get the Berkeley hunt one. Isn't Berkeley pronounced BARKley?

Bluesheep I think it’s because in Cockney rhyming slang it’s often the second word the real word rhymes with eg apples and pears is stairs, jam jar is car and so on. So in this case it’s hunt not Berkeley that is rhymed with.

Not thick-as-mince territory but fun random trivia. Nintendo was founded in 1889. (They made Japanese playing cards).

The Netherlands / Holland one has blown my mind. I thought it was the same place, just had two names like we can be called United Kingdom or Great Britain.

Which led to me googling why we had 2 names and I just found out it’s actually one name, The United Kingdom OF Great Britain.

My heart hurts 🙈🙈🙈

I don’t think it’s the rhyme that is in question, Marmalade but that we call a person a berk. But Berkeley is pronounced Barkley.

The uk isn’t the same as Great Britain.

Here :)

Until this awful tsunami, I thought Krakatoa was in South America...

jessebuni

Anyway just to add a piece of my own humiliation, when I was about 16 I suddenly said allowed to the whole room “oh my god afternoon! It’s after noon in the day!” And everyone looked at me like I was stupid but up until then i had just never thought about the word.

I have residents who insist it's not afternoon until after they've had lunch. So 1pm ish. Even when I said to one of them that it is literally after noon he told me that's a 'New fangled idea'

Last year I was in poundland and there was a family with clear voices shopping near me. The young man picked up one of the cakes from the end of the aisle and the older lady said to put it back as she could make a better cake. The younger woman then said how much she liked her carrot cake and that it was a shame that the older owman made it so rarely.
"I just can't be bothered grating all those carrots" was given as the reason, at which point the young man who was pushing a pushchair swung around and said in a horrified voice, "What do you mean? There's no carrots in carrot cake". At which point the younger woman called him a rude name and asked what the fuck did he think was in it then to which he responded I dunno, but not carrots!" and they walked around the corner to the next aisle.

I was already sniggering quietly and his next comment finished me off completely.

"I suppose next thing you'll tell me is that there's cheese in cheesecake!"
The response from the two women was short, rude and incredulous. I didn't stop smiling for hours.

Only recently twigged that Liam is short for William.

shoesarefab It’s The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

WRT the calendar, the year originally started in March, so by the time you got to SEPTember, that was the seventh month, in the Julian calendar. When the Gregorian calendar was adopted the whole calendar was mucked about with quite a lot, days were added and taken away and the start of the year was changed to January.

Reading about 'adding' extra months is confusing. Various sites suggest various additions, but it seems rather absurd that the Romans, who were so advanced would have a 10 month year running from March-December, then have a gap where days were uncounted until we got back to March. Hoping someone more knowledgeable will be able to pop on and advise.

ive jusgt tried the email thing on my phone doesnt work must be certain brands

i iused to think timbukto was made up couldnt believe it was real

@JillScarlet
How does that work with the Olympics and “Team GB” ??

Team GB is a slightly controversial name, but Team UK wouldn’t be quite right anyway because a) some athletes who aren’t from the UK (eg Channel Islanders) can compete for Team GB and b) most NI athletes tend to compete for the Irish Olympic team which represents the whole island of Ireland.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_GB

@wanderings Do you mean Leeds Castle, the one in Kent? 😄 www.leeds-castle.com