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Original poster

What dumb thing has taken you forever to realise?

734 replies

muchalover · 26/08/2023 19:45

Nights in white satin song was playing in the car today. A favourite song of mine so I was singing along and it dawned on me that the word is "nights," not "knights".

Whole song makes much more sense now 😳

I had a similar issue with "Toyota, the car in front" but it's a Nissan I'm behind (or other car brand).

And in the film Winnie the Pooh where the gopher says "I'm not in the book" and I thought it was the phone book😬 for decades!

I promise I'm intelligent.

OP posts:
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UnctuousUnicorns · 28/08/2023 22:25

ImBoilingJackie · 28/08/2023 21:13

Thanks for asking this, because I was trying to work it out too. Guessing people think of clouds as being solid masses?

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Surely thunder is God rearranging the furniture in Heaven? That's what we were told, anyway. 😜

mambojambodothetango · 28/08/2023 22:26

DavesSpareDeckChair · 26/08/2023 21:21

I also thought it was trombolese (must be the most commonly misheard lyric of the 90s) and thought that maybe it meant he got his trombone on a lease (as he's got no money, so he can't afford to buy it outright!).

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This made me laugh so much! I done even know the song but it seems to have caused much confusion and amusement.

Ghosttofu99 · 28/08/2023 22:37

WildAndFree123 · 26/08/2023 19:56

I was about 35 when I realised the wombles were from Wimbledon Common, not that they were from Wimbledon and were common.

A friend said this to me the other day. But I assumed it was a play on words so that both things are true: They are ‘common’ folk but also live on Wimbledon Common…

DuranNotSpandeau · 28/08/2023 22:43

I went to the US in my 20s and my friend asked if there were any national parks I wanted to go to...I said Jellistone as I had no idea it was made up for the Yogi Bear cartoons from the real name Yellowstone.😂
Until I was about 30 I thought that anything that could fit into a postboxes only needed a normal 1st or 2nd class stamp on. I had no idea you had to pay more for heavier letters.
When I started college I was asked which designers I did/didn't like. I said I didn't really like "Ver-sayss" (Versace) and thought I was really cool for coming up with one that no-one had heard of. It was about a year until I realised how to pronounce it and I never admitted it.

Threenow · 28/08/2023 22:44

Puffypuffin · 28/08/2023 12:41

Oh my god ... THAT'S what it means? I always thought that was a bit rude to the Wombles. I'm 56 FFS.

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I don't get this - I live about as far from the UK as you can get, and I always knew they were the Wombles from Wimbledon Common.

Shallana · 28/08/2023 22:44

sugarplum33 · 26/08/2023 21:38

I've embarrassed myself many times mispronouncing words I've only seen written. When getting the HPV virus as a teen the nurse asked me if I understood what it was for and I confidently said it was for the Human Pa-pillow-ma Virus. She didn't laugh, but I cringed after when I heard it pronounced correctly.

My family did laugh when I expressed a wish to travel to America and visit 'Yose-uh-mite' Blush

I'm glad I'm not the only one who made this mistake re Yosemite! When I told my dad about our plans he burst out laughing, 'Do you mean 'Yo-sem-it-ee'

Catsmere · 28/08/2023 22:47

Threenow · 28/08/2023 22:44

I don't get this - I live about as far from the UK as you can get, and I always knew they were the Wombles from Wimbledon Common.

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Same - perhaps because I only saw it written, never heard the song?

Puffypuffin · 28/08/2023 22:51

Threenow · 28/08/2023 22:44

I don't get this - I live about as far from the UK as you can get, and I always knew they were the Wombles from Wimbledon Common.

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Well the thread title refers to 'dumb' things, this is just another one of those! 😂

Threenow · 28/08/2023 22:52

Missingpop · 28/08/2023 20:06

Not me; but my friend kept asking why don’t private ambulance’s windows in them we all laughed at her & thought she was going potty but then I was driving her to hospital one day & she said look a bloody private ambulance it has no windows; I roared with laughter so much tears were streaming down my face; I had to explain to her it was an undertakers van that collects the dead bodies & that no patients in there would be worried about the view on their journey; she was mortified that she had never known about it when we met friends later I was in stitches S she tried to explain it to them 😂

I could see myself thinking the same thing. Where I live undertakers collect bodies in hearses.

timesaretight · 28/08/2023 23:10

I've only realised this week that, this little piggy went to market actually meant he was going to his death, not shopping.

toadasoda · 28/08/2023 23:13

Omg literally just realised tonight that the word toying means playing like a toy. Cannot believe I never knew.

midlifecrash · 28/08/2023 23:28

I wish to enter an objection - why are we assuming the first little piggy is off to the abattoir, when two lines later we have a little piggy eating roast beef? Why the switch between grim realism and fantasy? I submit that the first little piggy does go shopping, perhaps for said roast beef (let’s not think about cows) and the piggy that has none is maybe the one that did not go to the shops… which of them then goes wee wee wee wee all the way home is open to debate

cass5 · 28/08/2023 23:30

Mushroo · 26/08/2023 20:59

Song lyric wise, I only recently found out it’s not ‘my love has got no money, he’s got his trombolese’, which I blindly accepted without ever questioning wtf a trombolese is.

It’s actually ‘he’s got his strong beliefs’.

😂

LylaLee · 28/08/2023 23:43

midlifecrash · 28/08/2023 23:28

I wish to enter an objection - why are we assuming the first little piggy is off to the abattoir, when two lines later we have a little piggy eating roast beef? Why the switch between grim realism and fantasy? I submit that the first little piggy does go shopping, perhaps for said roast beef (let’s not think about cows) and the piggy that has none is maybe the one that did not go to the shops… which of them then goes wee wee wee wee all the way home is open to debate

They are fattened up with things like roast beef. Like if you were getting ready to take him to market in a week or so...

BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn · 28/08/2023 23:51

Feeding roast beef to a pig to fatten it up for market makes no economic sense.

DunePeyton · 28/08/2023 23:55

When I stopped thinking that the Captain’s log in Star Trek was an actual log.

LylaLee · 28/08/2023 23:57

BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn · 28/08/2023 23:51

Feeding roast beef to a pig to fatten it up for market makes no economic sense.

Wagyu beef, 800 thread count level pork you'd end up with.

Toomuchtrouble4me · 29/08/2023 00:51

I didn’t find out why the moon shone until I was 22. At Uni. 🤪 I’d just literally never thought about it, everybody laughed at me, I felt such a fool. I don’t know what I thought, I knew it wasn’t a star, but I never considered why it appeared bright in the sky. I just accepted it. 🤦🏻‍♀️

sashh · 29/08/2023 03:47

Dresserss · 28/08/2023 20:29

@cakeorwine but i know quite a few dutch people and they all call their country 'Holland' no matter what part they're from 😵‍💫 I'm confused now

It's a sort of shorthand. Like everyone from outside the UK tends to call us 'English'.

I once spent a few mins at passport control in Chile while the immigration officer tried to find 'Inglaterra' on the computer and asked several colleagues what it was on the system.

Pudmyboy · 29/08/2023 04:42

happychops · 28/08/2023 20:51

I grew up thinking this road sign was deer grazing 🤣

I thought it was a hammer hitting the road!

Pudmyboy · 29/08/2023 04:49

Jackienory · 27/08/2023 09:54

Billy Ocean: the going gets tough - " go and get stuffed "

Madonna: Spanish Lullaby, La isla bonita - " lucky slag Anita"

😎

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'go and get stuffed' 😂

Tabitha1960 · 29/08/2023 06:04

I was moaning to my b/f that the beaches where I live are all pebble and I wished they were sand instead, when he blew my mind by informing me that pebbles and sand are the same material! Sand is just really tiny pebbles!

VictoriaVenkman · 29/08/2023 06:45

Threenow · 28/08/2023 22:44

I don't get this - I live about as far from the UK as you can get, and I always knew they were the Wombles from Wimbledon Common.

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I had no idea there was a place called Wimbledon Common as a child. So if you listen to the theme tune in that context including how it is sung, it comes across:

The wombles of Wimbledon,
Common are we

Cakeandcoffeea · 29/08/2023 06:53

iwantawisteriathisyear · 26/08/2023 21:21

I only realised recently that thunder and lightning weren't two completely separate things. I didn't know that the thunder was the noise of the lightning. I haven't confessed that to anyone. Until now Blush

I had no idea 😮

SinnerBoy · 29/08/2023 07:04

Catsmere · Yesterday 22:47

Same - perhaps because I only saw it written, never heard the song

Did nobody actually watch "The Wombles"? I'm from Newcastle and knew that they went out collecting rubbish from the common, at a young age.