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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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20
Echio · 26/08/2023 22:18

Redavocadoes · 26/08/2023 21:25

In school I learned that rivers started in mountains and flowed down to the sea. Either from snow melt or from springs, which bubbled vigorously up in the mountains somewhere.

In my late 40's I discovered that some rivers ere made by quietly welling up from underneath the ground, when groundwater is close to the surface.
It actually blew my mind!

Hold on... am nearly 40... and ... wait wha.....??!!

I was totally taught that's where rivers came from! And that's what I thought... except maybe also because of the water cycle thing, it rained in the mountains?

Mind. Blown.

DragonFly98 · 26/08/2023 22:18

More embarrassingly I didn't realise that tenpin bowling was 10 pin bowling because there are 10 pins. I just blurred the word together though it was just a name like golf.

JudgeJ · 26/08/2023 22:20

Redavocadoes · 26/08/2023 21:22

"You picked a fine time to leave me Lucille
With 5 hundred children, and a crop in the field"

Eventually I realised it was 5 hungry children...

When I had my first baby this was very popular and another new Mum thought exactly the same as you and she wasn't impressed at the idea of 500 children!

Isitautumnyet23 · 26/08/2023 22:21

MWB29 · 26/08/2023 20:04

When I used to drive past security vans that had ‘POLICE FOLLOW THIS VAN’ written on the back I thought it was a command for any passing police cars to start following the van 😂 I was 28 when I realised it was a warning to possible robbers!

I thought exactly the same 😂

Pebbles16 · 26/08/2023 22:21

Jifmicroliquid · 26/08/2023 19:47

That those fluffy things you see in fields next to dandelions are actually dandelions in their final phase. I knew they were connected in some way but didn’t think they were the same thing.

This was exactly DH - my mind was blown that he didn't connect them
!

crocsaremybf · 26/08/2023 22:21

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’.

Ahaha same I always thought ''trombolese" too and thought it was some instrument.

Devilsmommy · 26/08/2023 22:21

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 is the best lyric meaning I've ever seen, I'm just gonna keep singing it wrong just so I can say it's because of this

Cabinet1278 · 26/08/2023 22:21

I used to think the world was in black and white because of the films and photographs… makes me cringe now

CryHavoc · 26/08/2023 22:23

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.

I THOUGHT THIS TOO

Echio · 26/08/2023 22:24

Was far too old to realise all of these are wrong:

We three kings of Orientar
Life is butter dream
To all intensive purposes
And Jamiroqaui 'got canned heat in my heels tonight, Big Ben'

Also discovered too late in life...
Capers are nasturtium seed pods
Timbuktu exists, as does Tipperary (I thought they were both fictional places)

Echio · 26/08/2023 22:25

I also thought Dads Army was from war time (like, the programme was that old...)

YouAndMeAndThem · 26/08/2023 22:25

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

It is pronounced 'pa-pillo-ma' though?! Isn't it??

WhileMyGuitarGentlyWeeps · 26/08/2023 22:25

@iwantawisteriathisyear

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 ...

I must admit that I thought this HAS to be made up ...

But I googled 'is thunder the noise of lightning?' and you are right! Shock What the ever living fuck??? How have I gone nearly 60 years without knowing this??????????????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

cariadlet · 26/08/2023 22:25

Babbleoff · 26/08/2023 21:55

Have just googled this and cant actually get over how its pronounced! Hyper-belly??? Not hyper-bowl??!

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It's more high-PER-buhlee

WhatsitWiggle · 26/08/2023 22:26

Rufus27 · 26/08/2023 21:50

I’d been driving for over a decade before realising this wasn’t actually a sign reminding me to wear my seatbelt 😳

For years, I thought that sign meant there were no more service stations ahead. To me, it looked like a table with a salt and pepper shaker on top.

Calmdown14 · 26/08/2023 22:26

Took my 40 year old friend on a long journey recently and she said "don't they measure the distance to the services accurately".

I must have looked slightly confused so she expanded" "27 miles and 36 metres. It's very precise!"

We had a good laugh that no, one is 27miles and the next one 36.

In her defence we are from a part of the country without motorways!

YouAndMeAndThem · 26/08/2023 22:27

Echio · 26/08/2023 22:24

Was far too old to realise all of these are wrong:

We three kings of Orientar
Life is butter dream
To all intensive purposes
And Jamiroqaui 'got canned heat in my heels tonight, Big Ben'

Also discovered too late in life...
Capers are nasturtium seed pods
Timbuktu exists, as does Tipperary (I thought they were both fictional places)

Sorry capers come from the caper plant! Nasturtium capers are a totally different thing!

WiddlinDiddlin · 26/08/2023 22:27

Housenoob · 26/08/2023 21:29

Same- they're known as 'dandelion clocks'. But also, I wonder why we never see them in transition? Like I've only ever seen a fully white fluffy one or a fully yellow dandelion. How and when do they change??!! I've just watched a YouTube video on it which is actually pretty cool but definitely haven't seen one halfway between one or the other.

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Here you go - the flower closes up and the seeds form behind, then it opens up and the dead flowerhead falls off!

Time lapse Dandelion flower to seed head

Filmed for my plant identification app https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/right-plants/id1361626912?mt=8https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=co.uk.app....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQ_QqtXoyQw

JohnnyYenSetHimselfOnFireAgain · 26/08/2023 22:27

DragonFly98 · 26/08/2023 22:13

I didn't realise that;
"I'll look at the sun and I'll look in the mirror"
in the Lily Allen song The Fear refers to the newspapers and not the actual sun and a mirror.

😆

In Creedence Clearwater Revival's Bad Moon Rising I always thought the lyric "there's a bad moon on the rise" was actually "there's the bathroom on the right". 😳

bucketsofdaylight · 26/08/2023 22:28

That old hymn about "There is a green hill far away, without a city wall.'

Took myself years to realise 'without' here meant 'outside' the city wall. I just thought it didn't have a city wall and it was a bit weird that they made a point of mentioning that.

The6thQueen · 26/08/2023 22:28

@iwantawisteriathisyear
@Louisetopaz21
@Jifmicroliquid

thunder is the sound the air makes as it rushes into the partial vacuum created by the lightning bolt (burns at 50000 degrees Fahrenheit, 3 times hotter than the sun) burning through the air it passes through. As the air cools it creates a partial vacuum, which makes the air rapidly expand and contract, basically the air column is a bit like a drum and the sound reverberates as a crack. As the vibrations gradually fade, this makes the rumbling noise that can linger.

JohnnyYenSetHimselfOnFireAgain · 26/08/2023 22:28

WhatsitWiggle · 26/08/2023 22:26

For years, I thought that sign meant there were no more service stations ahead. To me, it looked like a table with a salt and pepper shaker on top.

Show quote history

😂😂

JudgeJ · 26/08/2023 22:29

TheZenOne22 · 26/08/2023 21:37

haha! I also used to think this for years - I thought it was a popular name even though I didn’t know anyone called Anon

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My late mother thought that the horse called Bar ran in every race, poor thing, she saw its name at the end of the betting odds when she watched the racing on TV.
My brother asked Dad where Random was, the place they went to to draw the winner's name, The winner was drawn at random!
When we sang 'There is a green hill far away without a city wall' I used to wonder as a child why a green hill would need a city wall.
I also thought that 'Good King Wences last looked out'.

EnjoythemoneyJane · 26/08/2023 22:29

That you don’t have to break your front teeth trying to wrestle the cover off a new solid stick deodorant. You just wind the stick up. This is knowledge I acquired embarrassingly recentlly; I’m in my 50s 😳.

Also on another of these threads years ago someone said they’d only just realised that underwater tunnels (like the channel tunnel) are dug in the actual ground beneath the water. Total penny drop moment and made me realise I’d always subconsciously imagined fish swimming on the other side of the walls as I’m driving through. I’m not completely stupid, honest.

Bananabedhead · 26/08/2023 22:30

'while shepherds watch their flocks by night, all see Ted on the ground'. I thought Ted was the name of a lazy shepherd who couldn't be arsed to get up and care for the sheep