What random nugget of information were you completely unaware of before you discovered mumsnet?

[777holyandsinless]

I’ll start

it being a commonly held idea that itv is uncouth and bbc is the classy alternative

Pretty much everything about TTC / the two week wait (as a quasi-military operation, I did already know how the baby gets in there!), and a high percentage of info about parenting a baby and toddler (plus reading books about those).
It was invaluable to get the crowdsourced mass opinion on topics, going back years!

I didn’t know this until now! Thanks

That so many people are unhappy.

That so many people need help choosing a name for their baby.

I say paddy when my kids are having a tantrum 💁‍♀️

Agree with this (mining community, Nottinghamshire). When I went home from Uni to visit family when my father died, I went to hug my mother (who was in grief) and she said "Get off, you're embarrassing me". Obviously I'd learned soft Uni ways.

I'm always amazed at how many people actually tell their family and friends what their chosen names are before the baby is born, and then get mightily upset if anyone says they don't like it.

Well, we're going back a bit. Definitely wasn't the norm in the 70s in NE England.

The whole stag do thing leaves me bewildered and dumbfounded. The idea that a man or a woman, from a working-class background, can spend an amount of money on a weekend piss-up that would pay for a modest family holiday is beyond me.

This I can understand, but pp made it sound like it’s not done now and I think that’s really sad. Each to their own of course and of course kids are loved but my littlest’s wee face shining when I tell her I love her - priceless.

I hope that’s not the case now. They need two dishwashers!

You don't have teenagers do you 🤣

That's lovely. I suppose my mother just put it on other words. She used to say, "I could eat you up!"

Haha! No not quite, but I do have a 10yr old who is less lovey dovey these days, she’d rarely say it back to me. But I still tell her reasonably often.

Im just shocked at people not doing it with their wee ones. Although I have a friend who’s very anti kissing kids on lips and in my house that’s no big deal when they are small anyway.

@Jollyjoy ah well enjoy it while you can!

I dont understand this one, could someone please explain?

Thank you! Leicestershire here, and Grandad (Dad's dad) was a miner. There was great affection in their family but never any hugging or declarations of love. The only time I remember my mother touching me (apart from a well deserved slap on the leg when I was a teenager) was after my dad died and Mum hugged and kissed me. It was so uncharacteristic that I still feel a bit awkward when I remember it.

it's always completely random things that you wouldn't actually even KNOW whether "anyone" you'd ever met had done or not.

not "I've never met anyone with a full facial tattoo" which you might perhaps be fairly confident about but "I've never met/NOBODY 'in my circle' earns more/less than x amount" or "who had a child before/after x age" or "who has more/less than x in savings" or "who has slept with more/less than x amount of people" or "who has taken x drug," or "who spent x on their wedding" or who has/doesn't have a cleaner...." etc...

Often it's things I wouldn't even be able to say definitely about my siblings or some of my closest friends, let alone EVERYONE I've EVER met!

You might assume things about people but there's no way you actually know all these things about them - I for one know some of my closest friends would be surprised at some things about me, let alone my colleagues or hairdresser or whoever, so can only assume vice versa applies as well!

By "know" they mean "assume" and by "everyone" they mean "me, my mum and my best friend, whose experiences I assume must be universal so have extrapolated out to cover the other 9 billion people in the world."

Completely.

My favourite ever one was 'I don't know anyone with the middle name Elizabeth'.

As if you know the middle name of everyone you know! Everyone at work. Every school parent. Every teacher. Everyone of your DC friends. Just ridiculous.

Super king (& I think king) are wider than they are longer. This affects which way you put the duvet cover onto the duvet. Otherwise it won’t fit the duvet cover properly

Yes this. My Mum would never say anything like loving me, but she would say "I could eat you all up".

I can't remember my parents ever saying they loved me, but I knew they did, very much. It just wasn't the done thing in their circles in the 60s/70s. I also hate the hugging nowadays - I like my friends but I really don't want to hug them every single time I meet them and again when we part!