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

Sometimes the things that I come across on here that I’ve never encountered in real life, it’s because they are very trivial things that you wouldn’t usually discuss. We often just assume that whatever we grow up with in our own family is what everyone else does.

Example - I was quite disconcerted to find out from MN that some people eat Weetabix with hot milk. I’ve never come across that in real life (and tbh think it sounds grim but life would be boring if we were all the same!)

What's wrong with peg bowls in the dishwasher?

That you have a few fertile days a month and it’s actually not that likely to get pregnant outside the ovulation window.
From a teenager I was always under the impression any unprotected sex was equally likely to result in pregnancy and as I never wanted children, I never looked further into it. I was very late 30’s when I learned there’s a window of time each month where pregnancy is possible! 🫣

I love mumsnet for learning new things. So far yes as previously posters have said penis beakers, poo sticks exist and the script.

Then I came across gray rock and another poster put me onto Damien Talks money on YouTube. That got me investing in stocks and shares - Im £500 up so far. And style and beauty put me onto Skin & Me. My complexion is really good now

Besides opposite-sex friendships being impossible, and my male friends all apparently playing a decades-long waiting game to infiltrate my knickers, and how many people confuse ‘introversion’ with ‘misanthropy”, honestly, it’s more often how cheerfully underinformed some people are.

The fawn response, as in ‘fight, flight, freeze or fawn’. Very helpful. Also Grey Rock and The Script.

But given that you've never discussed it, you understand that some people you know might eat Weetabix with warm milk...you've just never asked which is fair. I'm talking about people who are flabbergasted to the point of disbelief that it could possibly be true.

One of my favourite ones was "I've never met ANYONE with a tattoo"! I mean, come on! How would you even know! Surely you don't ask everyone you meet. You have to assume that someone you've encountered across your lifetime might have a tattoo.

I think potentially I might have quite boring friends because we probably would discuss breakfast choices. I know people who have Weetabix with water (absolutely horrendous) and dry with butter on! They walk among us!

so glad I found out about ‘the script’ too!

Why?

Parking outside someone’s house is rude

People have endless hobbies but never say what they are because it’s ‘outing’

That your best friend of 30 years can invite you to their 50th and you can reply saying ‘No that doesn’t work for me. Have fun!’

I’ve never heard that before.

That ‘No’ is a complete sentence, and that spiders wipe their willies on your laundry when it is getting darked on.

Defo true in the 70's

That some people put mayo in their crisp butties.
Filthy animals!

I heard about executive dysfunction on a thread about someone's DH who had ASD. I recognised myself instantly, looked it up, and took photos of my bedroom. I showed them to my GP and was being assessed within two months.

Yes, I have ASD and I will never forget that I owe my diagnosis to MN. So grateful! My appalling untidiness had been a source of shame and sadness all my life. Now I know it's a disability rather than a moral failing.

That so many people have no idea of the origins of Halloween and will actively dismiss Scottish (and Irish) posters and insist trick or treating is a new fangled Americanism and nothing like it happened in the UK before.

Ditto dismissing anyone from the Midlands who points out that Mom is used in parts of the UK and also isn't an Americanism.

How to navigate the fight for Kinship allowance when we took in DN. it has made a huge difference to our finances and has allowed me to take a career break and settle DN into living with us.

That there’s an unhealthy amount of women who come across as only getting married for security… based on threads I’ve watched, I’ve seen it loads. I don’t believe in marriage, been with DP 21 years with no desire to get married, guess what we can do most things that married people can…

another one is how obsessive people get over grammar… jeez some people maybe be dyslexic, have other complex needs and there’s always one bellend who has to comment about grammar and nothing about the actual topic.

some People get so irate about how other live thier lives. Yes people ask for opinions, advice for certain aspects but the level of condescending high maintenance vicious comments I see is absolutely not necessary. If you simply don’t like it… scroll on

Cocklodgers, red flags, love bombing, the script.

How I wish Mumsnet had been around when I was making all my mistakes 😩

Oh I thought that was a very well known phenomenon 😀

I was once explaining to someone why some people will never, ever shop at Argos, on account of the fact it had a catalogue, and that catalogues were historically associated with paying weekly for purchases that one might otherwise have not been able to afford...granted that Argos was never that type of retailer, though it was developed on the back of the Greenshield stamp system after the success of Greenshield began to falter in the early 1970s.

Anyway, said person did not grasp a word of what I was saying, until I said "it's the same as people who would only watch BBC and not commercial television". Now that hit home - his late grandfather (a former headmaster) had once banned the viewing of ITV in his house, apparently.

What's the deal with the face wash?!

I never knew this

Ditto it never occurred to me that people don't wear pants in bed!

I don't think I have ever slept without pants on as an adult.

Because your laundry will dry faster.

That washing can be darkened on if left overnight and spiders rub their willies on it