To have reached the age of 38 without knowing

[lougle]

That pineapples don't grow on trees, but grow in the ground? I'm well educated, went to university (twice), but I had never thought about where my pineapple had come from, and it never occurred to me that the 'chopped' end was on the bottom and not the top!

What didn't you know until recently?

the Hoi Polloi

My dad always used to say you shouldn't put a "the" in front of hoi polloi as it's redundant.

That Evelyn Waugh was a man and that Evelyn can be a man's name at all!

Interestingly, his wife was named Evelyn, too. Their friends used to call them “He-velyn” and “She-velyn” to tell them apart.

And an extra note that did you know you can grow a pineapple from the top of a pineapple...

www.todayshomeowner.com/how-to-grow-pineapples-as-houseplants/

I have eaten many many fresh figs in my life (lived in a house with a fig tree briefly). I have never found a wasp.

Ah Watch my friend was fibbing then!

Has anybody else had a reading pronunciation failure?

For years I would read "epitome" as epy-tome whilst knowing and using the word correctly. Same with antithesis which I would read as "anti-thesis".

I thought (without really thinking about it) these were entirely different words that you never heard spoken for some reason.

I'm 38 too and have just learned something new (courtesy of your thread). It must be an age thing!

Ducks have a corkscrew shaped penis. Maybe the hyenas don't have it so bad after all - males will rape the female and often drown her. Having seen it happen, it's very violent.

"Me? Well, for years I thought that the Hoi Polloi were upper-class, not the riff-raff. "

Well that's this Hoi Polloi told! I thought the same I've only ever heard it used in sniffy terms when people have got something a bit fancy, e.g. "well it's alright for the Hoi Polloi, but us commoners have to dine on sausage and mash..." Who knew that they were really saying "Well it's ok for the commoners, but us commoners have to dine on sausage and mash..."

I am 39 I also thought pineapples grew on trees wtf!

I've never heard the phrase 'Hoi Polloi' but i like it!!

Hyenas, apparently, are physically incapable of raping/being raped, due to the female hyena's pseudopenis covering her clitoris and her vagina being hidden, brizzledrizzle (I have no intimate knowledge of the hyena, but did read wiki in some detail when the childbirth issue came up).

Oh, here's another one which may (but probably won't) save someone's life: I read a story the other day about a man who ate a few cherry pips and started to feel funny - his wife googled it and it turns out cherry stones contain ARSENIC and eating only a few can make you very ill - he had to be given some sort of antidote in hospital.

So there. Don't eat cherry pips.

I knew coconuts grew on trees ( and are heavy ) so my logic was Pineapples did as well. You live and learn. ( on mumsnet)

OMG. I just googled cashew nuts. I mean, OMG!

Tbh, I personally thought that the people using the term the hoi polloi are actually the ones identifying themselves as... well, a bit ‘common’?

Ah yes, that story is actually about cyanide in cherry, apricot, prunes, etc. But you'd have to actually chew the pits, not just swallow them, and normally you'd have to chew a lot of them.

Capers are not fish either. Not even when smoked.

MrsTerryPratchett just blew my mind with the cashew nuts.

Ah, cyanide not arsenic - I've been watching too much miss marple!

Confusing topic...

I only just 'got' the salt shaker one. Doh...

Killer whales are actually dolphins and not whales

Sarahh I told my other half about Orca not being whales when we were watching Blue Planet. He said “oh, what are they then? Sharks?”

Amaretto liqueur is made from apricot kernels.

Only some brands. Others are made from Almonds, or a mix of the two.