To ask the most basic thing you never knew/misunderstood until adulthood

[ChanandlerBongsLeftShoe]

I feel like a completely ridiculous excuse for an adult but the other day I found out the difference between cottage pie and shepherds pie.

I am in my 30s and gobsmacked (also feel a bit stupid now it's so obvious). I genuinely thought they were the same thing.

Is there anything you discovered as an adult that was just common knowledge to everyone else? Or perhaps there's a phrase you've found out you have been saying wrong all this time etc...!

Help me feel a bit better.

l thought that about Center Parcs too, if l'm honest.

"The rabbit/battery one isn't true though. The Duracell bunny was first used in advert in the 70s, long before the vibrator."

Vibrators have been around a lot longer than you think.

Cliff Michelmore

I always thought China was a tiny but very densly populated country like Japan. Who knew it's the 4th largest country in the world!

@HarrysOwl I only found out the Jee lay thing recently too! Your not alone

@cricketmum84

I thought he was called Jonty Rhodes too!
A friend of mine thought Ray Liotta was Ray Lee Otter

I was over 50 before I realised that HP sauce was named after the houses of parliament, despite the fact that there is a drawing of the iconic building on the label.

What???

The spider thing isn't right is it? They climb up the drain and then I wash them back down the plug hole to free them.

cricketmum, your John Torrode/Jonty Rhodes mixup made me laugh!

Jonty Rhodes is one of the main reasons I got into cricket back in the late 90s!

Hahahaha at pen elope I'll never read it Penelope ever again! 😆

l worked with a woman who swore that there was "no such thing as dinosaurs. lt's just piles of bones they've put together to look like something."
The same woman insisted she'd seen a unicorn at a horse show.

Another here who makes shepherds cottage pie with beef mince 🤔😆

hang on, hang on, hang on:

THERE IS A JONTY RHODES?

How did I not know that yet thought John Torrode was called that? Must've been lurking in the back of my head somewhere.

My mum said Sin Head O'Connor for years.

And when I met DH we went to a very posh restaurant and I ordered the Whore's Doors.

Very admirably the waiter said Good choice Madame, the Hors d'oeuvre

DH still reminds me of it 20 years later

This has reminded me I thought the same about wombles being common, and the song went (with my punctuation) "The wombles of Wimbledon, common are we!"

I also realised in my twenties that the "men swear" sign in shops was actually "men's wear" and nothing to do with men using bad language. It totally stood to reason as a child because my dad swore and my mum never did.

Many many years ago I asked my (ex) bf what a baby fish was called. Shouting through from the kitchen he advised me it was called a 'googlit'. I duely nodded my head at his wisdom.
Only when recounting this many months later and being a smug smarty-pants did I realise what he actually said was 'google it'.

When I was about 25 living independently in my own apartment there were pigeons nesting outside my window. My boyfriend at the time and I were taking about them and he was saying that pigeon eggs taste delicious, I looked at him in disgust saying you can’t eat them there are baby chicks in them - he took the piss out of me for years after, telling people that Tuckwit thinks the eggs in the shop come out date stamped

The stars are out day and night. I was truly shocked when I realised that. DP called me a dunderheid IIRC.

@separatebeds god I didn't know that!!! I thought it was a tennis fashion accessory to tell you the truth.

Makes perfect sense now!

Oh and that kahoonas (as in US slang for testicles) is actually spelled cajones.

This has reminded me I thought the same about wombles being common, and the song went (with my punctuation) "The wombles of Wimbledon, common are we!"

I too thought they were common as there were loads of them?!

@theonetowalkinthesun absolute quality!

I used to think chemical castration meant dipping a bloke’s bollocks in a vat of chemicals (like acid) so it just burnt their balls off. I realised what it actually meant when I was in my late twenties

That Goofy is a cow not a dog!
I'm in my 40s and only just learned this. Perrrlease!

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonty_Rhodes