things you didnt know, but should... mine is rice :/

[RainbowsAndFrogs]

i honestly have just had to google how rice is made. i wasnt sure if it was man made or grown. i know
i knew but wasnt 100%

honestly i have A levels and generally educated, although apparently not as much as i thought?

please tell me im not alone!

@drtyminded

had a heated discussion at work when i said that sultanas, currants, and raisins are all dried grapes

What did people think they were?

Well, Reading this thread I realise at 40 that a pony is not a baby horse. I always thought ponys grow up to be adult horses.

I only realised a few years ago that Richard Attenborough and David Attenborough are not the same person.

I know they weren't the same person but didn't know they were brothers. I thought Richard Attenborough was American.

@1Morewineplease

I always believed that geese flew away in the autumn to seek warmer climates. Turns out they arrive in autumn to escape colder climates.

To be fair, if you gleaned the information from north american tv, you wouldn't be wrong

@Feminist10101

Anything to do with cars. Can't change tyres, check oil or even pop the bonnet!

Can’t? My 10 year old DD can do those things. She can also identify all of the warning lights on the dash, knows most of the rules of the road and different speed limits and the basics of how the engine, clutch and brakes work.

There’s absolutely no reason anyone old enough to drive can’t do the things you’ve listed.

I’m over 60. I drive but I can’t do any of the things you list, largely because I have no interest in them. I can ring the AA to sort that stuff out for me.

I am very skilled in many other areas including maths, plumbing, dance, baking, tax law, drawing, embroidery, ski-ing etc. I don’t assume other people should have those skills nor do I assume I’m superior because I can do things other people can’t.

@YellowEllis

Oh and I only found out this year that a pickle is a cucumber, and not a vegetable in its own right

? i thought pickle was a generic term, rather like sauce but with coarser chopped pieces in, more spoonable than to pour/squeeze. like branston pickle. have never heard of a pickle.

Then again, it took me a good long while to discover that summer of 69 wasn't about the year...

Ok....I did not know that.

So belly buttons. What are they then if they aren’t the knot? I’m so confused.

Killer whales (orcas) are a type of dolphin. All dolphins are whales, not all whales are dolphins.
There are whales with teeth that 'dolphins' fall in to and whales with the filter mouths. Filter mouths are just whales, not dolphins.

I thought a kipper was the name of a fish in its own right until my 8 year old nephew informed me it is the word for a split-down-the-middle fat smoked herring. I imagined that there were shoals of kippers swimming about.

i think i'm revealing too much of my ignorance.

i thought halifax was the full, proper name for hell, because i'd never heard of it until a forbidding, severe, and untrained junior school teacher used to shout at us:
you can go to halifax, i don't care !

@DobbyTheHouseElk

Then again, it took me a good long while to discover that summer of 69 wasn't about the year...

Ok....I did not know that.

So belly buttons. What are they then if they aren’t the knot? I’m so confused.

What knot?

When I was 15 a boy at school was showing off that he had done something wrong at the weeks and the police had been called. He was making out he was really cool and had done all these bad things and I laughed at him in front of everyone said he was showing off and a liar and I knew this because how could the police have been called on a SUNDAY when they wouldn’t have been working . I honestly believed they had the day off imagine if they did I think all crimes would be committed on one day a week 🤣🤣

Changing a tyre and changing a wheel are very different procedures.
Unless your small child has an IMI Level 2 in Light Vehicle Maintenance and Repair I doubt she's been anywhere near a tyre machine, and much less a wheel balancer.

@grey12

I had the idea that Winston Churchill was american

(Disclaimers: not born in the uk and hate history!!!)

I don't know, I just thought he had more flair than the english people I knew, with the cigar and all. Maybe kind of Capone style

well, you are half right. his mother was american. she was quite racy apparently. and he was born premature, but quite large... about 7 months after his parents were married.

Did you know limes are meant to be yellow when ripe and not green?

That turning your car engine on and off again straight away can flood the engine. (Mine is an old car so perhaps doesn’t happen on new cars).

[quote plixy]@TheChippendenSpook my husband is colour blind and didn't know the Statue of Liberty was green until we went there and read a sign explaining it had been copper and turned green over time. The look of shock on his face was amazing. [/quote]
I can imagine his expression! If it blew my mind then I can only imagine how he felt on learning it.

So if "Holland" is a part of The Netherlands, what's the other part called?

@Feminist10101

Really? Your 10 year old can change a tyre?

With someone finishing the tightening, yes.

I changed the oil in my dad’s car aged 6.

These are excellent life skills to have and the sooner the better.

(I refurbished a house - including plastering and replacing electrics at 18. I’ve fitted and tiled all 4 bathrooms in this house including the slate floors, fitted the wooden flooring throughout the downstairs myself. I learned from my dad and DD is learning from me. I don’t understand why anyone wouldn’t give their kids these skills. See also cooking, cleaning....)

But what if your dad was a newsagent?

@Tigresswoods

So if "Holland" is a part of The Netherlands, what's the other part called?

That's like saying 'If London is a part of England, what's the other part called?'

Holland is 2 districts within The Netherlands. The other bits are other districts, not one homogenous area.

It’s NIGHTS in white satin?????

@Hurryupbaby11

My film knowledge isn't great so I was well into adulthood before I realised Harrison Ford was one man and not a famous duo called Harris and Ford (presumed it was just like Ant and Dec or Simon and Garfunkel.)

Years ago I remember Noel Edmonds (I think) telling a story about his dad. He'd said "Have you heard this record?" and his dad said "Yes, but I feel sorry for the middle one, the others have got nice names. Noel didn't know what he was talking about, then his dad said "Well I wondered why they called him Newt" Olivia Newton John!

Technically I KNOW how to do car stuff, but that doesn't mean I CAN actually do it.

Or want to do it.....fuck that, my hands would get dirty!!

But on the theme of cars, in a lot of them if you leave your finger on the 'open' button it will eventually open your windows and vice versa.
Great for letting fresh air in on hot days before you actually get in it!!

@DobbyTheHouseElk

Then again, it took me a good long while to discover that summer of 69 wasn't about the year...

Ok....I did not know that.

So belly buttons. What are they then if they aren’t the knot? I’m so confused.

Your belly button is the stump from your umbilical cord, which connected you to the placenta in the womb. After you’re born, the midwife/ doctor clamps and cuts the cord

@drtyminded A boy in my class, 15 at least, didn’t know prunes were dried plums!
I too thought it was Knights in White Satin.
My dd aged 5 sang - Away in a manger, no crisp for a bed.
Until I watched a 101 Dalmatians with dd I didn’t know they were born plain white and their spots come a couple of weeks later.