Ridiculous things you've only recently realised you've been wrong about your entire life

[Seasidedolly]

I genuinely thought if you pulled the reverse cord on ceiling fans, it would circulate warm air.

My friend thought the yellow average speed cameras on motorways were there to look for missing children.

I had another recent revelation but I can't remember it now

No, so it was immaculate conception of Mary (to Saints Anne and Joachim, who shagged) - ie she was born and lived free from sin. Hence immaculate.

Then she had a virgin birth.

How did you make it though irish Catholic school without praying to Saint Anne?

I only found out a couple of years ago that water polo is not played on horses. I envisaged it as like normal polo but galloping about through big puddles.

I thought pineapples grew on trees. I imagined some kind of palm and they were cut down. I was watching a farmville type game on facebook and said "it's pretty accurate except for the pineapples in the ground". 36 years of age....

my DH will never let me forget it - I am so often right that he is like an elephant when I do something embarrassing.

My head has exploded. If Mary had a virgin birth then Jesus must have been an Immaculate Conception too, or else how was she a virgin?

I thought the lunar cycle was exactly 28 days long every time, and got very confused when I realised the full moon wasn't on the same day of the week as the previous one.

I feel quite proud that I knew all the things in this thread, but then I did have quite the obsession with trivia in my teens. I have no idea how the moon thing passed me by.

My MIL thought until about 6 months ago that wasps made honey and were actually bees. The also thought that bumble bees were wasps.

I thought that Brussels was a country until I was in my late teens..

Emmm, seeing as Brussels is not, in fact, a country, what country is it in?!!

Ha GloriaHotcakes. Glad i'm not the only one!

Brussels is in Belgium

Oh no, a lunar month isn't 28 days? What sort of month is four weeks then?

DorothyBastard...I just choked!!!

I was only fourteen once gave a make up tutorial to a friend and told her she had to be SUBTELL with her blusher. She fell about and has never let me live it down. I had no idea that subtle wasn't pronounced like that wasted private education.

Some years back, my parents were selling their house and my brother was the agent. A well known snooker player called Dene O'Kane was having a viewing. My brother was horrified when my mother opened the door and said "it's lovely to meet you Deano"....she was astonished he was actually just "Dene".....

Our next door neighbour was once a famous political figure. I confused his name with Charles De Gaulle and during a history lesson put my hand up and said "he lives next door to me". Teacher fell about. That day, I had to accept that Charles De Gaulle didn't live in North London as I had thought and was indeed dead

I was shocked to discover that pine cones didn't contain tiny monkeys. My mother let me believe that for a very long time.....

demented specifically I think she was meant to be free from original sin, which only relates to humans/mortals, doesn't it? So Jesus wasn't one, and there didn't need to be an intervention to make him stainless*. Caveat- Catholic school and family but firmly atheist.

*Latin for stain is macula, so immaculate means stainless, kinda.

Catholics believe that Mary was conceived the normal way, but God acted at her conception to free her from sin. That was the 'Immaculate Conception'. It's nothing to do with being conceived to a virgin.

And a mole is about the size of a large mouse, isn't it?

This one isn't my whole life as I realised about 3 years ago (I'm 32). It's a bit rude. I didn't know what gay men did in bed. I genuinely thought they just went to bed and rubbed their willies together I couldn't understand what was so exciting about that.

Thanks zebra. Just googled it. Read it out to dh and he was as flabbergasted as I am.

I havent got one, but the amount of people on tenderhooks, not tenterhooks i hear is quite common.

Linked to the posts about water polo, when DS1 told me he was doing an indoor rowing competition I asked him in all innocence how many lengths of the pool they needed to do . It took him a while to stop laughing enough to explain that they use rowing machines .

My sis genuinely thought the Shard building was called the Shaft.

I still struggle with the word placate. How to pronounce it? Plasate? Plackate?

I must be the only person who thought that your instep was under your foot, I still sort of think it is even though I know it can't be, because that's your arch.

pants plak-ate

You know what, ignore that! I don't say it like that myself!

I was surprised to find out a few years ago that Irn Bru wasn't made in Scotland from girders. I thought girders was the manufacturer.

I've never given water polo much thought really, but I vaguely assumed that it was in a swimming pool on horseback. Horses do swim.

I had a revelation about why IrnBru is orange! We were visiting an old coal mine, and the guide showed us a puddle of standing water that was stained bright orange with rust from iron ore. I looked at the DC and went . They went whatevs mother.