Randomly odd things you believed as a child and possibly beyond...

[Elmo230885]

I live this type of thread...

(I'm not talking about believing in Santa or the tooth fairy)

I'll start. I had a cousin named Stephen and he had the middle name Dean. For some reason he used to switch and go by either name. So as a child I believed that Dean was short for Stephen in the same way Bill is used for William.

I thought i could make the wind blow at will by whistling that old sailors tune.

@Latenightreader

I believed that the belly button got its shape when the doctor or midwife tied a knot in it. I thought that the type of knot resulted in the shape, and outies were because they’d messed up the knot. I confessed this to my mum recently and she fell around laughing and asked when I’d realised. I had to confess it was when they didn’t knot my daughter’s cord (I was 40 when she was born).

I also believed that when you had a cold you had to wash your hands before you touched your nether regions or your fanjo would catch a cold. I didn’t think much about it, but always washed my hands before going to the loo if I had a cold. About five years ago I had the revelation that I must have mixed up cold and cold sore...

@Latenightreader I always thought the same....when ds (now 14) was born I remember shouting to the delivery room (I had been prepped for a possible c-section) "Tie the cord properly, I want him to have an inny!" I blame the drugs

When I was little the aa adverts used to call themselves the 4th emergency service. Cue the whole family in fits of laughter when the car breaks down and I suggest calling 999 for the car ambulance when I was well into my teenage years

That there was a bank inside St. Paul's cathedral (confused after the film Mary Poppins).

73kittycat73
That if you ate an apple pip, a tree would grow in your stomach.

I read of a woman who wore dentures and wasn't the greatest at dental hygiene. She started to get a pain in her mouth, went to the doctor and they found a tomato seed had started to sprout into the roof of her mouth behind her dental plate!

LunaNorth OMG your poor Mum, I'm glad your Dad explained before she gave birth.

That some houses smelt of apples.

I eventually worked out that they were up for sale and that "apply within" on the sign outside didn't mean what I thought it meant. 🍏🍏

I thought pregnancy was a contagious disease you could catch. I was fearful of pregnant women (and fat women in case they were pregnant) refused to sit next to them on trains, talk to pregnant relatives... to my parents befuddlement. I'd also hold my breath if passing one or in close proximity too. I avoided babies too by association.

Obviously I hit puberty and had biology classes. but it was so ingrained in me I still avoided them.

Sorry, but the swan breaking your arm is complete and utter twaddle. Swan wings are far to delicate compared to human arm bones.

73kittycat73
That if you ate an apple pip, a tree would grow in your stomach.
..
I was told that one too.

My aunt and uncle had a dog and kept a sack of dog biscuits in a cupboard. I asked if I could eat them and uncle said they would make me bark. Well of course I had to try and they didn't. I still believed it though, just thought I hadn't eaten enough.

Have remembered another one - that somewhere deep inside your body you had white blood. My mum's friend had some problem with her white blood cells, and I overheard then talking about it!

Slippers - to my little mind, they were inherently evil! My reasons for thinking so were as follows:

• They often had faces.
• In cartoons of children being told they had to go to bed, the child would often be wearing slippers.
• I remember a nanny trying to force some on to my feet, which were a bit too small.
• They came off easily, so had minds of their own: the adults would call them "naughty slippers".
• One pair I was given had padlock symbols on (I kid you not!).

And the clincher was when I learned that in days gone by, they could be used to smack children's bottoms. This never happened to me though.

[quote wanderings]@RedLama It looks like Enid Blyton was also confused about points of the compass. "The kitchen faces due north, so east will be over there." She pointed to the right. The three went out of the kitchen, and turned to the right.

But when going out of the kitchen, they would then be facing south, not north! This drove me mad every time I read it. No wonder they didn't find the Secret Way that day. (Five Go Adventuring Again)[/quote]
hey?
If I am standing in the kitchen looking out of the window, and it is facing due North, then North is in front of me, then East is to the right.

Why would you be facing South if you went out of the door?

My grandad told me that the children mannequins in Marks and Spencers were naughty children who got turned into mannequins or something similar to that.

@mangomama91

My grandad told me that the children mannequins in Marks and Spencers were naughty children who got turned into mannequins or something similar to that.

that's terrifying!

Steppemum- it is isnt it! I guess me and my brother must have been playing up in the shop or something for him to say that

@steppemum Because when they went out of the kitchen door, they did so into the rest of the house, not outside. When they say the kitchen faces north, that must mean the outer wall with the window faces north, with east on your right. When they went out of the kitchen, they went out into the rest of the house. Assuming the door to the kitchen is not in the same wall as the window (most unlikely), they would not have faced east by turning right out of the kitchen!

@mangomama91 That sounds like quite an imaginative threat from your grandad. Did your grandad make you watch Carry on Screaming, where ladies were vitrified and turned into shop mannequins?

@Lelophants - I still thought the little piggy was going to do his shopping at the market I’m 45.

I thought when my parents said they were going to decorate my bedroom they meant balloons and streamers, not boring wallpaper.
I thought there were two types of sky - blue when sunny and white when colder. I didn't realise a solid white sky was just clouds.

[quote wanderings]@steppemum Because when they went out of the kitchen door, they did so into the rest of the house, not outside. When they say the kitchen faces north, that must mean the outer wall with the window faces north, with east on your right. When they went out of the kitchen, they went out into the rest of the house. Assuming the door to the kitchen is not in the same wall as the window (most unlikely), they would not have faced east by turning right out of the kitchen!

@mangomama91 That sounds like quite an imaginative threat from your grandad. Did your grandad make you watch Carry on Screaming, where ladies were vitrified and turned into shop mannequins?[/quote]
well, I would read it differently.
the wall of the kitchen and the door face north.
The kitchen door is an outside door? In that wall?

Obviousy i haven't read the book

I literally used to think sex was 2 people jumping on top of each other (like how they show on tv🤦🏽‍♀️) until sex education day at school 😭

Until his 30s (when DD was small) my DH believe that if you went to feed the ducks in the park the aim was to throw bread/grain as far away from yourself as possible. Ideally you should stand quite a way from the edge of the pond and fling the duck food over the pond so that the ducks can chase it. The ducks don't like to eat food dropped on the floor or is shallow water so all the people feeding ducks by the edge of the water are doing it wrong and the ducks spit out anything they feed them.

It actually took a while for him to believe me that this was more to do with his DM's fear of birds than the feeding preferences of the ducks!

@NoImNotEntertained
'Apply within'

A few years back when 'vegan leather' became a thing, I amused myself by telling our teens that vegan leather was made from the hides of cows that didn't eat meat. They totally bought it.

@steppemum Perhaps I should have included in my description that after going out of the kitchen, "they found three rooms there", so they were still very much inside the house, and hunting for something in the house, and they did not go through a door leading to outside.

On hearing a newsreader say “a man is helping police with enquiries” with regard to a crime I thought someone had popped into their local police station when they had a bit of free time and offered their help.
I also thought cats were female and dogs male.