What commonly known thing did you learn at an embarrassingly older age?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well into my 30's, I thought vanilla/strawberry/chocolate ice cream was "napoleon flavored" until realizing it was actually Neapolitan. Oops

Me too! I also thought there were two versions- chocolate/strawberry/vanilla, and chocolate/cherry/pistachio. Only later did I realize they had different names.

Remind me of the other name. It began with a P.

[Anonymous]

I was in my 20s when I learned it wasn’t “scolding” hot water.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well into my 30's, I thought vanilla/strawberry/chocolate ice cream was "napoleon flavored" until realizing it was actually Neapolitan. Oops

Me too! I also thought there were two versions- chocolate/strawberry/vanilla, and chocolate/cherry/pistachio. Only later did I realize they had different names.

Remind me of the other name. It began with a P.

Spumoni? It’s the only kind of ice cream I ever turned down as a kid

[Anonymous]

I thought the expression “your name is mud” referred to your name being in the dirt. Two years ago I learned it was “your name is Mudd” referring to the doctor, Dr Mudd, who took care of President Lincoln’s murderer John Wilkes Booth and the doctor’s name and reputation we’re ruined.

I also just learned that east/west interstates are even numbers while north/south are odd numbers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well into my 30's, I thought vanilla/strawberry/chocolate ice cream was "napoleon flavored" until realizing it was actually Neapolitan. Oops

Me too! I also thought there were two versions- chocolate/strawberry/vanilla, and chocolate/cherry/pistachio. Only later did I realize they had different names.

Remind me of the other name. It began with a P.

Spumoni? It’s the only kind of ice cream I ever turned down as a kid

Yes! Spumoni. I love that stuff.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:1. That Alaska is attached to Canada. It was always off floating with Hawaii when we learned it in school. I always thought it was an island off the coast of Canada until I was in my 20s.

2. That the saying is "for all intents and purposes" instead of "for all intensive purposes"

Yes, I always thought Alaska was an island too.

And I thought that Los Angeles and Ellay were two different cities in California.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I used to love the movie Dirty Dancing when I was a kid. I had NO IDEA that Penny’s character was getting some back room abortion. The whole time they kept saying, “Penny is in trouble.” I had no idea what that meant.

It was only when I was watching the movie in grad school when it finally clicked and I was like, “holy hell!”

Wow! Were you very sheltered in a conservative area as a kid? I saw Dirty Dancing when I was 11 and completely understood "knocked up" and "a folding table and a dirty knife" - the whole thing.

[Anonymous]

As a preteen I had all the usual crushes with the posters on my bedroom walls. My father would shake his head disapprovingly and insist they were all drug addicts ordering me to take them down. Crying I would defend my crushes and screaming he had no idea and was wrong.

Well, years ( and years) later every damn one of them had drug issues, rehab, you name it. Guess he was right all along.

[Anonymous]

That jojoba is pronounced (ho-ho-ba)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The saying that "It's always in the last place you look" is literal. It's the last place because you found it! Don't know why that never clicked for me.

You’ve legit blown my mind.

+ 1. WTAF

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

This isn’t mine, but my mother’s. She is very proper. To give an example, she addresses birthday cards to male children as “Master John Doe.” That level of proper. She has never, nor would she ever, utter something as crass as the F word. That’s what makes this hysterical. At some point in her life, she heard the phrase “shot his wad,” and had no idea what that referred to. She interpreted it as “he gave his all,” so she would occasionally describe someone who had put in grueling hours at work and she would say, “He has really just shot his wad.” The first time I heard her say this, I was too shocked and horrified to respond. The second time, a year or so later, I could barely keep myself from laughing out loud, and decided it was my dad’s duty to speak up, so I didn’t say anything. The third time, a couple years later, Mom even referred to a woman “shooting her wad.” At that point, it occurred to me that Dad wasn’t correcting her (surely he knows what it means, right?!), and that she was probably uttering this phrase to people outside of our family, since she was so clearly unfamiliar with its meaning. I steeled my nerves, sat her down and explained it to her. It was so awkward for me that I don’t even remember how she reacted.

You need to look up the origin of this saying. It's NOT sexual.


NP: It's not?? I'm afraid to google for further confirmation at work...

Go ahead and Google. It goes back to the days of muzzle loaded guns.

Yeah, sorry OP but your mom probably laughed so hard after you had your "talk" with her, thinking what a dumbass she raised!

https://people.com/politics/orrin-hatch-shot-their-wad-definition-twitter/

Your article says that the phrase is more commonly understood as a sexual reference. Orrin Hatch admitted as much. The innocent origin doesn’t matter if everyone is snickering about sexual innuendo when you use it. The whole point of the article you posted is that Orrin Hatch created a stir by using the phrase because people don’t think of spent musket fire when they hear the phrase. How are you not comprehending this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That Jews are not considered white. I was born in the hood and actually never knew anyone Jewish or at least no one that said “I’m Jewish” until I was about 38 years old. I wasn’t educated on the anything about Jewish culture or even the Holocaust. I never understood why Jews would say they were discriminated against, because to me they looked white. I was really ignorant to all things Jewish until my then 7 year old DD starting learning about it the Holocaust in school. I felt pretty stupid. But it was never anything I was taught about.

Did you learn about World War II? Or no history at all?

[Anonymous]

In my late 20s at a semi-fancy restaurant I ordered sweetbreads thinking it was sweet bread. I had no idea it was pancreas. I don’t eat meat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The meaning of the lyrics of most of my favorite songs from the 70s...and 80's for that matter!

The correct LYRICS to some popular songs.

Embarrassing.

I remember playing the same songs over and over, pen in hand, trying to figure out the lyrics so I could write them down. Kids nowadays will never know the joy of FINALLY figuring out what they were singing after listening for the 200th time in a row.

+1. Though, sometimes I still sing my incorrect version. Consider it the remix.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I used to love the movie Dirty Dancing when I was a kid. I had NO IDEA that Penny’s character was getting some back room abortion. The whole time they kept saying, “Penny is in trouble.” I had no idea what that meant.

It was only when I was watching the movie in grad school when it finally clicked and I was like, “holy hell!”

Wow! Were you very sheltered in a conservative area as a kid? I saw Dirty Dancing when I was 11 and completely understood "knocked up" and "a folding table and a dirty knife" - the whole thing.

Good for you? I don’t think most 11 year olds would.