Things you were shockingly old when you learned

That's it.

xpost Tell that to Lai Mpun, the lead singer of Bangkok's Phleng Chat.

I am 33 and didn't know any of these things. Wait - how the hell DOES a candle work?!

Same with Sandy Shaw.

i don't know how to explain it but i used to think chickens had a really weird way of "mating", something to do with the rooster's legs. (!!?!?) :)

I thought penguins were as tall as humans until that march of the penguins movie

"that SHIFT + 6 = ^. I think I figured it out a month or so ago. I always wondered how people got that character."

^^^Dude, you beat me by a month. Thanks!

I once spent a half hour trying to eject a cd from a Mac before someone finally told me there's an eject button on the keyboard. I was going through all these crazy menus and preferences...

I think I was like 16 or 17 when I learned that cows and bulls were the male and female versions of the same animal and not two distinct animals.

What sort of seemingly basic facts did it take you a surprisingly long time for you to learn?

― filthy dylan, Wednesday, November 12, 2008 5:30 AM (6 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I thought penguins were as tall as humans until that march of the penguins movie

loooool one of my friends thought this and it was since passed into running joke territory.

I think I've done that Mac eject button thing too :(

Pronounced lapels like 'labels' for years until corrected but happily don't dress well enough to use it often

My girlfriend was shocked to learn, at the age of 33, that a 'Flea Circus' is actually a rather charming mechanical toy, and is in no way operated by any parasitic insects.

Ismael, at the age of 32, is shocked to learn the same thing. This thread is getting embarrassing

WAT! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flea_circus

I thought penguins were as tall as humans until that march of the penguins movie

one of my friends thought this and it was since passed into running joke territory

no but seriously, what is this about?

i mean i can see that there's rarely anything to size them against in the big white antarctic, but why would anyone then automatically think okay here's a bird i could play tag with

u could still play tag w/it tho

But you could make the same assumption with ostriches in the big yellow desert (or wherever they live), and in that case you'd be right!

I'm still in touch with several grown adults who genuinely believe there's 'something' to supernatural claims about ouija boards, despite its fairly obvious origins in parlour games / illusions which utilised the (admittedly fucking spooky) ideomotor effect.

aw no-one said 'where babies come from'

I've had a lot of experiences in my adult life with mispronouncing words I understood as part of written text, but hadn't heard aurally in the context of conversation etc. For example, I was well into my twenties before I knew the word "vehement" wasn't pronounced veh-hee-ment. I wish others would politely correct you when you do that instead of letting you blindly sound like an idiot.

I'm a bit like that, but now I'm in the habit of saying works incorrectly, I can't get out of it. Canal is not pronounced can-el, but there's fuck all I can do about it now.

^ This happens to me all the time too - so much so that I actually now find it quite amusing when I realise, midway through a sentence, that a word I've never heard before is looming at the end. I suppose that people who talk a lot, rather than reading, must find the same with spelling. It only annoys me when some moron uses it as an opportunity to score cheap points (sadly fairly often)

I was going to start a thread like this, but it was going to be more about 'life lessons' that took you forever to learn, rather than trivia.

Anyway it's taken me this long to fully realize how unreliable first impressions can be when it comes to people.

but why would anyone then automatically think okay here's a bird i could play tag with

haha

TAL have an episode on this in the "best of" section on their wesite. people who thought unicorns were real, etc., lots of awkward silences at cocktail parties: good stuff.

i like to tag birds. (runs)

There's a penguin here and he wants to say "you didn't touch me ner ner ner"

I thought penguins went "weh weh weh"

I'm still in touch with several grown adults who genuinely believe there's 'something' to supernatural claims about ouija boards, despite its fairly obvious origins in parlour games / illusions which utilised the (admittedly fucking spooky) ideomotor effect.

― Huey in Bristol (Huey in Melbourne), Wednesday, November 12, 2008 7:08 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

you couldnt get me in the same room as a ouija board

I was about 35 when I figured out Open Sesame = Open Says Me.

i used to think HAZCHEM was a foreign word for danger like Achtung

I just figured out, like 2 days ago, that the lyrics are "highway to the danger zone"

(until then, thought they were "I went to to the danger zone")

ooh i like that

lol mandee those are even better

Nothing, as I'm not shockingly old.

Misheard lyrics are always better. The singer of my old band had this (intentionally) corny line that went "sleep all day til the telephone ring / head to the bar and shake that thing", the latter half of which I always thought was "head to the barber and shave that thing".

My friend always thought that Op Ivy song Take Warning went "skate boarding", which is way better.

Same with Sandy Shaw.

Ok I sounded this out several times in several different ways and I still don't get how this is a pun. Help?

I think that 'Shaw' is meant to sound like 'shore' - I don't hear it either

Sandy Shore.

Shaw is pronounced exactly the same as Shore, in England.

hows it pron in USA?

Well I guess it must be different, if people are having problems hearing it? Dunno.

I didn't even know it was her real name, tho.

wasn't, rather

I knew someone who, if my friend is to believed, is said to have uttered at age 18 "wait, you can't get pregnant if your clothes are on, right" while making out.

'Shore' rhymes with 'oar'. 'Shaw' is the same as the first three letters in 'shopping' xp

i'm loving this thread. so many discoveries!

WAT! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flea_circus

― Øystein, Wednesday, November 12, 2008 1:59 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

http://www.noonco.com/flea/movie.htm

My flabber hasn't been gasted quite like this in a long time :-/

xp I only got that Sandie Shaw pun because I once attended a seminar about legal practice given by an English professor who made a big thing out of the difference between 'law' and 'lore'. I didn't have a clue what he was talking about

Wait - how the hell DOES a candle work?!

I know, right?!!??!

i too only figured out lipps, inc. lately. also, fear's lee ving. it never occurred to me until i was driving in the car one day and bam.

He did! Also "The Cover of the Rolling Stone" and "Sylvia's Mother" for Dr. Hook.

and "Someone Ate the Baby"

Shel Silverstein was knee-deep in nashville. Wrote songs and hung around with the "outlaws".

Waylon mentions him at the end of this incredible clip of Waylon Jennings singing Waymore Blues in front of his wife Jessi Colter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugm0JZhX3CI

his albums are pretty wild (also an acquired taste)

Freakin' at the Freakers Ball is not exactly material you would expect from a children's author for ex.

he had quite the, uh, reputation on marthas vineyard.

I'll just be honest with everyone and say I wasn't aware until I was older that Shel Silverstein wasn't Black.

he was kinda the gene simmons of children's book authors/songwriters.

Oscar Isaac could probably play him if he shaves his head or wears a skull cap

Guys, this is all brand new info for me.

A friend not on here has informed me that his music has adult themes . . . I dont know how to feel about all this.

He died in Key West which is one of my first homes. Man, I'm learning a lot tonight.

Freakin' at the Freakers Ball

So curious and scared at the same time.

I'll kiss yours if you kiss mine
I'm a-gonna boogie till I go blind

Need to know what he was up to on MV and also why PP assumed he was black.

https://i.imgur.com/C7B8khC.png

"Need to know what he was up to on MV"

just infamous for skeevin' on the young women at the bars. nothing illegal as far as i know? but apparently he didn't age very gracefully. he practically lived at the playboy mansion in the 60s and he took that attitude with him in life.

still, he was no roald dahl as far as infamous vineyard-related kid's book authors go though. (roald didn't live there but his daughter tessa does and virginia neal did.)

Oscar Isaac could probably play him if he shaves his head or wears a skull cap

― Kurt Dandruff (Neanderthal), Wednesday, October 30, 2024 2:02 PM (fifty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I've been saying this

Cast Oscar Isaac as Shel Silverstein pic.twitter.com/RZZ1ISc46A

— John M. Cunningham (@jmcunning) October 8, 2020

Bobby Bare and Shel were great together. There’s a mammoth Bear Family box of their collaborations that I covet.

Lol Jaymc I was about to be like really? You were? And then I scrolled down. Neither of you are wrong though - he absolutely could.

I'm new to diving deep into country related things, so consider my awareness of the massive awesomeness of Bear Family Records something I was shockingly old to have learned.

Not just country, either. I have a fantastic Bear Family box of Louis Prima stuff.

Bear Family was for the real freaks. Made Rhino seem like a label for casual music fans. All those 10+ disc boxes.

Bought and loved those huge Bristol, Knoxville, Bristol, and Johnson City sessions

Boxes

big admirer here, I have Vinyl-On-Demand label boxes that are similar in intent although very different musically. no BF boxes tho.

pssst I hear that guy Ned has a bunch

I just wish Bear Family had followed up the Lesley Gore box with other girl group boxes.

Bear Family had an 8-LP box of JUST German-language Connie Francis songs.

i lucked into a ton of CDrs of bear family stuff and have been playing them at the store. lots of other great small label country comps too. 21 Country Boppers! Hillbillies and Hicks Vol. 10! stuff like that. tons of fun. they sound great. tons of great r&b and doo wop comps too. and rockabilly. i love no-name rockabilly. its all fun.

Captain Webb. Captain Webb. (oo-ee-yoo)

Super Space Detective!

Captain Webb. Captain Webb. (oo-ee-yoo)

Super Space Detective!

Sorry, I couldn't help myself. I don't remember if there are any other lyrics. "The child audience were dressed in futuristic clothes and had gelled hair." Oh, hang on, it was released as a single:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFkaigGXtis

Performed by The Spacewalkers. That's something I was shockingly old before I learned. It actually sounds like The Buzzcocks or Pete Shelley solo but with the vocals recorded in an office. It has a good beat!

Classic crap 80s kids TV