The weirdest or dumbest thing you believed when you were a kid is... n/t

[cynatnite]

[anarch]

1. that we lived in a democracy

[EstimatedProphet]

2. If you "broke your balls" it would kill you

[Not_Giving_Up]

3. Well, my mom told me

a whopper about how the TV worked. Now, this was in the mid-seventies, and the TV was one of those huge cabinet jobs. Everywhere that we lived, the TV was always in front of a window.

I asked my mom how the people got in the TV, and she told me that they came and went through the back of the TV, in and out of the window. When one show was ending, I'd run to the back to try to see the people coming and going, always thinking that I'd just missed them. What killed it was when we were watching Spider-Man (not a cartoon, a weekly primetime show), and Spidey was falling between two skyscrapers, and they froze it mid-fall and put that dreaded "To be continued" message on the screen. I was very upset, because Spidey wouldn't be able to be in the air like that for a week, and how was he going to get out of the TV if he was stuck in mid-air???????

[u4ic]

4. That everyone 'way back then' only saw in b & w

:silly:

[Not_Giving_Up]

7. LOL....I thought that one too!

I'd forgotten about that though!

[uppityperson]

5. I could grow up to be president. And my father got a tonsillectomy

at the same time I did so I didn't cry either. Perhaps swallowing gum would give me worms.

[mykpart]

6. that clown didn't wear make-up;

they were just born that way. I was so disappointed when I found out the truth.

[LeftyMom]

8. The physical difference between boys and girls was hair length

When I was four I thought all the hair metal bands that were popular at the time were all-female. My dad laughed his ass off when I told him that and explained that they were mostly men with big poofy hair and tight pants that sometimes made them look a bit like women.

[Nikia]

17. My sister and I believed that boys had tails

We thought that the particuliar part of a male's anatomy was the same as a dog or squirrel tail.

[blitzen]

9. that the "future" was gonna be really good and cool n/t

[amitten]

10. That Washington state and Washington D.C. were the same.

:blush:

[swag]

11. In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. and

Jesus died for my sins and will one day rise again and blah blah blah blah.

[Arugula Latte]

60. Oh yes, that old chestnut.

So many fall for it, it's amazing, isn't it?

[barb162]

12. that there was a Santa

[DanCa]

13. Presidents dont lie. Honestly I thought that.

And that a two party system works.

[BelleCarolinaPeridot]

14. That I lived on an island .

And the rest of the world was in B&W - weird . And also , that we lived forever , we just existed . Figured that one out the hard way when I was 5 .

[Nikia]

15. Everyone had a different name

When I was little, during the early 80's, I spent a lot of time at my grandparents house. A few doors down, lived Barbra Bush. My grandparents were on friendly terms with her, which confused me because they really hated her husband, the vice president. My grandparents had to explain to me that this neighbor wasn't married to the vice president after I mentioned something to the effect.
Around the same time, I told my great grandmother's sister on my fathers side that my other grandmother, on my mother's side, didn't like her. She was confused because she didn't really know my grandmother. It turned out that my grandmother didn't like her husband's sister. I called them both Great Aunt Evelyn though and thought that they were the same person. I didn't see either of them very frequently and held another strange belief that people could change their appearances drastically from time to time.

[DanCa]

16. That the world was really black and white when I watched old time tv

like my three sons, i love lucy, and leave it to beaver.

[NoSheep]

18. That death was for people who just give up. I was sure I could beat it.

:shrug:

[zanne]

57. LOL!

That's adorable. I've been laughing my ass off reading these posts.

[NoSheep]

19. 2nd weirdest: Cartoon creatures were real and the people on the TV were

fake. I used to try to figure out where Bugs Bunny might live so I could go see him!

[Nutmegger]

20. That if I stepped on a crack, I would break my mother's back.

[NoSheep]

21. Where'd ya get that head-slappin-smiley?

[Nutmegger]

49. Here's the website....

http://www.coolsmilies.net

[Gormy Cuss]

52. Did you ever stomp on a sidewalk crack because you were mad at her?

I did. :hi:

[DanCa]

22. That I could get sucked down the bath tub drain and drown.

[LibDemAlways]

87. One time my then ten year old brother played

a joke on our four year old sibling. As he was draining the tub after a bath, he called out to our younger brother, "Help, help, I'm going down the drain," then hid behind the open bathroom door. The little guy came running in, saw the water rapidly going down the drain with no sign of big brother. He burst into tears and started yelling for our mom who came running. It took a long time to calm him down, even after our practical joker sibling fessed up.

[fizzgig]

23. that if you bought swiss chesse you would win

i had no idea what you would win, or why it was only if you bought swiss

but damn was i conviced we'd win something if we bought swiss cheese

no, i did not eat paint chips

[cynatnite]

24. That the opening sequence to Thundarr the Barbarian could really happen

Seriously, a comet flies between the moon and the earth, then the moon breaks in half, the earth gets its ass kicked. Thought it could happen and it scared the hell out of me.

[gardenista]

25. That if I swallowed the Communion wafer I would get pregnant.

I had wafer-tongue for a few months even after I learned the truth, just in case...

[Elidor]

26. On cigarette machines, it said No Minors Allowed

I always felt sad for those poor miners: they worked all day underground, and no one would let them buy cigarettes. I wondered why it was that people hated miners so much.

[zanne]

58. That's a good one! nt

[Arugula Latte]

62. That reminds me ...

One day my mom told me we were going to go see a mime show (this was the 70s, mind you). I'd never heard of a mime, and I thought she said a mine show, and I couldn't understand why they wouldn't allow the miners to talk.

[Elidor]

68. Poor miners. No smoking. Not allowed to talk.

I've always felt sorry for them.

[HEyHEY]

27. If I rigged my kite properly, I could fly

[SmokingJacket]

66. Hey, I thought that too.

I thought it would take me straight to Disney Land.

[Kellanved]

89. I've seen that plan working

The person ended up in the north sea, about ten meters from the beach. And it was not exactly summer that time.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

91. If I jumped, and then "re-jumped" in midair, I could fly.

I also seriously considered using a bedsheet as a parachute.

I suspect a fairly big thread could be made with just ideas for flying.

[Sequoia]

97. That if I could suspend myself over the Earth

the Earth would move under me and then I could set myself down in another country when it passed under me. Also that were the dark and light crack on the globe was really night on one side, and daylight on the other...no dawn or twilight.

[Z_I_Peevey]

28. That if I made good grades, practiced good grooming,

was polite, went to church on Sundays and was a generally good girl, someday I'd grow up to be just like Donna Reed and vaccuum my pretty little house while wearing high heels and pearls. And nothing bad would ever, ever happen to me.

[kwassa]

99. I was fed a version of this dangerous and outrageous lie, too.

[Burma Jones]

29. Babies were conceived through oral sex

[tenshi816]

61. I thought it was through french kissing. n/t

[TallahasseeGrannie]

30. That condoms were supposed to help you get pregnant

and then later my mother told me if a man got an erection and didn't ejaculate, he could get very sick. The message was, of course, don't let them get erections or they'll make a mess.

But I laugh when I think of the line my father fed her for all those years.

[RebelOne]

31. Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy and god

[fight4my3sons]

32. my mother told me that chocolate sprinkles were ants.

I wouldn't eat them for a long time. I would only eat the rainbow kind. She still thinks that is a funny story.

[bikebloke]

33. Wind was caused by trees waving.

[brook]

34. That cumulus clouds...

were souls on their way to heaven. The day they buried my Grandpa, they made me go to school. Spent the day looking out the windows, hoping to see his so I could say "Goodbye".

[bertha katzenengel]

45. Oh, my.

:cry:

[brook]

59. I hadn't thought

of that in years...

Your response touched me. Thank you.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

35. There were little people living in between the floorboards

At the top of the basement steps, there were a couple of cracks in the floorboard that were illuminated by the basement light when you looked into them. To my 4 year old eyes, they looked like corridors of a building; and I was certain that someone had to live there.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

36. LOL ..did you read The Borrowers too?

[GoddessOfGuinness]

40. I didn't...

It must just be a common childhood fantasy... :beer:

[weeble_wobble]

37. That I would

go down the drain in the bathtub if i was in the tub while the water was draining.

also, i thought that salt helped cool food down.

[Atmashine]

38. That babies came from...

well...the moms threw them up. From their mouths. Well, where else do things go out????

[lakemonster11]

85. Hey, if it's good enough for the Greek gods...

[TheProphetess]

39. My mom enjoys telling the story of how she duped my sister and me

She told us that tub butter was butter you had to eat by the bathtub. So, the next day she finds us in the bathroom eating our toast with the butter from the tub on it. Of course, at first she wanted to know what the heck we were doing in there but then when we told her "you said we had to eat it by the tub" she said "carry on" and tried not to laugh her ass off.

This is what I grew up with.

[Cathyclysmic]

41. Potatoes will grow behind my ears if I don't take a bath....

I believed this because THAT'S WHAT MY MOM TOLD ME!

[lakemonster11]

86. My mom used to tell us that, but not without giggling.

[WritingIsMyReligion]

42. The moon was out to get me.

Seriously. My mother would hold me and look out the window at the moon, and I would scream and scream, because I thought that that BIG, scary orb in the sky was watching me.

:shrug:

:D

[bertha katzenengel]

43. cats are girls and dogs are boys

Imagine my surprise . . .

[Wapsie B]

44. That it was normal to be an angry, bitter, fearful republican.

Wait a minute, that one's still true.

[peekaloo]

46. white noise from the tee vee was evil.

:scared:

[Ohio Joe]

47. Flying Cars

I was certain that by the time I was allowed to drive that we would have flying cars. Here I am 42 and dammit, I want my flying car !!!

[kskiska]

48. That when I grew up I'd wear evening gowns and go to nightclubs

like in those old movies where they lived in Upper East Side apartments and lounged around in formal wear while uniformed maids served them canapés. Then they'd all pile out of their limo in front of the El Morocco, and go in and drink cocktails and dance and laugh a lot.

It never occurred to me that my parents didn't live that sort of life.

[momophile]

50. the sky made a sound meaning it was a good day...

then I found out that the sounds I was hearing were airplanes. Oh youth... blah...

[kwassa]

51. That women became pregnant from kissing with their mouths open

you mean, it isn't true?

[LeftyMom]

70. I thought that was what "oral sex" was until some point in my early teens.

:blush:

[pitohui]

53. the one abt the golf ball

they are made w. an acid inside, if you cut into the golf ball, the acid is so strong it would cut down to the center of the earth

[SmokingJacket]

67. Hey, I heard that too..

So my friends and I cut one open. Imagine our surprise to find the world's longest rubber band... it was almost as cool...

[I Have A Dream]

54. that my area of the country was extremely important because...

we had ABC, NBC & CBS right there. I didn't understand the concept that there were LOTS of these stations. I was really disappointed when I found out. I think that this is when I started viewing the world differently -- more like a Democrat. (I thought that the world revolved around my little area, but, of course, it really didn't.)

[warrior1]

55. Once a mean girl

in the third grade told me that the dispensers in the girls bathroom had a combs and mirrors for a nickel. Of course put my nickel in and out came a big ladies kotex. Fucking mean girls.

[zanne]

56. I blame nuns for this one.

When I was a kid in elementary school, I thought that if God "called" you to become a priest or a nun, he used the phone. Sometimes I'd hold my breath when the phone rang, praying it wasn't God.

[WolverineDG]

63. that if i left my shoes in the window at night

i wouldn't have to go around barefoot in never-never-land with peter pan.

that the ghosts & monsters couldn't get me if they thought an adult in the room was still awake (which is why my parents got me a radio--ghosts & monsters are pretty stupid, ya know & can be fooled by radios); unfortunately, this was before the widespread use of 24-hour radio stations, so once the national anthem played at midnight, i was on my own or i had to find another station that was still broadcasting. :scared: can you imagine being terrified of the "star-spangled banner?" :rofl:

dg

[sakabatou]

64. Pro-Wrestling was real.

[Hoooweee]

65. if i swallowed any seed (apple, watermelon, whatever)

the plant would grow inside me and I'd have branches sticking out of me.

Eating cucumbers was a motherfucker.

[FlaGranny]

95. I swallowed an apricot pit

in school when I was about 7 years old and another kid told me a tree was going to grow in my stomach and I would die. I believed I was going to die until eventually I forgot about it.

[mvd]

69. I remember thinking that..

you HAD to get married. And when it was time, you just went down a hall and chose someone. One of my earliest memories.

[Hissyspit]

81. And what was it that you believed that WASN'T true?

:7

[graywarrior]

71. Limbo & purgatory

[henslee]

72. that running around a shoe store was the only way to test new sneakers!

[henslee]

73. Suppresing a sneeze could make your brain explode.

[woofless]

74. Any milk besides Hood milk is poison.

My grandpa used to be head of Purchasing for Hood's in Boston. When I went to first grade they served Sealtest in school and I got in trouble for refusing to touch it. Ma got called and everything. Pretty funny nearly 50 years later.

Woof

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

92. Similar:

Popsicles of a certain cheaper brand were made with water from a dirty river. Oddly, none of my parents were in Nestlé's payroll.

[RPM]

75. the steelers

oh, wait - i am redeemed in believing....

[Dervill Crow]

76. That martians had to report to the immigration office.

Every Saturday morning there was a public service announcement on TV about aliens needing to get registered.

Also, my brother told me that a witch lived underneath the house and would wake up if I flushed the toilet, but I wasn't allowed to tell anyone. I was always in trouble with my mom for not flushing.

[EstimatedProphet]

79. I remember that commercial!

"All aliens must register by January 31", which is my birthday. I always wondered why they had to register on my birthday.

[Dangerously Amused]

77. That if you swallowed gum

...it would stay in your stomach for seven years. I worried about the kids who always swallowed their gum. Figured their stomachs would be packed solid with gum by the time they grew up.

[seaglass]

94. Isn't that true? n/t

[Catchawave]

78. Sanitary Napkin machines in Ladies Rooms

is where you bought your clean dinner napkins.

[texanwitch]

80. I believed that a friend of my parents was the actor Patricia Neal.

She looked and sounded just like her, and I had seen the movie "Hud".

[GRLMGC]

82. Well, some adult told me this

to get me to tie my shoes before i got on the escalator. I believed that once, a kid got his shoelaces stuck in an escalator and died. What the fuck is that? hahaha

[SofaKingLiberal]

83. That I could fly off the kitchen table in my Superman pajamas.

I had the cape and everything, but it didn't matter. Those were my first of many, many stiches.

:crazy:

[lakemonster11]

84. My brother reminded me today

that when he was little I convinced him that there was a hotdog stand on the top of the Hotel Monaco in Seattle (he was very hungry at the time).

:rofl:

[LibDemAlways]

88. I remember being in first grade when someone

invited my mom to join a school carpool. I could not imagine what a carpool could be. I kept picturing a car with a swimming pool in it. It sounds incredibly dumb in retrospect, but at the time it really had me baffled.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

90. New comic books and magazines came from the center of the earth

and emerged monthly or weekly by a vertical tunnel behind the newsstand, where I couldn't see. But see, this has a perfectly rational explanation.

In times of high inflation in Brazil, the price of things rose every two or three months or so. I'd often hear my folks say, for instance, "Donald Duck rose" when they brought me a new issue of the Donald Duck comic. They were complaining about the price of things; I thought they were just saying the comic had arrived.

[myrna minx]

93. I was a child in the 1970's and when the news would report that

there was rise in guerrilla attacks in central america, I thought that gorillas were converging and attacking towns and villages. I was always dubious of the Grape Ape after that.

My sister believed that sailors were the only ones who could make a lady pregnant. (Hahah-sea-man ;-))

[Sequoia]

96. That we had gone to the moon already.

I was six and had read a little Golden book about some guy named Tom who took two kids with him to the moon. I was so exicted until my dad told me it wasn't true but I didn't believe him at first.

[Ron Mexico]

98. That a human being could "run out of words."

I was under the impression - probably from an adult who wanted me to shut the hell up - that everyone had a specific number of words that they could say, and once they hit their limit they'd be mute for the rest of their lives.