What are some funny things you thought as a kid that were wrong?

[Silver Surfer]

• Bill Cosby was a good guy
• My blanket could protect me from monsters
• Guys in the muscle magazines just worked out hard and were natural
• McDonald's was for the rich kids
• Fruits and veggies were inferior to fries and burgers

You had me 'til the fruits and veggies part........

 

[Silver Surfer]

But In N Out?

Mostly I like to But In.......

 

[BrAinPaiNt]

To this day, I still have never eaten at a Whataburger

We were at the last few days of basic training at Fort Bliss in El Paso.

We had already graduated and were just waiting a few days for everyone to get their orders and or rides to our AIT training.

So all the guys from Texas was telling anyone that had not ate at a Whataburger that they don't know what they are missing and that we HAD to eat at a whataburger.

So one guy took a bunch of orders, went and got it and brought them back.

I thought it was pretty good, but we had been eating plain chow hall food and in my case a good deal of just rice and gravy to lose weight, so about anything tasted good.

After being stationed in Texas later...had plenty of chances to eat at Whataburger and to me they were similar to a burger king. I like burger kind so I had no problem with whataburger but all in all it really
was not something super special like many make it out to be.

Frankly I was more in awe of subways sandwiches in Texas, well before they had them in WV.

With that out of the way...

When I was really young I was confused as to why there was a color Orange and a Fruit of the same Color and same Name...Orange. For some time I was confused as to why there was the color purple but then there were certain grapes that were purple but called grapes...For a short period of time I made up my own name for them and called them graples.

The threat of the Easter Bunny or Reindeer getting killed by my uncles...was very real in my mind.
My grandparents had a big old fashioned "farm" house on top of a hill in the back woods. Not sure why it was called the farm house as we never had livestock and only had one field with some potatoes in it.

Anyway, It was normal for the various members of the family to spend many a weekend at the Farm house together in the summers and different holidays.

I had one Uncle who we can honestly say was not all there. He got some beagle for a short period of time and it was barking one night. He yelled out the window for it to shut up. It did not, he later that night went out and shot it with his rifle killing it. So keep that in mind when I tell you what happens next.

During deer season my dad and some of the uncles would get out hunting rifles, the farm did have a good number of acres of woods. They would go out hunting every year. But they would get out the rifles, clean them up, get their camo gear out the day before and all of that. My cousins and I would ask what they were doing. They would reply, as a joke, that they were going to go out and kill santa's reindeer or at other times the easter bunny....now normally this would be funny and you could laugh at a kid crying over that or being upset over it...but when you knew your one uncle had killed his own dog for barking at night...you, and your cousins, really believed it. To which we would all be begging them not to kill santa's reindeer because santa would not be able to get to us that year...lol

 

[BrAinPaiNt]

When I was very young I was fascinated, like many young boys, with snakes.
Read many books on them, suitable for my age books, and thought I was an expert lol

While livng in florida one summer I thought I had caught a king snake. Caught it and put it in a plastic bag and later a plastic container. So after initially catching it and putting in a plastic bag (all I had) I found a plastic container...reached in the bag pulled it out and put it in the container.

Went to show my parents who were talking with someone that lived in the area.

He said...boy you are lucky you are not dead.

I said...but this is a corn snake, they are not deadly...he said that is no corn snake...that is a Coral Snake.

 

[Reverend Conehead]

I was born less than a year after JFK was assassinated. I remember my mom told me about it and how sad it was, but somehow I got it confused with Jesus Christ and the crucifixion. For a while I thought JFK was the son of God and we were worshipping him when we went to church.

 

[Reverend Conehead]

When I was very young I was fascinated, like many young boys, with snakes.
Read many books on them, suitable for my age books, and thought I was an expert lol

While livng in florida one summer I thought I had caught a king snake. Caught it and put it in a plastic bag and later a plastic container. So after initially catching it and putting in a plastic bag (all I had) I found a plastic container...reached in the bag pulled it out and put it in the container.

Went to show my parents who were talking with someone that lived in the area.

He said...boy you are lucky you are not dead.

I said...but this is a corn snake, they are not deadly...he said that is no corn snake...that is a Coral Snake.

Holy crap, you are lucky. A Coral Snake will kill you in minutes.

 

[timb2]

When I was kid I had a bad nightmare where everyone had turned into vampires being infected and the only one besides me who was normal was my German Shepard. Now come a couple of years ago they make a movie "I Am Legend". I could have been set for life if I had thought to write the script down when back in the 70s.

 

[timb2]

I also remember listening to a hostage situation on the radio as a child and the Guerrillas had captured and shot the hostages and I was scared because I thought Gorillas could capture you and shoot you.

 

[timb2]

I had a little but of EVIL in me as a child. My parents asked me what I wanted for Christmas and I wanted an Elf. They told me they couldn't get one and we had an old style couch that had long legs and I could get under it which was by the Christmas tree and I was scheming to kidnap one Santa's elves when he came down to help spread out the presents. My scheme I had in motion until I got tired and crashed and my parents put me in bed. I never told them I was hatching to grab an Elf.

 

[paladin]

When I was a kid I remember adults talking in hushed tones about weird issues like "youth in asia"
Thought why is anyone concerned about kids in China?

Euthanasia

 

[Reverend Conehead]

I used to think the Lord's Prayer started with: "Our father who aren't in heaven..."

I was confused by talk of God in heaven when the prayer said he wasn't there.

 

[Silver Surfer]

I used to think the Lord's Prayer started with: "Our father who aren't in heaven..."

I was confused by talk of God in heaven when the prayer said he wasn't there.

So you went on to become a reverend to clear things up......

 

[Reverend Conehead]

So you went on to become a reverend to clear things up......

LOL, something like that.

 

[Reality]

During deer season my dad and some of the uncles would get out hunting rifles, the farm did have a good number of acres of woods. They would go out hunting every year. But they would get out the rifles, clean them up, get their camo gear out the day before and all of that. My cousins and I would ask what they were doing. They would reply, as a joke, that they were going to go out and kill santa's reindeer or at other times the easter bunny....now normally this would be funny and you could laugh at a kid crying over that or being upset over it...but when you knew your one uncle had killed his own dog for barking at night...you, and your cousins, really believed it. To which we would all be begging them not to kill santa's reindeer because santa would not be able to get to us that year...lol

That's so mean, but funny .. as an adult

 

[Reality]

When I was very young I was fascinated, like many young boys, with snakes.
Read many books on them, suitable for my age books, and thought I was an expert lol

While livng in florida one summer I thought I had caught a king snake. Caught it and put it in a plastic bag and later a plastic container. So after initially catching it and putting in a plastic bag (all I had) I found a plastic container...reached in the bag pulled it out and put it in the container.

Went to show my parents who were talking with someone that lived in the area.

He said...boy you are lucky you are not dead.

I said...but this is a corn snake, they are not deadly...he said that is no corn snake...that is a Coral Snake.

I grew up with my grandparents and we had a dog who had free run of our large fenced-in yard. The yard was basically flat, green and full of trees, but there were woods behind the property that tended to get a bit swampy that during the colder months and some of it would reach a little into our backyard.

I had the largest yard in the neighborhood, so all of the kids in my neighborhood came to my house to play football in the backyard. Well one day we were playing football like we always did and I see our dog trotting along from the backyard and it looks like he has something in his mouth. I started walking toward him and the closer I got, I started realizing he had a snake in his mouth! A live snake! It was also a dark colored snake which most likely meant it was a water moccasin (aka: cottonmouth).

So, I started chasing my dog screaming his name and the word "NO" and every other verb I could think of. Of course the dog thought I was playing with him and he started running around, shifting back and forth, having a great time while I was freaking out. I started yelling at my friends, "He's got a snake! Help me get it out of his mouth!" and they started chasing him, and the dog couldn't be any happier. There were more kids playing with him than he had ever seen. After what seemed like forever (probably more like 3-4 minutes), he started to get tired and dropped the snake. I took a hoe and killed it and later found out it was indeed a water moccasin.

Needless to say, football was done for the day, the dog was worn out, and I still to this day have no idea what I would have done had I actually caught the dog with the snake still in his mouth.

 

[Reality]

I also remember listening to a hostage situation on the radio as a child and the Guerrillas had captured and shot the hostages and I was scared because I thought Gorillas could capture you and shoot you.

I had something similar happen. They kept saying "gorilla soldiers" on the news on tv and I wanted to see them. I was just imagining gorillas with guns. So I would sit there watching the entire news broadcast and not see one single gorilla. I remember commenting on it more than once with my family and they never explained it to me. I eventually learned what it meant and immediately was disappointed.

 

[Reverend Conehead]

When I was a kid, we used to go to water ski tournaments in the summer. Just before we left to go to a tournament in Mississippi, my parents had brought a black and white cat home that we named “Kit.” After we got back to Texas from our tournament, we kids were asleep and didn't know this happened, but my mom accidentally ran over and killed Kit. They were resourceful and called up a neighbor begging for a replacement black and white cat. When we got up the next morning, we discovered that Kit, our black and white cat was still there, but that she was smaller and the black spots were in different places then they used to be. My dad claimed that she didn't get enough to eat and she shrunk and that spots changed because of that. My sister said, “But she's not as friendly as she used to be” to which my dad answered, “She's mad because she didn't get enough to eat.”

It was years before I learned there was original Kit and replacement Kit the Cat.

 

[Shinaoi]

I thought

-that when a song played on the radio, the band had to actually be at the studio to play it.

-I never really could grasp how traffic lights worked, and thought there was a person somewhere that looked on to see who's turn it was.

-the tv show wkrp Cincinnati was an actual recording of the local radio station and took place on the hill radio tower in El Paso where I lived as a kid.

-I thought Kenny Rodgers and Dolly Parton were married, and couldn't understand why they were singing about being in love if they really weren't.

-I literally thought my dad could beat up anyone.

-I didn't understand the term you're fired from work. I thought you made them so mad they caught you on fire for doing something wrong.

 

[jimmy40]

When I was about 5,6 years old in the late 1960's I went to this secretive meeting in deep east Texas where my grandfather was being honored and men were wearing strange robes and whatnot and my grandfather was sitting on this throne looking thing wearing a strange looking hat with my grandmother sitting beside him. I didn't think much of it until years later in school learning about the KKK. I was convinced my grandfather was some huge KKK guy. I finally got the nerve to ask my mom and she started laughing and said it was a free mason ceremony and my grandmother was big in the Eastern Star.

 

[FloridaRob]

As a kid I went to church everytime the doors were open and loved watching superman. I believed that if i prayed hard enough, and put my red cape on, God would let me fly. After several belly busters off the front porch, bloodied and bruised, I figured I was wrong.