# Embarrassing Epiphanies
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [February 4, 2004, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561 "2004-02-04T22:56:42Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/41 "2004-02-06T01:13:18Z")
I didn’t have cable TV until I moved out of my parents’ house and got a job. They still don’t have cable.
What this means is that in high school, I didn’t have the benefit of MTV. (This would be the early-to-mid 1980s.) Oh, weep for the deprived child.
So one time I’m over at a friend’s house, not really paying attention, and he says, “Hey, this is the new video from Hall and Oates.”
“Mmm,” I said, and watched for a minute.
Then I said, “Who’s the other guy?”
My friend: “What?”
See, I was thinking the guy with the mustache was prominently featured in the video, so he had to be Holland Oates, and I couldn’t figure out who the other guy was.
Weep, I tell you…
---
### Author:  [@Cerri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cerri)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/42 "2004-02-06T01:32:54Z")
You know those Deer Xing or Railroad Xing signs?
Took me till I was 16 to figure out Xing meant Crossing. Was sitting in the back seat of my parents’ car, driving along, and saw a Deer Xing sign, and as they always had, it perplexed me. Xing? What’s an Xing?? I mean, it obviously a sign to watch for deer crossing the road, but what does Xing…oh…ohhhhh. :smack:
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### Author:  [@sperfur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sperfur)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/43 "2004-02-06T02:06:22Z")
> [@PictsiePat](#):
>
> Our son basically taught himself math out of books in the basement when he was a little kid. The one that had us scratching our heads was “I just found out how to find the hip-no-tuse.”
Oh, OH! I remember one!
Hippo-craytes and So-craytes.
But I was only about 13 at the time.
---
### Author:  [@Tripler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tripler)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/44 "2004-02-06T02:11:25Z")
> [@Cerri](#):
>
> You know those Deer Xing or Railroad Xing signs?
>
> Took me till I was 16 to figure out Xing meant Crossing. Was sitting in the back seat of my parents’ car, driving along, and saw a Deer Xing sign, and as they always had, it perplexed me. Xing? What’s an Xing?? I mean, it obviously a sign to watch for deer crossing the road, but what does Xing…oh…ohhhhh. :smack:
Sheeat. When I was a kid, I wondered if “Deer Xing”, “Railroad Xing” and “Xmas” were somehow related.
But then again you’re talking to a guy that once asked his mom, “Mom, if Grandmom and Grandpop are the ‘in-laws’, who are the ‘out-laws’”?
I was a very imaginative/confused child.
Tripler
No people, I am not making this shit up.
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### Author:  [@monica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monica)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/45 "2004-02-06T02:26:03Z")
I used to think that “hors d’oveurs” was pronounced “whores day voors.” I understood the spoken pronunciation, but never made the connection between that and the written word.
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### Author:  [@sunfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sunfish)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/46 "2004-02-06T05:15:33Z")
> [@Elenia25](#):
>
> I’ve had this problem all my life. I started speaking Hindi first, and while my mother spoke very good English, she spoke it with the Indian version of the British accent and still said things like “torch” instead of flashlight. My father’s English was (is!) atrocious. So I would read constantly, and not know how to pronounce the words properly because my reading level was so far ahead of my class.
Related language problems for me: Although both my parents speak German, and usually did when certain friends and family came to visit, I grew up speaking English first (my sister’s fault, really - but that’s another story). Still, there were English words for some things that I didn’t learn until I was rather older. I still remember the day my sister came home from high school - I was in 4th grade then- to announce excitedly that “Käsenudeln” (“cheese-noodles”) were actually called macaroni and cheese. And I think it was 6th grade before I knew what a “washcloth” was, having called it a “Waschelappen” (“wash rag”) until then. Btw, I was at no great advantage in German class much later, having really only heard my parents’ dialects and not knowing how their pronunciation deviated from standard German speech (and thus spelling). I had to read out loud in order to figure out the texts we were given.
Also: I was a 5th-year grad student before I ever actually “saw” the face of the man on the moon. I don’t know why, but I always figured it was just an expression. :o
---
### Author:  [@Muad\_Dib](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muad_Dib)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/47 "2004-02-06T05:38:15Z")
[But I would not feel so all alone,
Everybody must get stoned.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=139129)
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### Author:  [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/48 "2004-02-06T06:41:20Z")
**Monica:**
\*There was a young girl of Vancouver,
Who, when told it was not ‘horses doover,’
Found she hadn’t the nerve
To ask for \*hors d’oeuvres,
_So had soup as a saving manoeuvre._
**Sunfish** :
Don’t feel bad. I did a music video as a computer project in Grade 10, and in one scene I morph my mom’s face into the man in the moon (don’t ask). My teacher thought that was sooooo creative – more than she might have, because she had never seen the man in the moon before! (And no, she wasn’t from a culture where they see something different in the moon, like a rabbit or so forth.)
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### Author:  [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/49 "2004-02-06T07:07:21Z")
[QUOTE=Elenia25]
> [@Ellis Dee](#):
>
> I hate those. As a young lad I read a ton, and often encountered the written word before the spoken word, or worse, thought they were different.
>
> QUOTE]
>
> I’ve had this problem all my life. I started speaking Hindi first, and while my mother spoke very good English, she spoke it with the Indian version of the British accent and still said things like “torch” instead of flashlight. My father’s English was (is!) atrocious. So I would read constantly, and not know how to pronounce the words properly because my reading level was so far ahead of my class.
>
> But the one I clearly remember was “comfortable”. Not “com-for-table”, with table said like the thing you eat on.
>
> Not to mention words like “faux pas”.
Odd. My mother (a native Hindi speaker) always called a torch/flashlight a _battery_ . (Whereas I grew up in England and always thought of it as a torch). I never understood why, especially since she called a battery a battery too.
Confusing in the extreme- “Boy! Fetch the battery!” I would have to figure out what she meant by context. If it was dark, I brought a light source. If it wasn’t, I brought AAs.
---
### Author:  [@Odinoneeye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odinoneeye)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 12:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/50 "2004-02-06T12:00:32Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Mine, or one of them, was just a few years ago. I found out that the word forte, meaning a speciality, is pronounced “fort” and not[\b] “for-tay”.
I love this one. Especially because people who don’t know the word usually pronounce it correctly and then are “corrected” by people who are wrong!
I’ve only ever heard it pronounced correctly on TV or film once, in an episode of M_A_S\*H. Charles uses it correctly.
---
### Author:  [@t-keela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/t-keela)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/51 "2004-02-06T12:09:28Z")
Webster says:
6 entries found for forte.
To select an entry, click on it.
forte[1,noun]forte[2,adverb or adjective]forte[3,noun]forte-pianomezzo fortepeine forte et dure
Main Entry: 1forte
Pronunciation: 'fOrt, 'fort; 2 is often 'for-"tA or for-'tA or 'for-tE
Function: noun
Etymology: French fort, from fort, adjective, strong
1 : the part of a sword or foil blade that is between the middle and the hilt and that is the strongest part of the blade
2 : one’s strong point
usage In forte we have a word derived from French that in its “strong point” sense has no entirely satisfactory pronunciation. Usage writers have denigrated 'for-"tA\ and 'for-tE\ because they reflect the influence of the Italian-derived 2forte. Their recommended pronunciation 'fort, however, does not exactly reflect French either: the French would write the word le fort and would rhyme it with English for. \*\*So you can take your choice, knowing that someone somewhere will dislike whichever variant you choose. All are standard, however. \*\*In British English 'fo-"tA\ and 'fot\ predominate; 'for-"tA\ and \for-'tA\ are probably the most frequent pronunciations in American English.
bolding mine
hmmm… Apparently BOTH are correct.
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### Author:  [@brainfizz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brainfizz)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/52 "2004-02-06T12:51:49Z")
It’s surprising the looks you get until you realize that “Grand Prix” is pronounced somewhat differently to how it’s spelt.
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### Author:  [@Iteki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Iteki)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/53 "2004-02-06T13:30:36Z")
> [@Ri-chan](#):
>
> I was thinking of starting one of these threads myself…as for my embarassing realization, it came during a (high school) Spanish class. We were going over pronunciation, and our teacher mentioned that, for example, veinte, is pronounced as it’s spelled, not with the ‘i before e’ rule. All of a sudden, it sunk in that that wasn’t supposed to be a spelling aid…I have no idea where I got that, because it doesn’t even make sense, but I went through 15 years beleiving that’s what it meant. 😕
Oh. My. God?! You mean it is a pronunciation rule!?
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### Author:  [@Iteki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Iteki)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/54 "2004-02-06T13:32:12Z")
> [@Finagle](#):
>
> Hate to hit you with another epiphany, but it _is_ supposed to be a spelling aid. …
Oh crap, sorry, should have read the whole thread, but suddenly, for a few seconds the world made sense.
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### Author:  [@Philster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Philster)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/55 "2004-02-06T14:47:43Z")
You should see the look on the face of a 40 year old adult who did not know that raisins are dried grapes.
Now follow this…
A cow-orker just discovered this fact last week (raisins = grapes), after I explained to someone else at the table that I like prunes. Everyone was like, “Ew, prunes. They make you go to the bathroom.”. So kiddingly, I said, “I’ll just switch to plums.” And everyone agreed that was better. And then no one chuckled.
So, I had to ask, “You do know that prunes are dried plums…right?” And about 12 people looked at me like I was nuts. Then I said, “Hellooooo, prunes are dried plums and raisins are dried grapes and milk comes from cows. Am I on this planet alone?”
Mass epiphany.
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### Author:  [@Spiff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiff)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/56 "2004-02-06T15:37:54Z")
Now, I don’t want to turn this into a political debate, but I know I’m not the only one who wishes that Dubya would have an epiphany soon and start pronouncing the word _nuclear_ properly.
And on the topic of the OP … my own pronunciation epiphany came when I learned that _epitome_ was four syllables. That was when I stopped pronouncing it as _eh-pi-tome_ (last syllable rhyming with _home_).
And yeah, I was confused in a 7th grade social studies class that focused on morals and ethics – I couldn’t figure out why young kids in Asia were such a moral dilemma.
And finally, it wasn’t until a biology class in college that I came across the verb _lyse_, meaning to kill cells by bursting their membranes. All of a sudden, I figured out the logic behind naming a disinfectant spray _Lysol_.
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### Author:  [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/57 "2004-02-06T16:03:36Z")
> [@Snooooopy](#):
>
> One of the reporters at this small newspaper I used to work at once asked me how to spell “prima donna.” Turns out she thought the phrase was “pre-Madonna.”
>
> Such is the state of modern journalism.
Considering the meaning of “prima donna”, the confusion does make sense _S_
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### Author:  [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)
#### Post date: [February 6, 2004, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/58 "2004-02-06T21:09:46Z")
> [@Spiff](#):
>
> Now, I don’t want to turn this into a political debate, but I know I’m not the only one who wishes that Dubya would have an epiphany soon and start pronouncing the word _nuclear_ properly.
“You think someone would have told him by _now._ You would think that at least Condoleezza Rice would have gotten up in his face, ‘Fool, it’s NU-CLE-AR!!’”
- Margaret Cho
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### Author:  [@kalex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kalex)
#### Post date: [February 7, 2004, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/59 "2004-02-07T17:35:30Z")
I was in my mid 30s when I found out how a dishwasher works. I always figured it just filled up with water, like an aquarium. My family likes to bring that up from time to time.
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### Author:  [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)
#### Post date: [February 7, 2004, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/embarrassing-epiphanies/227561/60 "2004-02-07T22:07:20Z")
I’m embarassed to admit that I was out of high school, in college, and then I learned that there is no land under the northern polar regions of Earth, as there is under the southern.
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