_
> “How do you _do_ that?!”
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#):
>
> I’m in my late 30s and I can hear our non-electric, corded “backup” phone let out a quiet chirp before the real ringing starts on both cordless and corded phones.
At a previous job, I had occasion to hook up a sample of residential phone lines to an oscilloscope, in order to figure out why incoming call detection on a piece of hardware we were designing wasn’t working. It turned out that some COs put voltage on the line somewhere in the 30-40 VAC range a second or two before the full 90 VAC. Given a mechanical ringer, it’s quite possible that the lower voltage would make the clapper vibrate enough to make a buzzing sound of its own, even if it doesn’t strike the bell(s).
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### Author:  [@Nutty\_Bunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nutty_Bunny)
#### Post date: [August 4, 2009, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/63 "2009-08-04T18:05:41Z")
Both my father and my husband’s father have been dead long before my 3 year old daughter was born. However, she often talks about her grandfather or points to a corner of the room or down the hall and says her grandfather is there. Just yesterday, I was helping her get out of the car and she suddenly said “I saw grandpa, you know”. I tried to get her to elaborate, but she clammed up.
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### Author:  [@supergoose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/supergoose)
#### Post date: [August 4, 2009, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/64 "2009-08-04T20:41:49Z")
> [@Nutty\_Bunny](#):
>
> Both my father and my husband’s father have been dead long before my 3 year old daughter was born. However, she often talks about her grandfather or points to a corner of the room or down the hall and says her grandfather is there. Just yesterday, I was helping her get out of the car and she suddenly said “I saw grandpa, you know”. I tried to get her to elaborate, but she clammed up.
See if she can pick him out of a line up. Unless she’s already seen a photo of him and been told it was Grandpa.
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### Author:  [@AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2009, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/65 "2009-08-05T08:01:20Z")
> [@](#):
>
> I had cheerfully replied, “Oh, I used to bark like that when I was a dog.”
>
> I feel fairly confident that I was never in fact a dog
For some strange reason this made me crack up. Perhaps you were a dog in a past life.
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### Author:  [@Oy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oy)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2009, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/66 "2009-08-05T13:18:29Z")
> [@AboutAsWeirdAsYouCanGet](#):
>
> For some strange reason this made me crack up. Perhaps you were a dog in a past life.
Since there’s no evidence that there are any previous lives, I think it’s more likely I was referring to a time as a pre-schooler when I used to pretend I was a dog, to the point of making floppy ears from brown paper bags and hanging them over my head.
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### Author:  [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2009, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/67 "2009-08-05T15:00:40Z")
> [@Shirley\_Ujest](#):
>
> My friend’s youngest son, for reasons that are unclear, calls his only-child cousin who is the same age as him, " Nelson".
>
> The kid’s name is Brandon, but the minute this revelation came out, it really fit this kid.
>
> We all refer to Brandon as Nelson, behind his back. ( We are all kinda scared of him anyways. He’s 8 and a terror.)
Any chance the kid might have seen The Simpsons? If the other kid is a terror and people are scared of him, maybe he reminds your friend’s son of Nelson “Ha-ha!” Muntz.
My creepy-kid story was firsthand, but I don’t remember it. My parents tell me when I was about three, they used to catch me standing up in my crib talking to myself (or so they thought). One day they asked me about it, and I apparently told them I was talking to “the beautiful white lady,” but that I didn’t do it anymore because she had told me that I was getting too old and thus she couldn’t come back to see me anymore.
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### Author:  [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2009, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/68 "2009-08-05T15:10:57Z")
> [@winterhawk11](#):
>
> My creepy-kid story was firsthand, but I don’t remember it. My parents tell me when I was about three, they used to catch me standing up in my crib talking to myself (or so they thought). One day they asked me about it, and I apparently told them I was talking to “the beautiful white lady,” but that I didn’t do it anymore because she had told me that I was getting too old and thus she couldn’t come back to see me anymore.
Same here, except (according to what I was told, since I don’t remember it) I told my mother that there was some old feller wearing a pair of overalls asking me questions while I was standing in my crib. My mother was already freaked out by the vibe she was getting from the house we were staying in, and became convinced that it was haunted. We moved out soon thereafter.
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### Author:  [@Nutty\_Bunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nutty_Bunny)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2009, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/69 "2009-08-05T16:48:47Z")
> [@supergoose](#):
>
> See if she can pick him out of a line up. Unless she’s already seen a photo of him and been told it was Grandpa.
She has seen photos of both grandpas since the first time she pointed, but before the first time, we didn’t talk about grandpa much, if at all, so it was spooky.
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### Author:  [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)
#### Post date: [August 5, 2009, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/70 "2009-08-05T17:16:16Z")
I’ve talked about this before, as long as we’re going with the hauntings. Our oldest son was just a toddler, and my wife heard him talking one day after a nap. He said “Bebe.” My wife said, “oh, was the baby talking?” and he corrected her, “no, BEBE.”
She asked who told him about Bebe. He said, “Bobby,” and then laughed.
Bebe and Bobby were my parents’ names. At the time they had been dead 25 and 32 years. He had never heard their names.
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### Author:  [@shellofmyformerself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shellofmyformerself)
#### Post date: [August 6, 2009, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/71 "2009-08-06T01:24:19Z")
Two years ago my grandmother was taking her slow journey to death (she had Alzhiemers and frequently had no idea we were even there). Every Friday night for the last 6 months of her life we drove over to Conyers to visit her either at the nursing home or the hospital, then drove back home to Montgomery every Sunday night. One Sunday night after we got back home, my daughter, who was 5 at the time, was coloring. She got up to show me a picture she had drawn of a bald man wearing glasses. I asked her who it was and she said, “It’s Grandpa Jess. He’s coming to see The Granny tonight”. My grandmother died later that night.
Grandpa Jess was my grandfather who died when I was 7. My daughter had never seen a photo of him. He was bald and wore glasses.
Freaked me out at the time and still does to this day. I kept the drawing.
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### Author:  [@rbroome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rbroome)
#### Post date: [August 6, 2009, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/72 "2009-08-06T01:46:47Z")
when I was a teenager I had a friend who was telepathic-on occasion.
One night we were talking on the phone and she anticipated something I was going to say. It happens. But I decided on a test. I happened to have a box of crayons in my room. I would pick out a crayon and she would name the color. No second guesses allowed. I didn’t say anything after each name. She got all 24 right. Creeped us both out. We understand that she could hear my breathing over the phone and that might be a clue, but I can’t figure out how that would help. And that if she kept track in her head (or had an identical box of crayons) the odds of being right would increase as the test continued. But 24 out of 24? I don’t remember whether I attempted to randomize the drawing-but I am guessing I would have.
We didn’t try anything like that again.
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### Author:  [@Marlitharn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marlitharn)
#### Post date: [August 6, 2009, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/73 "2009-08-06T08:11:20Z")
Not my kid, but a former co-worker’s. She woke up one night to find her 3 year old standing by her bed staring at her.
“What’s wrong, honey?” she asked.
“Is it time for me to stab you now, Mommy?” he said sweetly.
He was sleepwalking and apparently having a bad dream. Personally I think if my kid ever did something like that I’d make an emergency appointment with a psychiatrist and on the way there stop off at a church for some holy water just to cover all my bases.
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### Author:  [@Arglefraster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arglefraster)
#### Post date: [August 6, 2009, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/74 "2009-08-06T18:04:21Z")
A while back my husband and I were having lunch with a friend and his son (about 5 at the time I think). My husband made some kind of joke. The kid laughed and said “That was funny!” Then his face dropped into a pissed off expression and he said “I _hate_ jokes”.
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### Author:  [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)
#### Post date: [August 6, 2009, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/75 "2009-08-06T18:20:04Z")
> [@Marlitharn](#):
>
> Not my kid, but a former co-worker’s. She woke up one night to find her 3 year old standing by her bed staring at her.
>
> “What’s wrong, honey?” she asked.
>
> “Is it time for me to stab you now, Mommy?” he said sweetly.
>
> He was sleepwalking and apparently having a bad dream. Personally I think if my kid ever did something like that I’d make an emergency appointment with a psychiatrist and on the way there stop off at a church for some holy water just to cover all my bases.
Perhaps he mistook his mom for [someone else](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=11411160&postcount=15).
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### Author:  [@Oslo\_Ostragoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oslo_Ostragoth)
#### Post date: [August 7, 2009, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/76 "2009-08-07T05:43:35Z")
> [@Marlitharn](#):
>
> Not my kid, but a former co-worker’s. She woke up one night to find her 3 year old standing by her bed staring at her.
>
> “What’s wrong, honey?” she asked.
>
> “Is it time for me to stab you now, Mommy?” he said sweetly.
:eek:
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### Author:  [@Elret](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elret)
#### Post date: [August 11, 2009, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kids-can-say-the-darndest-things-to-creep-you-the-hell-out/504862/77 "2009-08-11T09:38:12Z")
> [@supergoose](#):
>
> Hypothesis for “when I was big” stories: Maybe it’s a matter of little kids not understanding that small -\> big and never the reverse (barring reincarnation or somesuch). I’m certain they’ve all heard adults say something like, “When I was small…” so kids simply turn it around, using their prodigious imaginations to fill in the details.
That’s what I figure, too. It’s still creepy, though! My 3 year old does it regularly, and has since she could talk. The eeriest one to me was when she was about two and a half, early on a cold, dark morning in the dead of winter. We were driving in an unfamiliar neighbourhood when she announced that when she was older, she and her little brother used to sit on that lawn in the summertime, and that she wore a beautiful white dress for the parties. She had neither a white dress nor a brother at the time.
(Although interestingly I was in fact pregnant at the time, which she didn’t yet know, and did in fact have a boy about 5 months later, so I’ll let y’all know if we ever move to that house and start throwing garden parties.)
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