# Scarey now... never. But as a child...YIKES!
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [December 19, 2004, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599 "2004-12-19T03:37:08Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Dragwyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dragwyr)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/1 "2004-12-19T03:37:08Z")
[This thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=292463) was being read by Mrs. D and I and we were wondering what things that looking back, are quite humorous now, but when you were a child, scared the bejeebers out of you?
When Mrs. D was a child, she was absolutely terrified of her grandfather because he had part of 3 fingers missing due to various feed grinding accidents. She figures she was about 3 at the time.
For me I remember being deathly afraid of the wicked witch of the west from the Wizard of Oz. Oddly enough I would still watch the entire show, then when I went to bed, I’d have nightmares about her. It’s quite silly now, but I still remember how scary she was.
So what are yours?
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### Author:  [@Abbie\_Carmichael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Abbie_Carmichael)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/2 "2004-12-19T03:48:55Z")
Thunderstorms.
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### Author:  [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/3 "2004-12-19T03:57:15Z")
There was a mde for Tv version of Alice in Wonderland made for…I think NBC, maybe ABC, back in the 80’s.
The Jabberwock scene. Holy. Living. Fuck.
I still, to this day, don’t know what happens in the movie after that point. once the mirror gets all freaky, and the lightning and shit started happening, I would stop watchng (we had it on tape.)
Since I decided I was brave enough to watch it…the tape disappeared and I have no idea how to obtain a copy. Though, truth be told, I haven’t looked.
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### Author:  [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/4 "2004-12-19T03:58:05Z")
I was terrified by the forklifts at the 84 Lumber.
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### Author:  [@Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Purl_McKnittington)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/5 "2004-12-19T04:06:46Z")
1. My father grows a beard every winter, so that the wind doesn’t chap his face all to hell when he’s working outside. The first spring I was old enough to recognize him (about 20 months), after shaving it off, I screamed bloody murder when he came to pick me up and give me a whisker rub sans whiskers. It took him a good hour to convince me he was in fact the daddy I knew and loved. The next year, I got to watch him shave his beard.
2. When I was about 10 or so, I was convinced the ghosts of my mother’s parents lived in my closet and would punish me if I misbehaved. Don’t ask me why or how I believed this – I just did. I remember staring at my closet and being unable to sleep because I had taken an extra cookie after dinner without asking Mom first or because I had gotten out the second edition Bowdler’s _Family Shakespeare_ and looked at it without permission. I eventually got over my fear of my dead grandparents. My mom still doesn’t know about this. Maybe I’ll tell her (very casually) over Christmas.
3. Tornado warnings/watches
4. Cows. I’m still rather nervous around them, which makes doing chores when I go home on breaks very, very difficult. There’s something about a ton of hamburger and having to wash off its quad-nippled boob that just freaks me right the hell out.
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### Author:  [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/6 "2004-12-19T04:08:23Z")
> [@Dragwyr](#):
>
> For me I remember being deathly afraid of the wicked witch of the west from the Wizard of Oz.
I had nightmares from when the ruby slippers were removed and her feet curled up and shrank under the house.
For me, for awhile, I was deathly afraid of electrical sockets. You know how sometimes you yank on the cord when it the appliance is still on and there’s a bit of a spark? I was convinced I was going to be electrocuted every time I plugged something in or pulled it out. My mother finally went Tough Love on me and forced me to plug in a vaccuum cleaner. I was crying and shaking the whole time, and demanded that she hold my hand, somehow thinking that if I was going to be electrocuted, so was she.
It is to laugh, now!
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### Author:  [@C3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C3)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/7 "2004-12-19T04:09:38Z")
I was scared of the people who lived behind us. I don’t know why. My best friend lived across the street from them, so we would cut through their yard to visit each other. The house was owned by a cop and he rented rooms to other police officers. They were just a bunch of young guys, pretty quiet except for the occasional party, and they were hardly ever there. Still, we’d race across their yard as fast as we could and we were always too terrified to trick or treat there.
My husband was scared of search lights. His family used to go to the movies in town and when they rode back home in the dark, he remembers cowering on the back seat, scared to death of the search lights in the sky.
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### Author:  [@Miss\_Purl\_McKnittington](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Purl_McKnittington)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/8 "2004-12-19T04:13:06Z")
> [@Miss Purl McKnittington](#):
>
> . . second edition Bowdler’s _Family Shakespeare_
Second? Did I say second? Definitely not second. More like 12th or 15th. But not second, as it’s not that old.
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### Author:  [@Athena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Athena)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/9 "2004-12-19T04:24:56Z")
Fiddlehead ferns. They used to grow in my sandbox, and they reminded me of big icky worms. I made my mother come and pull them up.
ssshhhh… don’t tell anyone, but I’m **still** afraid of them.
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### Author:  [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/10 "2004-12-19T04:45:40Z")
The car wash. As a very small child, I hated the car wash and would scream bloody murder if I was in the car and my parents took us through one.
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### Author:  [@klintypooh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/klintypooh)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/11 "2004-12-19T04:48:45Z")
Mine was the witch in the Return to Oz, who can change her head. ☹
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### Author:  [@Kythereia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kythereia)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/12 "2004-12-19T04:57:02Z")
The dark. I’m still not completely over it, but then I have a whole _host_ of phobias that I need to deal with.
Also, dogs. Now that I actually have one, not so much. 🙂
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### Author:  [@Elenfair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elenfair)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/13 "2004-12-19T05:00:19Z")
E.T. scared me shitless. Couldn’t sleep for days.
My dad is still amused at the fact I was cheering for the government guys through the movie!
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### Author:  [@Spongemom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spongemom)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/14 "2004-12-19T05:19:39Z")
I watched Stephen King’s “IT” when I was five. I still hate clowns.
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### Author:  [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/15 "2004-12-19T05:24:35Z")
I don’t personally remember this, I was told of it. When I was, oh, four, my brother kept me from following him into the basement by telling me there were ghosts down there. Two days later, Mom told me to go to the basement to get something. Terrified, I said, “Noooooooo, Mommy! There are goats down there!”
Even in the fourth viewing, I found some reason to leave the room when then witch in _The Wizard of Oz_ dismembered the scarecrow and threatened to burn him. :eek: Now, I marvel at Margaret Hamilton’s over-the-top wickedness. It takes a hell of an actress to be that evil. Has any present-day actress been that vicious?
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### Author:  [@Fritz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fritz)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/16 "2004-12-19T05:47:10Z")
The original Outer Limits.
One episode that starred William Shatner was about his trip to Venus, and his encounter with an alien. Scared me spitless.
I’ve seen the ep as an adult, and the alien is ludicrous now, but back then…boy howdy.
Other episodes gave me nightmares but the one above…_shudder_
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### Author:  [@Regallag\_The\_Axe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Regallag_The_Axe)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 6:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/17 "2004-12-19T06:13:23Z")
Big dogs. Scared me shitless. And daddy long legs. Creepy little buggers made me want to run untill my legs fell off. Now I can just pick em up, and toss em across the yard.
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### Author:  [@Ms\_Macphisto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ms_Macphisto)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/18 "2004-12-19T06:33:47Z")
A distant relative (my grandfather’s cousin?) had huge bushy white eyebrows. I was utterly terrified of him. Now I just feel bad because my parents say he loved kids and it really hurt his feelings that I was scared of him, but I guess that’s hard to explain to a two-year-old and he passed away before I outgrew that.
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### Author:  [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/19 "2004-12-19T07:08:37Z")
The dark. Until I was sixteen or seventeen, I had to always have a light on when I went to bed. Nowadays, I get annoyed if I have to sleep when there’s a light on.
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### Author:  [@Marathon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marathon)
#### Post date: [December 19, 2004, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scarey-now-never-but-as-a-child-yikes/280599/20 "2004-12-19T07:30:41Z")
When I was a kid, they used to show episodes of the game show _Tic Tac Dough_ during the day when I was home on summer vacation.
There was some bonus round, and I think the contestant could pick an X or an O somewhere on the board, and behind one of them was a dragon that would cause the contestant to lose (my memory of this is pretty foggy). Anyway, the appearance of this goofy 8-bit-graphic dragon and the accompanying “roar” would scare the pants off of me.
Tornado watches and their sirens would scare me, too. And so would just about any 1980s-era movie or TV show about nuclear war.
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