I know that Regis Filbin has been in entertainment for decades, but I had never actually seen him until fairly recently. So whenever they used to talk about him in some comedy skit I figured that it was just a name they made up.
Thank you for that. You just made my day start with a good laugh.
From A Christmas Story:
I only realized recently that these things actually existed and that there was a comic strip with Red Ryder in it.
Years ago I was teaching history and the subject of alchemy vs. chemistry came up. I started to make a point illustrating the difference, using Flamel as my example. A girl immediately shot her hand up, saying “That’s from Harry Potter!”
I finished the story, but I think the impact was dulled somewhat.
That’s one of my favorite trivia questions: Who’s smarter, an idiot, an imbecile, or a moron?
The AWESOM-O episode of South Park was from 2004. Parker and Stone did make it up. I think that make it even worse for culture.
I thought “Wolf 359” was a code-word designation for the rendez-vous point for Starfleet when they battled the Borg. I found out later that it’s an actual star.
I bought one for my son about 20 years ago and hid it behind the tree and pulled it out as the last present. We had been watching the movie that Christmas and it was a real special ‘holy shit’ moment for him.
Easy mnemonic : “Duh… you can’t fool me, because I’m a moron!”
No, Barbie, Queen of the Prom came out in 1960, Mystery Date in 1965. The original Mystery Date did not include names for the dates, IIRC.
Mine too. Though I was picturing something more ursine. 
The first time I saw a commercial for The Social Network I thought it was a joke. The very idea was so ridiculous I was sure it was a parody trailer like something on SNL. The next few months with all the jokes online which followed the premise only helped me to spend the entire time not sure whether it was real or not, but suspecting joke. It wasn’t until it started showing up one people’s best of the year list that I fully realized it was indeed a real movie. My mind still balks at the idea and I think I’m going to just keep going with my initial interpretation and refusing to believe it.
My Dad used to tell us all sorts of “trivia” that was bullshit - things like giant catfish live at the bottom the dam in Crab Orchard Lake, two NFL owners in the 50’s traded franchises in a poker game, “tip” and “golf” are acronyms, etc.
One of his favorites was that the “carrots are great for your eyesight” thing was bullshit invented by the British as misinformation to mess with German pilots. I was plenty surprised to find out that one was real, lemme tell you.
I remember that episode and among other things, there was a scene of Cartman (dressed as a robot) pitching multiple Adam Sandler movies to a group of Hollywood execs, but I was talking about the very specific reference to Jack and Jill that was included in the 15th season episode “You’re Getting Old”, first broadcast on June 8, 2011. The boys are at a theater and watching trailers for upcoming films, one of which is Jack and Jill. Another is a Jim Carrey film about him dealing with a flock of penguins, and a third is a movie about a duck who becomes president. The Sandler and Carrey movies were real, I would later find out to my amazement.
The duck president one might also be, but I can’t find a specific film.
Ireland hasn’t been a part of the Commonwealth since 1949 and we’re (mostly) native English-speaking.
Well the actual gun as described in the film didn’t exist as I found out recently when I tried to buy one.
Was anyone else taken in by Von Daniken when they were a kid? I really thought all of that stuff had some basis in science growing up. I realize it doesn’t count towards the OP, since there are still folks who take it seriously, but finding out that and all the Devil’s Triangle stuff was bunk was a watershed moment in my own life.
-XT
Crushing disappointment wasn’t it? 
[QUOTE=An Gadaí]
Crushing disappointment wasn’t it?
[/QUOTE]
It really was. I was just a teen, and it seemed all the mystery had gone out of the world when I discovered this stuff was bullshit. It wasn’t until I got to college that I started to find out that real life was plenty mysterious enough, and that reality was weirder than any made up bullshit or hokey psudo-scientific claptrap.
-XT
I think Joe was being facetious.