# What's a misconception you had when you were a kid? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [February 5, 2018, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201 "2018-02-05T05:36:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/81 "2018-02-06T17:31:38Z")
> [@MrAtoz](#): > > … > I figured we were rich. Yes sir, we would be living on easy street from now on. After all, dad had one hundred dollars! What could possibly cost that much? What could anyone possibly want, that a hundred dollars couldn’t pay for? Obviously there would be no more of my parents telling me we couldn’t afford it when I asked for the latest cool toy I saw on TV. Dad had a hundred dollars, you can afford anything when you’ve got that kind of money in your pocket! Yeah, I had something like that. As I recall, my parents had heard that I was discussing my dad’s salary with other kids on the block. I guess they were upset that I had been going through their financial records. Plus, money was just one of those things that WAS NOT DISCUSSED. Well, turned out I had no idea how much the old man made, and had just made up some unimaginably huge sum like “one THOUSAND dollars!” Of course, at that time our weekly allowance was our age + a dime. So at age 12, I got a whopping 22 cents! Whoo baby - don’t spend all that in one place. And don’t pass up the opportunity to get 3% on that in your passbook! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![ioioio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ioioio/32/316_2.png) [@ioioio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ioioio)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/82 "2018-02-06T17:36:04Z")
At age 12, my best friend and I found an unused condom along the road. We knew it was something that went on a man’s penis, but we couldn’t figure out why it didn’t have a hole to let the guy stuff out. ---
**Author:** ![xizor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xizor/32/102_2.png) [@xizor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xizor)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/83 "2018-02-06T17:47:15Z")
When I was around 5 (in kindergarten), I witnessed my mother breast feeding my sister, and I deduced that breasts got big and filled with milk when women had babies. That is why girls at school and men did not have large breasts, because they didn’t have babies. And the larger the breasts, the more babies that woman had. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/84 "2018-02-06T18:24:51Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > I thought the Storm Troopers in Star Wars were robots, and the markings on their back spelled “oil”. I have a small TV related one. As a kid watching _Battle of the Planets_, the team were told something about if they screwed up again, they would be grounded. I thought the superior meant that they would be tossed in a grinder. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/85 "2018-02-06T18:46:32Z")
The first time I heard about salaries I thought workers were paid once a year. If you made $18,000 a year you were given that much money once a year. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/86 "2018-02-06T19:28:00Z")
The theme song for the TV program [Maverick](https://www.lyricsondemand.com/tvthemes/mavericklyrics.html)has the line in it, “Livin on jacks and queens”. Watching the program as a kid, I wondered, “Who is Jackson Queens, and why is Maverick living off of him? Maybe he finances Maverick’s gambling. Queens is a place in New York, maybe this Jackson guy lives in Queens.” ---
**Author:** ![MacLir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9e8a1a/32.png) [@MacLir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacLir)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/87 "2018-02-06T20:48:25Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > I got my first pair of glasses when I was 10. > > As we left the optician, I stopped short. My mother almost ran me over “what are you doing! Are you” “THE TREE! It’s got LEAVES!”, pointing at the tall tree across the street. > > “What? There’s always been a tree there and it’s always had leaves!” > > “Yes but one leaf one leaf one leaf one leaf!”, pointing all over the treetop. > > “… you didn’t… know… you knew trees had leaves. Where did you think they came from?” > > “Yes but I thought they were like dandruff. I thought it was all solid stuff and bits of it flaked off.” > > If you and your spouse wear glasses, please don’t wait until the school tells you your kid needs glasses before having them checked. Pretty please. Turns out tree leaves aren’t like dandruff. Been there. Did That. Exactly. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Sir\_T-Cups](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ed655f/32.png) [@Sir\_T-Cups](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sir_T-Cups)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/88 "2018-02-06T21:33:47Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > One kid told me that “69” stood for “six minutes of fun, and nine months of pain” which kinda shows how much we knew about sex at that age Weren’t we all so dumb at that age? I mean, lasting 6 minutes? Ha! So ignorant… > [@GESancMan](#): > > Somebody up-thread mentioned a one-time event, which reminded me of one of my own. > > When I was about 10, we were again visiting my aunt and uncle. Keep in mind, this was around 1981, when attitudes weren’t as enlightened as today. The adults were having a conversation, which I was only half-way paying attention to. Several times, my aunt said something about some guy being “AC/DC.” I kept hearing the name of my favorite band, so I thought she was talking about someone who was into them as well. > > So I suddenly piped up with “I’m AC/DC!” My aunt stopped mid-sentence, and stared at me slack-jawed. After a few seconds, my cousin’s wife said “it’s a band, Mom.” My aunt kind of shook her head, like she was coming out of a trance, and went back to her conversation. Forgive my ignorance, but what does that mean? ---
**Author:** ![MacLir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9e8a1a/32.png) [@MacLir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacLir)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/89 "2018-02-06T21:50:16Z")
> [@bibliophage](#): > > I thought the moon was following us every time we drove in the car at night. It never got closer or farther away and always stayed in the same relative position, so it must be following us. > > Also, I thought the phases of the moon were random. I thought it could be full one day and a crescent the next. I didn’t spend a lot of time outdoors at night when it was a kid, and I was probably about ten before I noticed that the visible part of the moon changes shape only slightly from one night to the next. This seems a good lead-in to one of mine. As a kid, I had a distinct memory of seeing five full moons, all lined up, when I was in the car at the Sears store. This confused me, since I KNEW there was only one moon, but I remembered it clearly. 😕 Years later, Sears moved to the new mall. As they were clearing out the old store, there in the dumpster was the lighted sign for their five cent sale. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/90 "2018-02-06T21:54:04Z")
> [@Sir\_T-Cups](#): > > Weren’t we all so dumb at that age? I mean, lasting 6 minutes? Ha! So ignorant… > > Forgive my ignorance, but what does that mean? AC/DC was lexicon for Straight or Gay, i.e. Bisexual. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2018, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/91 "2018-02-06T22:21:02Z")
In adolescence, I had more knowledge about sex than some of the guys, although I had no experience in it; I read a lot. Once, in a gym locker room, I discovered some guys who believed babies came into the world through a woman’s anus. I told 'em they were wrong, and one of them wanted to fight me over it. When I was a younger kid, I had some misconceptions about property ownership. I thought an “abandoned building” was a closed business that no longer belonged to anyone. That got me into trouble a couple times. The first time was when a friend and I wriggled through a broken window and looted the coin-op candy machine, taking a lot of rather stale candy. My co-conspirator blabbed to his brothers, who told his parents, who told my parents, and we were in trouble. My evil dad railed at me for being stupid, but he still didn’t explain the property concept. ---
**Author:** ![Gullible\_s\_Travels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9de0a6/32.png) [@Gullible\_s\_Travels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gullible_s_Travels)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/92 "2018-02-07T00:52:22Z")
> [@Pantastic](#): > > Because shows always liked to tell you how to survive it, I had the impression that quicksand was lurking all over the place ready to suck you down if you weren’t careful. I was sure that it was something people had to deal with on a weekly basis if they went around in the woods, but since there wasn’t any locally I figured it was only other woods. Me too, I thought quicksand must be a regular hazard for most people! Another one of mine - I thought that when you turned the TV volume up, that sent a signal to the TV station and the people started talking louder. ---
**Author:** ![Arcite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/67e7ee/32.png) [@Arcite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arcite)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/93 "2018-02-07T01:08:23Z")
I had kind of an obsession with symmetry, so since both the school year and the summer seemed interminably long, and I knew a year was 12 months, I assumed we had school for 6 months then 6 months off for the summer. I remember feeling cheated when I realized we only had 2.5 months off for the summer and went to school the entire rest of the year. ---
**Author:** ![MsBatt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c68b51/32.png) [@MsBatt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsBatt)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/94 "2018-02-07T02:08:54Z")
Not my misconception, but my classmates’. I grew up in a rural community, and a lot of my classmates lived on farms. I remember in the second grade almost getting into a fistfight with some of them because they insisted that when mare ‘got’ a foal she went out in the pasture and dig it up. I didn’t know where she _did_ get it, but I was pretty darned sure that wasn’t the right answer. ---
**Author:** ![Ignotus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ecc23a/32.png) [@Ignotus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ignotus)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/95 "2018-02-07T02:15:35Z")
I long believed that touching the prongs of an unplugged electrical device, like a toaster or vacuum cleaner, could be dangerous, as there might remain some electicity stored in said device. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/96 "2018-02-07T02:43:16Z")
A couple more of mine, that other posts reminded me of: First, sometimes when we went on trips, I’d notice signs towards the start or end of the trip that said “Cleveland corporation limit”. Well, I knew that factories were the same thing as corporations, so I figured that that was like a zoning thing: You weren’t allowed to have factories past that line (past on which side, I wasn’t sure). Second, you know how a lot of songs, instead of ending abruptly, just fade out? Well, I figured that, while the song was fading out, you could just keep turning the volume knob up on the radio to balance out the fade, and keep listening to the song indefinitely. Why, there could be entire verses after there, that were just too quiet to hear. Oh, and on the glasses thing: My vision was never bad enough that there were things I’d failed to learn about the world, but I was astonished at how three-dimensional everything looked once I got my glasses. Depth seemed so exaggerated, like the world was a scene in a View-Master. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/97 "2018-02-07T02:47:37Z")
> [@Ignotus](#): > > I long believed that touching the prongs of an unplugged electrical device, like a toaster or vacuum cleaner, could be dangerous, as there might remain some electicity stored in said device. Hey, capacitors in an electrical device store energy. You could be electrocuted poking around in a CRT TV. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/98 "2018-02-07T02:55:49Z")
In kindergarden I thought Lincoln was a great president because he’d freed the sleighs, which had gotten stuck in the snow. ---
**Author:** ![pohjonen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pohjonen/32/423_2.png) [@pohjonen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pohjonen)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/99 "2018-02-07T03:00:19Z")
I thought women could be walking along, minding their own business, and spontaneously become pregnant. ---
**Author:** ![Courk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/91b2a8/32.png) [@Courk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Courk)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2018, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201/100 "2018-02-07T03:56:28Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > My dad taught English at a junior college; my mom was an art history slide librarian at SF State. I was in junior high school before I figured out that other kids’ parents didn’t get the entire summer off. My dad was a firefighter when I was growing up, so he’d be gone for an entire 24 hours, but then have 48 hours off. Over the summer we would do various day trips on weekdays, or even routine stuff like going to the store, since anything you could want to do would be less busy. Why would you do X on a Saturday when it’s so crowded? I honestly didn’t get it until I started working a 9-5 job that sometimes you don’t really have the option of doing grocery shopping at 11 am on a Thursday [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-a-misconception-you-had-when-you-were-a-kid/808201.md?page=6)