# Words and phrases you misunderstood as a child **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 25, 2014, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655 "2014-01-25T00:53:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Inna\_Minnit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Inna\_Minnit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inna_Minnit)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/21 "2014-01-25T03:14:42Z")
In fairness, a couple can mean two. The married couple means two people who are married to each other. ---
**Author:** ![Leaffan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leaffan/32/299_2.png) [@Leaffan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaffan)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/22 "2014-01-25T03:17:08Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > There are still people who believe this. A few years ago, I had a supervisor at work who wanted something done urgently, and I told them that it “would take me a couple minutes” to do it, figuring it might take me a half hour or so and that I would deliver the result then. They stepped away from my desk and came back two minutes later and eviscerated me for not meeting my estimate. When I mentioned that I had not estimated “two minutes” (which would have been an unreasonable estimate anyway), they said that the word “couple” means EXACTLY TWO. Huh? 😕 A couple does indeed equal two. It was the other two items in my list that I was misinterpreting. Another one I thought of: When my parents got their Canadian citizenship they were very proud to go out and vote for the first time. I asked who they were voting for and they told me. Well, imagine my surprise the next morning what the newspaper said “Xxxxxx wins two to one!” I was so proud that my parents’ two votes were all the candidate needed to win. ---
**Author:** ![Omega\_Glory](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/7c8e57/32.png) [@Omega\_Glory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omega_Glory)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/23 "2014-01-25T03:30:24Z")
I thought soap operas were so poppras. I heard “No, thank you” as “no thank you.” As if the speaker was refusing to say thanks. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/24 "2014-01-25T03:50:07Z")
I always thought my parents served orderves at parties. ---
**Author:** ![Fionn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Fionn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fionn)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/25 "2014-01-25T04:28:47Z")
When I was really small I wondered why my parents were talking about earning a celery. ---
**Author:** ![USCDiver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uscdiver/32/354_2.png) [@USCDiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/USCDiver)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/26 "2014-01-25T04:38:41Z")
I grew up thinking astronauts blasted off in the Space Shovel. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/27 "2014-01-25T04:43:13Z")
Oh, here’s one I just thought of (also from five or six years old): I didn’t know if one would say ‘You will be beheaded’, or ‘You will be headed.’ (I’ve always been a little morbid. 😉 ) When I was five I went to a friend’s house to play and as I approached I head him yelling [Miiiiiiiightor](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/86/Mightor_title.JPG)!, the shout of a cartoon character we liked. (Mightor would raise his club and yell his name, and he got some sort of super strength or something.) Turns out he’d injured his toe and his grandmother was putting mercurochrome on it, and he was yelling ‘My toe!’ ---
**Author:** ![Flywheel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Flywheel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flywheel)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/28 "2014-01-25T05:01:23Z")
I thought there were celebrities named: [ul] [li]Sarah Jessa Kaparker[/li][li]Kurko Bane[/li][li]Rootball[/li][/ul] ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/29 "2014-01-25T05:04:02Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > There are still people who believe this. A few years ago, I had a supervisor at work who wanted something done urgently, and I told them that it “would take me a couple minutes” to do it, figuring it might take me a half hour or so and that I would deliver the result then. They stepped away from my desk and came back two minutes later and eviscerated me for not meeting my estimate. When I mentioned that I had not estimated “two minutes” (which would have been an unreasonable estimate anyway), they said that the word “couple” means EXACTLY TWO. Two minutes can be “a couple of minutes” Four minutes can be “a couple of minutes” Half an hour is definitely NOT “a couple of minutes” Your Supervisor \<==\> Not Weird. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/30 "2014-01-25T05:05:44Z")
To be fair, **robert\_columbia** didn’t say _which_ couple of minutes. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![drewtwo99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@drewtwo99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewtwo99)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/31 "2014-01-25T05:41:02Z")
I used to think that this episode of Seinfeld was _broughtuyued_ by Zoloft, or whatever. Had no idea for the longest time that they were saying “brought to you by.” I thought that the word broughtuyued meant that they were a paid sponsor or paid for the show or something. ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/32 "2014-01-25T05:47:17Z")
Fixed the title as you asked. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/33 "2014-01-25T05:52:44Z")
10-Q. ---
**Author:** ![Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Springtime_for_Spacers)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/34 "2014-01-25T06:18:54Z")
In church when they said that Jesus “sitteth on the right hand of God the Father” I thought he was sitting on God’s literal right hand. And that God was therefore a few orders of magnitude bigger than Jesus. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/35 "2014-01-25T06:25:36Z")
For some reason, I thought “bull’s eye” was “bull size.” No, it didn’t make any sense to me, either. ---
**Author:** ![araminty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b5e925/32.png) [@araminty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/araminty)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/36 "2014-01-25T06:31:12Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > At school we used to do eeny meeny miney mo the “old” way. > > I went through my entire primary school career thinking we were catching a “knicker” by the toe, since that was the closest word that I actually knew, to the word in the rhyme. > > Looking back on it, I’m pretty sure the standard pronunciation of my classmates involved a “K” rather than a “G” sound too, so I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only one experiencing confusion. Me too. In my head, a nicker was someone who nicked stuff. Thus, ought to be caught. ---
**Author:** ![Dereknocue67](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6de8d8/32.png) [@Dereknocue67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dereknocue67)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/37 "2014-01-25T08:48:55Z")
As a child I overheard my mother telling a friend that she “had gas in her stomach”. I immediately wanted to know why my mother had been drinking gasoline. ---
**Author:** ![BeeGee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b5a626/32.png) [@BeeGee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeeGee)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 9:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/38 "2014-01-25T09:40:58Z")
My uncle broke his arm when I was about three. My concept of “broken” was “broken off”. I was terrified to go see him. ---
**Author:** ![Gateway](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/dbc845/32.png) [@Gateway](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gateway)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/39 "2014-01-25T09:57:00Z")
I thought our knees were called “kneels” And the shoulder blades were called “wings” ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2014, 10:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655/40 "2014-01-25T10:06:51Z")
The line from an advertising campaign “Gentlemen prefer blondes”; as a kid I misinterpreted it as a _command,_ not a _statement,_ which I found rather peremptory of them. Gentlemen! Prefer blondes! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/words-and-phrases-you-misunderstood-as-a-child/679655.md?page=3)