8/21 blog: The Stupids

[Ken Jennings]

Going off of the blog entry where I confess to some obvious facts that had eluded me my whole life:

So does anyone else have their own examples of perfectly self-evident things that they never realized/understood wrongly until appallingly late in life? These can be everyday facts, trivia, word usage, etymologies, etc.

[Lilly]

Well, until I read your blog about 3 minutes ago, I had no idea that the well-beloved saying, "You've got another thing coming" was incorrect!

My friend used to think that "You can't have your cake and eat it too" was "You can't have your cake and Edith too" because if you had cake, you would be fat and Edith wouldn't like you.

[rkd]

So it's "You've got another think coming"??? Never heard that either. Nor do I understand it. I reckon it'll be quite the surprise to Rob Halford. The one I didn't know till recently was that "for all intensive purposes" should be "for all intents and purposes."

And FWIW, it wouldn't have occurred to me that the hippos George and Martha were named for the first First Couple. (And I just read a scene in Pynchon's Mason & Dixon a few days ago which featured the Washingtons.) The names George and Martha automatically make me think of the Albee play first, for some reason.

[polarea]

I was convinced that Madonna had a hit song titled "Cheerio Girl" from when I could talk and dance until I way too old (like 10 or 11). It was my favourite song, and I thought people who tried to correct me were playing a joke on me. : )

I think I was a bit slow on the uptake on the definitions of both notorious and infamous as well.

[Lilly]

I used to think "prevent" meant "to make more of" (I have NO idea why.) I interpreted Smokey the Bear's "Only You Can Prevent Forest Fires", as "You're the one who makes all these fires!!" So in Kindergarten when we colored pictures proclaiming, "Scrubby Bear likes clean hands...because hand-washing prevents infection" I refused to wash my hands from then on.

[themanwho]

6 years ago I realized that the line from "American Pie" -- "I was a lonely teenage broncin' buck" -- was a nonsensical spoonerism.

-M

Edited to add: "Broncin'"? "Bronckin'"? It even looks wrong, when you get right down to it.

[WendellWit]

6 years ago I realized that the line from "American Pie" -- "I was a lonely teenage broncin' buck" -- was a nonsensical spoonerism.
"Broncin'"? "Bronckin'"? It even looks wrong, when you get right down to it.

You mean it wasn't referring to Jack Palance's short-lived TV series "Bronk"? (even though it aired four years after the song was recorded...)

[twolilhahas]

I always thought that "chuck" was "chunk." As in "chuck it here!" I've always said, "Chunk it here."

And I always thought "genius" was spelled "genious" until recently.

[JayLewis]

Anyone ever see the George & Martha cartoon series? I used to watch (in my mid-late 20s) once I realized who did the voices.

Anyone wanna guess who voiced George & Martha?

[themanwho]

Anyone ever see the George & Martha cartoon series? I used to watch (in my mid-late 20s) once I realized who did the voices.

Anyone wanna guess who voiced George & Martha?

Looked it up at the imdb, so I won't post the answer. I will, however, add, "Name another famous couple from the world of Juvie Lit named George and Martha."

-M

[twolilhahas]

George and Martha Wilson. Dennis the Menace.

[sidnelle]

Has anyone else confused "prick up your ears" with "perk up your ears"?

[JD]

I was in my teens before I found out the song played at the beginning of Iowa Public Television's shows about the State Fair each year was not the fair's own theme song, but rather the theme to the movie "How the West Was Won."

[Ken Jennings]

And I always thought "genius" was spelled "genious" until recently.

I've heard many, many people call the standard Trivial Pursuit box the "genius edition."

It's "Genus edition."

[Cynthia]

There is a Looney Toons cartoon in which Bugs Bunny is in the Army and is so incompetent and annoying that his Sergeant assigns him to the task of hitting bombs with a hammer and if they do not go off Bugs Bunny writes the word dud on the bomb. I was well into my thirties before I figured out why this is funny.

[dnkoenigin]

I STILL have never figured out what the real lyrics are at one point in Pat Benetar's "We Belong" (at least, I think that's the title.)

I can only hear "whatever we rely on for brains, for worse or for better". Yeah, I guess I could go and google it...

Kate

[Sean]

I was riding along in a van on, ironically, a trip to a Brain Bowl tournament when a thought suddenly struck me. Apropos of nothing, I burst out laughing because I suddenly realized that the French knight in the famous taunting scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail who said "sniveling English caniggets" was attempting to phonetically pronounce "knights." We hadn't even been discussing the movie or anything, so I have no idea why my brain suddenly decided to drop that on me, but I felt rather silly afterwards.

--Sean

[ninjapirate]

I can't think of one of my own (though I know I have them), but my oldest daughter came home from kindergarten one day after they had begun learning to write their ABC's. She had drawn a picture and labeled it "chree". I asked her delicately what it was and she was quite dumbfounded to realize that I did not recognize her tree.

[MommaJ]

Anyone remember the late sixties song by Friend and Lover called "Reach Out in the Darkness"? (If you weren't born yet, I really don't need to hear about it.) For years my then-boyfriend now-husband was convinced that the chorus, which consisted of the title phrase repeated over and over, was "Freakout in the Garden", and whenever it was played he would loudly sing along using his own lyrics. The song is all about connecting with others (and the word "groovy" is in the lyrics, so you can appreciate the whole 60's hippie touchy-feely vibe), but I really prefer the image of folks going berserk amongst the rhododendrons. For years the same husband also thought he was living in a "doggy dog" world, rather than the usual "dog-eat-dog" one.

[gsong]

Toe the line instead of tow the line I figured out relatively late, and still get wrong.

Only last year did I realize that viceroy simply means vice-king.

And last week while rereading Middlemarch I realized that The Smiths' "How Soon Is Now?", a song that I never listened to before carefully, begins "I am the son and the heir" (a reference to Fred Vincy), not "I am the sun and the air". In this case the ambiguity might be deliberate (emphasizing the messianic feel), but how many times have I heard the song!

(In regard to the trivia-head v. "deep thinker" debate: I've always felt that the distinction lies in learning styles. The trivia-heads I know possess a playful pride in knowing things and a certain fear of embarrassment that leads them to acquire knowledge that will minimize such embarrassment. (These friends also tend punish themselves by immediately declaring their stupidity whenever they get something wrong.) The "deep thinkers" I know are pretty hard to embarrass, and seem to feel that pushing the limits of their knowledge (that is, reading and talking about things above their level) is the best way to increase it. I guess an analogy might be learning to snowboard by braking a lot or crashing a lot.)

[Ken Jennings]

"How Soon Is Now" is about Middlemarch?!

[marxychick1]

I was playing a card game with some friends. I can't remember what it's called, but it's like a standard deck of cards, but there is a fifth suit (stars). Anyway, there are 13 rounds. The wild card depends on what round you're playing. Round One, ones are wild. Round Two, twos are wild. It keeps on going like that. Anyway, we got to Round Eleven, and I asked "So, elevens are wild this time?" Nobody corrected me. I must have tossed out 3 Jacks before I realized what was going on

[Ken Jennings]

(In regard to the trivia-head v. "deep thinker" debate: I've always felt that the distinction lies in learning styles. The trivia-heads I know possess a playful pride in knowing things and a certain fear of embarrassment that leads them to acquire knowledge that will minimize such embarrassment. (These friends also tend punish themselves by immediately declaring their stupidity whenever they get something wrong.) The "deep thinkers" I know are pretty hard to embarrass, and seem to feel that pushing the limits of their knowledge (that is, reading and talking about things above their level) is the best way to increase it. I guess an analogy might be learning to snowboard by braking a lot or crashing a lot.)

This definitely ties in with the innate competitiveness of trivia freaks (also examined in Brainiac). I think the "deep thinkers"' tendency toward dialogue is a sign of their more collaborative learning style. Trivia freaks are less likely to care what you know, as long as they're sure it's less than what they know.

[gsong]

Actually, that was my polite way of saying "deep thinkers" usually are pretty pretentious ... but pretending does often lead to the real thing, I guess. (Like titling a school essay ambitiously then trying to write up to it.) In terms of trivia freaks being competitive, I think as everyone's in on the "game", maybe it's not too different from collaboration?

And I don't know if this belongs in this thread, but I never knew until last month that when we say George W. Bush is our 43rd president we mean non-consecutive terms. A friend and I were writing down names from memory and kept asking each other "Who are we missing? Who are we missing?"

[Lilly]

I was playing a card game with some friends. I can't remember what it's called, but it's like a standard deck of cards, but there is a fifth suit (stars). Anyway, there are 13 rounds. The wild card depends on what round you're playing. Round One, ones are wild. Round Two, twos are wild. It keeps on going like that. Anyway, we got to Round Eleven, and I asked "So, elevens are wild this time?" Nobody corrected me. I must have tossed out 3 Jacks before I realized what was going on

Five Crowns!! I love that game! There is one like it called Quiddler, where you have cards with letters on them and have to spell words instead of making "sets". Same gameplay basics as Five Crowns, but with letters instead of numbers.