I done a stupid

[dissolute ocelot]

I thought Ted Heath (the jazz guy) was the Prime Minister.

Understandable because Edward Heath the child-murderer politician was a big classical music fan and did actually conduct orchestras a few times, as well as playing piano. So to a child it's perfectly understandable to think the politician who conducts orchestras also had a successful musical career. Especially as Ted Heath bandleader died the year before Heath became PM. No I certainly didn't confuse the two myself.

[Bentpitch]

I think I was about 15 when the shocking realisation came to me that the sky was always blue,  there were just sometimes clouds in the way. I'd never been on a plane.

[amateur]

Thought "albeit" was pronounced "ab-lite"

[madhair60]

I think I was about 15 when the shocking realisation came to me that the sky was always blue,  there were just sometimes clouds in the way. I'd never been on a plane.

This isn't true. It is not blue at night time

[Underturd]

He's right, you know, I bet you feel extra stupid now.

[Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse]

Was watching a documentary about ice age megafauna focusing on sabre-toothed cats, "terror birds" (massive carnivorous flightless birds) and dire wolves. Narrator: "Only one of these top predators would survive to the present day"

Me: I WONDER WHICH ONE

right before footage of WOLVES, DUH.

[Gurke and Hare]

I had a similar issue that caused me untold angst, except it was a 1980s headline on the frontpage of The Sun:

"PAUL MCCARTNEY - WHY I'M SCARED MY VICE GIRLS MIGHT HAVE AIDS"

You only saw the headline, I guess? I'm curious about the sense in which they were Paul McCartney's vice girls. It makes it sound like he had a sideline as a pimp.

[Underturd]

Or he had a part time job in Screwfix

[Bentpitch]

He's right, you know, I bet you feel extra stupid now.

What a mistake-a to make-a. More fool me.

[kngen]

the first time I saw the word 'miniseries' I read it myself as 'mi-NIH-zer-ees' and thought it was along the line of ministrations, but with a more lugubrious feel, like lamentations or something else vaguely biblical. 'The miniseries of Job' - that sort of thing. How I got that from a short article about a Brookside spin-off, I'll never know.

[Underturd]

Some people who lived in Brookside Close were often miniserable, so it's fair.

[Jockice]

Once phoned up directory enquiries and they went "Name?" and I said "Ross."

At the box office of an over-18s venue while aged 17. 'Can I have two tickets please?' 'Who for?' 'Me and my cousin...'

Even after that they let me buy them. And Big Country were very good.

[kngen]

I've just read Matthew Perry's autobiog and apparently in the 70s it was perfectly acceptable to literally put a sign around a child's neck saying UNACCOMPANIED MINOR  and stick them on a long plane journey on their own. He goes on at length about how it contributed to messing him up and he wasn't even interfered with. 

OT a bit, but I watched The Parallax View the other day, and there's a bit where Warren Beatty tails a guy the airport then follows him on to a commercial flight - like, just wanders onto the tarmac and climbs the stairs, without a soul stopping him, or even enquiring what he's up to. He sits down and the steward comes over (Oh! Here we go! You've been rumbled, Warren, son!'
'Where are you going? 'Umm, Phoenix.' 'One way?' Yes please' 'That'll be $50 then', which she writes down on a piece of paper. He then pulls some crumpled dollar bills out of his pocket and hands them over.

It was great - like an 8-year-old's version of commercial aviation. It's also the environment that Matthew Perry was flying around in, presumably. I mean, at least now there are manifests and logs and computer records that, you'd imagine, limit the proclivities of sky-nonces. Back then it was like a Greyhound bus with wings. Mental.

[kngen]

Some people who lived in Brookside Close were often miniserable, so it's fair.

'Harry Cross! You miniserable sod!

[idunnosomename]

The sky isnt blue at all. Fly up and look down, do you see anything blue above the land? No.

[Jockice]

As a pretentious teenager mentioned reading Camus. Pronounced as it looks. Until someone younger than me told me it wasn't.

[Fishfinger]

During the interval of a stage production of "The Woman in Black", a work colleague recommended I read the original novel. "Oh, yeah I will, what's it called?"

[Underturd]

Well the name of an adaptation isn't always the same as the name of the source, so that isn't necessarily stupid.

[Fishfinger]

I was about to add: we worked in a bookshop where we'd sold many, many copies of it.

[Underturd]

Verdict: done a stupid.

[badaids]

You only saw the headline, I guess? I'm curious about the sense in which they were Paul McCartney's vice girls. It makes it sound like he had a sideline as a pimp.

I did only read the headline.  My mother got The Sun, The Mirror and The Star delivered. But only for the bingo.

But yes today, I would love to read this article and find out what the bloody hell they were on about. I've done a Google search a few times but never managed to track down a copy. I don't know if the sun has an archive.

[Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse]

DEMeter? I've been calling her DeMEETer

[Fishfinger]

Verdict: done a stupid.

Now I feel seen.

[Theoretical Dentist]

I thought the word 'hierarchy' (which I guess I'd only heard) was 'High Iraqi', which i assumed was like an Iraqi version of the Supreme Soviet. I didn't know what a soviet was, only aware of the word as an adjective for things related to the Soviet Union, so I thought that kind of formula was a general thing for naming countries' governing bodies.

[Clatty McCutcheon]

I think I was about 15 when the shocking realisation came to me that the sky was always blue,  there were just sometimes clouds in the way. I'd never been on a plane.

Scientists now believe that the constituent parts of the sky are as follows:

Colourless gas      54%
Wind                     43%
Birds, insects etc. 3%

You will see then that none of the ingredients of the sky are blue in colour, so it cannot be blue.

[Clatty McCutcheon]

That reminds me, I used to think that when weather observations recorded 'light air', that meant that the air was less dense or something. It seemed to happen when air pressure was high though, so that didn't seem quite right.

At some point I discovered that 'light air' is an actual category of wind speed on the Beaufort scale, meaning very slight movement in the air - not quite calm but not even enough to be a 'gentle breeze'.

I'm sure everyone here already knew that though.

[Jockice]

This wasn't mine but someone on the classified ads section of my old paper once translated someone in the personal columns looking for 'hedonistic adventures' as 'head on a stick' ones

[wrec]

As a pretentious teenager mentioned reading Camus. Pronounced as it looks. Until someone younger than me told me it wasn't.

I did this. Albert (as in Uncle) Kah-muss. Felt better about it when I heard of someone mentioning Beck-ay.

[popcorn]

I think I was about 15 when the shocking realisation came to me that the sky was always blue,  there were just sometimes clouds in the way. I'd never been on a plane.

Yep me too. I think I was a bit younger than 15 but not by much, maybe 11 or 12. My mum told me.

[Gurke and Hare]

OT a bit, but I watched The Parallax View the other day, and there's a bit where Warren Beatty tails a guy the airport then follows him on to a commercial flight - like, just wanders onto the tarmac and climbs the stairs, without a soul stopping him, or even enquiring what he's up to. He sits down and the steward comes over (Oh! Here we go! You've been rumbled, Warren, son!'
'Where are you going? 'Umm, Phoenix.' 'One way?' Yes please' 'That'll be $50 then', which she writes down on a piece of paper. He then pulls some crumpled dollar bills out of his pocket and hands them over.

It was great - like an 8-year-old's version of commercial aviation. It's also the environment that Matthew Perry was flying around in, presumably. I mean, at least now there are manifests and logs and computer records that, you'd imagine, limit the proclivities of sky-nonces. Back then it was like a Greyhound bus with wings. Mental.

American airports have always looked weirdly lax on TV. Even relatively recently, if a character needs to stop someone catching a flight for whatever reason they always go to the airport and get right up to the gate just in time to see the person vanishing along the skybridge. What, so you didn't have to scan a boarding pass to get to security then?