Another thread about cluelessness

[alpinerabbit]

Before I spoke decent English, I had no clue what exactly Frank Zappa's song "Bobby Brown" was about. I just liked the song.

also, I thought "Rocky Horror Picture Show" was pretty innocuous fun. Yeah I got that it was about "initiation", but had no idea it might offend people.

At least twice I was clueless about someone having a crush on me. But that evens out with my having eternal crushes on several guys.

[mimitabby]

I started out clueless, but life taught me to grow up fast.

when i was in 8th grade, the kids had a field day with me because i did not know the slang words that most kids knew. I knew the long proper words, (thanks mom) but had no idea that pricks were body parts, etc.



as a sophomore, a teacher asked us if anyone in our families had a drinking problem. I was living with a detested drunk stepfather at the time and I raised my hand. NO ONE ELSE DID. Humiliated and infuriated, i turned to my class and said, "you mean NONE of you have a family member that drinks too much?" no one would look at me.

I knew my trigometry teacher was gay when I was a senior. I despised the way he flirted with innocent boys. I had the same disgust for the handsome young chemistry teacher who acted like he was buddies to the "in crowd" in our classroom. Imagine my disappointment when i went back to my highschool 30 years later and he was the only teacher left that was there when I was.

[redrhodie]

When I was about to leave my old job, I found out one of my coworkers had dated our boss before either of us had started working there. I had no idea! It made some of the company dynamics a lot more clear!

[indigoiis]

When I first got into raising alpacas, our mentors kept talking about "spit tests" to determine pregnancy. I didn't know what the heck they were talking about - do the animals spit on a progesterone card? Do we collect spit and then run a test on it?

I found out after I conjectured, in front of a lot of other farmers, the above theory. Everyone laughed. Then we went out to witness a "real" spit test. All it is is bringing in a male alpaca to the paddock, and if a female spits at him, she's 95% of the time preggers.

Boy was my face red.

[Pax]

When I first got into raising alpacas, our mentors kept talking about "spit tests" to determine pregnancy. I didn't know what the heck they were talking about - do the animals spit on a progesterone card? Do we collect spit and then run a test on it?

I found out after I conjectured, in front of a lot of other farmers, the above theory. Everyone laughed. Then we went out to witness a "real" spit test. All it is is bringing in a male alpaca to the paddock, and if a female spits at him, she's 95% of the time preggers.

Boy was my face red.

When we moved home from Italy I was placed in a civilian school populated with farm kids, there were bovines wandering about the pasture next to the school and I asked if they were boy or girl cows and was the bull a boy or girl bull...I had no idea that cow = female and bull = male.

[mimitabby]

When we moved home from Italy I was placed in a civilian school populated with farm kids, there were bovines wandering about the pasture next to the school and I asked if they were boy or girl cows and was the bull a boy or girl bull...I had no idea that cow = female and bull = male.

oh, that's really cute! ( I love the spit test story too!)

[alpinerabbit]

oh geez that reminds me. my 2nd grade best friend made animal sounds while we were playing with toy ponies, she thought they go "pon-pon"....

[shootingstar]

also, I thought "Rocky Horror Picture Show" was pretty innocuous fun. Yeah I got that it was about "initiation", but had no idea it might offend people.

Well, I'm still clueless about this one.
I am not aware of any teachers as gay. I'm still clueless.

*We had a high school math teacher that was an alcoholic. He didn't hide it. He kept his bottle of booze in his top desk drawer. This caused great amusement amongst us at that time: the guy must have been clueless-drunk to do that.

*When I was in my early 20's, I went to a wedding shower of a good friend. A guest was in a wheelchair. She was a lovely, gracious person. After the party, I found out she was transsexual. The first transsexual I had personally met. I haven't met one since...but then I might be clueless...once again.

*When I was in kindergarten and not knowing English at all. First month was awful. After school, the (white) boys taunted me and called me: "Jap" and tripped me. Pitched stones at me. It was 1964. After awhile, they stopped, when I befriended some gals. (Or I should say, they wanted to protect me.) For the next 10 yrs., I never understood why they flung the term at me: "Jap" since I was Chinese. Then I figured out later, this must have been hangover of fear/resentment of the Japanese-Canadians/Americans during WWII and how they were misunderstood, relocated to camps, etc. I didn't know about this part of North American history until I was 18. Clueless, yes. Humilated and yes, abit traumatized as a child...when other people are cruelly clueless to others.

*When I was 19, found out my work supervisor was gay and in love with another floor supervisor. I had no clue ...and same for many other women employed there also. This was at a retail store. They announced their love..and broke up not long thereafter.

*I've told this story on TE forums under a different topic, but here it is again:
My parents bought their lst house, a dilapidated place with a backyard. During our lst spring, we noticed this huge low bush of large leaves with red stalk. We hacked up the bush since it had to be a pesky weed. But it kept growing back every spring. Several YEARS later we found out we had several bushes of ...rhubarb growing.

[indigoiis]

That last story reminds me of when I worked in a b&b in a tourist town. Two German tourists came and I gave them a map and directions to the Cliff Walk. They came back with armfulls of a lovely, shiny leaved green vine that they intended to use to make wreaths. I looked at the plants and told them I thought they were poison ivy. Sure enough, next day they were both covered in raw, pink welts. D'OH!