I Used To Believe newsletter: May 2010
Hi,
Monsters usually cause a lot of problems - this week it's crocodiles which are lurking under the bed or tailing cars. It's not a problem so long as you've got an expendable sibling or a parent who drives fast.
Have fun,
Mat.
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I thought that the reason there was glass over the instrument panel in a car (battery gauge, fuel, etc.) was to prevent people from manually grabbing the speedometer needle and jamming it well over 100 mph - because accelerating that quickly was almost certainly illegal.
andrew
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I used to always want to go to Antarctica because I thought I'd be able to stand upside down. I wasn't a bright child...
Anon
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When I was young my dad would say that "Christmas was around the corner" and so I would ride my bike to the end of the block and around the bend looking for snow and Christmas lights.
jessie
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When I was younger I used to believe that the darker your skin was, the darker your shadow would be.
Mary S.
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All throughout elementary school, I believed that it was illegal for teachers to come into the bathrooms. So, during class, when we had an assignment I didn't want to do, I would tell the teacher I had to go to the bathroom. I would stay in the bathroom stall playing my GameBoy or reading a book for about 45 minutes and return to class when the the assignments were about over. When the teacher would take me aside and ask why I was in the bathroom for so long, I pretended to be embarrassed and told her I had bad constipation. I never got caught, and was usually excused from the assignments. Foolproof.
Colton
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I used to believe that there was a little man living in my stomach that was constantly trying to crawl up my throat and out through my mouth. To keep him from escaping, I had to be sure to eat and drink every day.
Anon
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When I was little, my grandpa told me that we could grow worms (using a bucket full of dirt and sprinkle sugar on top). Every time I went there I would see the worms. Didn't know until later that he would run into the garden before I showed up to dig them up.
Mindy
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Around age 8, I got to help my mom work the concession stand at the recreational soccer fields on Saturdays. She couldn't understand why I was so excited to sit in a hot shack all afternoon. I cried when I was told that I didn't get to keep the money from all the candy and Gatorade I sold.
andrew
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I used to believe that if I didn't use up a pencil within the week that I had first sharpened it, it would grow back into a tree. Needless to say, my mom was very angry when she had to buy new pencils all the time!
Anon
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When I was younger, I truly believed that if someone ever tried to drown me it wouldn't work because I could just keep drinking all the water until it disappeared. I was confused when people did drown and thought "why didn't they just keep drinking?"
Stewart
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One day in second grade everyone had to stand up and give a presentation about what nationality our family was. When it was my turn, I got up in front of the class and declared that I was half Irish and half Catholic. I had never even thought otherwise; it didn't make sense that I could be 100% Irish and 100% Catholic. After noticing that my teacher could hardly contain her laughter throughout my presentation, I later asked my mom about it and learned that these were not mutually exclusive characteristics.
Anon
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I once heard somewhere a statistic about ducks flying into airplanes. Somehow I got it in my head that ducks could fly faster than airplanes. I used to ride in the plane and look out the window for ducks to flap on by. I was always amazed at how fast they were. In 10th grade, I said it out loud to someone for the first time, and realized how silly it was!
J$
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When I used to take baths with my big sister as a child, my 16 year old sister told us that if you put sea salt in the bathtub that you would turn into a mermaid. When she put the salt in, it took 5 minutes before my sister and I started thinking that we could see fins! We ran out of the bathroom so fast!! haha
Brookey:D
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When I was in kindergarten, sometimes my teacher would make kids stay inside during recess to do "make-up" work. I was always extremely jealous of these kids because I thought make-up work meant you got to play with make-up. I imagined kids sitting around the teacher's desk primping and applying lipstick! Then, after I had chickenpox, I finally had my own make-up work. I was SO disappointed when I realized what it really was!
Ashley
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When I was a kid I never realized there were airports, so I thought planes had long ladders that you climbed up.
Jeff
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When I was a little girl, my grandma told me that if you stretched after you ate, the food would come out of your ears. As I got older, I realized it was impossible. But still to this day, if I see someone stretching after a meal, I tell them, "stop, or the food's gonna come out your ears."
Jennifer
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I lived near a high school when I was growing up, and one day I asked one of the football players coming home after a game what he had in his duffle bag. He told me that football was a violent sport, and he had body parts of the players that got beaten up in the game - I believed him for years, and concluded that he was taking them home to bury them in his backyard!!
MO
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Not knowing the word "tailgater" I assumed that it must be a variety of alligator. Family trips to Colorado were terrifying for me, given that my father spent hours cursing all the tailgaters that were RIGHT... BEHIND... OUR CAR.
fjfjdv
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I used to think a giant crocodile lived under my bed, so I sent my little sister under there to get rid of it for me.
Courtney
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When I was a child in the late 80s and early 90s, blue eyeshadow was wildly popular in my area. So, I thought that when a girl grew up, her eyelids would naturally take on a light bluish tinge.
Emily
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