Long beautiful locks are something I've always wanted to have. In fact, a few years back I tried to grow out my hair, but it was a disaster. It took a year to grow three stringy inches.
I've always thought that dudes with glorious manes had it made. But apparently they suffer from "identity" issues, not of their own making. Let's discuss...
Redditor u/mistermika06 wanted all the boys out there to share a few tales of mistaken identity by asking:
Long-haired men on reddit, what are the weirdest encounters where someone has mistaken you as a woman?
I've never mistaken a gender from behind. I also don't just assume anything until I have a full profile. Remember when Brad Pitt sported those gorgeous blonde waves of Heaven? There was no mistaking him from behind.
Not Again
long haired man GIF
Giphy
"I was washing my hands in a public restroom and an old man walked in an said "Oh sorry Miss" and scurried out before opening the ladies room and I heard him yell "OH not again." Maybe not the most weird but I could not stop laughing."
- HaV0C
Hey Sexy
"Years ago I was cat called by a passing car of bros who yelled, "nice butt!" I wasn't built back then like I am now, but younger, skinnier me still had a damn dumptruck."
"This has been my fear recently. I over developed my lower body a few years ago so everything below the waist is seriously built. I haven't had a haircut since before the pandemic and add a mask covers my facial hair I notice I get looks from men and women when I walk into stores."
Back in the Day
"Back when I was 10 or something, I was in the local YMCA swimming pool minding my own business. Suddenly these two girls maybe 3 or 4 years older than me ask "excuse me, shouldn't you be wearing a shirt or something?" Then they heard my voice when I responded, and started cracking up, as did I."
Learning Lessons
"Someone grabbed my butt at the bar in a nightclub. I'm 6'3 and have pretty broad shoulders so I'm not sure how drunk they were to make that mistake, just cause I have longish curly blonde hair. I turned around and he apologised and said he thought I was a girl as if that would have somehow been ok. Opened my eyes to the kind of harassment women must get all the time at a club."
bad spin
jimmy fallon lol GIF
Giphy
"I was in college at a party. Hair down, was wet from a shower. Some frat dude walked up behind me, grabbed me by the butt and spun me around. "You want a piece of this!?" Was the first thing that came out of my mouth. To this day I've never seen a more horrified moron."
Best Excuses For Late Assignments That Were Actually True | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
kiss off...
shampoo GIF
Giphy
"Opposite problem. The time there was some woman, who had hair exactly like mine, sitting on a park bench. I had wandered off somewhere and my wife, thinking it was me, came up behind her and decided to give her a big kiss on the top of the head."
Cut It
"I had long hair at 15-17 because my older brother did and his hot gf was always gushing about how hot it was and not enough guys had long hair. Got mistaken for a girl twice. Once at a petrol station the guy gave me change and winked while saying "here you go sweet heart". He was totally hitting on me!"
"Then a few days later when delivering pizza to a family the kid looks at me all confused and says "Mummy is that a boy or a girl?" The mum says "That's impolite". Then after the door closes I hear the kid say "ok but WAS it a girl or a boy?" The mum replied " I really don't know." Cut my hair the next day."
"My brother had a photo of me from that time on display for a couple years. He told me some of his friends asked if I was one of his old girlfriends. I was greatly offended until I actually saw the photo in question and holy crap I definitely looked like a girl! Thankfully he lost that photo and other photos from that time aren't so bad."
"ARE YOU TALKIN' TO ME?"
"At our high school we had an ultra strict rules lawyering woman who monitored the halls and would stop people constantly for anything and everything. Was walking down the halls in high school when I got a "Mam", "Mam", "Maam", "MAAM". Finally she grabbed my shoulder. Now, I had a very baritone voice, even back then."
"So I turned around, exaggerating my deep voice even more and gave her the most booming deep "ARE YOU TALKIN' TO ME?" I could muster. She looked utterly deflated. Absolutely 0 energy or fight left in her due to the embarrassment. She very sheepishly said that I needed to cover my book (it ripped literally 15 minutes earlier) and fled the scene with her tail between her legs."
- Dubanx
Mommy!
"Once (when my hair was slightly shorter) I was taking the metro to DC when this kid and his mom got on a few stops after me and sat in the row right behind me. The kid was talking a lot about nothing, as kids tend to do when they first learn to put a full sentence together. I could hear him over my music."
"Then, he starts talking about some "Hey! The girl up there has more hair than YOU, mommy! Look! Look, her hair is longer than yours. You're not looking mommy!" I turned to look out the window as we exit a tunnel, then he says, "WHOA! She's a Boy."
"Never mind, mommy!" I locked eyes with the mom who just laughed and told the kid to sit and be quiet for a while."A few minutes later, he asks his mom how boys can grow longer hair than girls to which mom says "I don't know, but I can always buy some more hair if I want it to be longer. I don't always have to grow it all by myself." The kid was stunned."
Hey Dude
jared leto mars GIF
Giphy
"Dude slapped my butt and called me a fine looking wh**e. So I punched him. I think I'm slightly better looking then just fine. But after that I grew out my beard and no one has slapped my butt again yet."
- Koobitz
1989
"In 1989 I was still getting wavy perms because my Mom liked them. (yeah yeah, Momma's boy) It had just been done and my hair was almost curly. I was driving to Pitt for school and some guy drove up behind me honking and flashing his lights. I pulled over and he jumped out and as he ran up to my car I was opening my door. As I swung my legs out he saw that I was a painfully skinny guy and stopped flat."
"I said, "what's the problem?" He stammered for a second and replied, "I think you have a flat tire!," got back into his car, and drove off. I kicked the tire. It was fine. I had no idea what had happened. I just thought he made a mistake. In retrospect, years later, I often wondered what was really going on. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened that day if I had been a woman."
- raydude
The Duo
"I was young at the time. My mother and I got pulled over for a "investigation" by a well-known less-than-noble officer who liked his women's age on a clock. He asked my mother for her license, proof-of-purchase, and all that good stuff. We exchanged glances, and I saw his disgust as he realized I was a dude. He probably thought we were a mother/daughter prostitute duo, because those were very common in the area. Boy, did he have a surprise."
Hey Lady
"I've been catcalled from cars who only saw me from the back a couple times. Once at a bar a friend and I were at table, a old dude walked past us, again I had my back to him and he said "evening ladies" to which I responded "I'm not a lady". Guy got super embarrassed, we got a kick out of it."
It's Miss...
Flaunt Long Hair GIF by VPRO
Giphy
"Ma'am? Ma'am? MA'AM! That's the men's room! <pause> Oh my god, I'm so sorry!"
- ErWenn
At the Game
"Alright, so this was way back when I was in High School and had been growing my hair out for a few years now. So to set the scene, me and my family went to a baseball game and my older sister got to bring her boyfriend along with her. Now, after the game, we were all walking back to the parking garage, so big procession of people leaving the stadium with panhandlers everywhere, as you'd expect. That's when one of the panhandlers calls out to my sister's boyfriend, "Hey man, you've got two girls hanging off you, surely you've got some spare change for me."
Even Worse Bro
"My brother was thin and had long hair when he turned 21. He was standing next to the table when a dude walked by and and squeezed a cheek. The grabber realized he was a man and got all freaked out and was like "ahh man. I thought you were a chick. I'm sorry. We told him that still wouldn't be cool even if he were a woman. The bartender "asked" him to leave."
- Redd889
Cafe Days
"Almost 20 years ago I was in a redneck town in the middle of the night with a female friend. We go into this coffee shop and this guy standing in the doorway says all lecherously "Hey ladies!". I say "Evening," and his eyes get huge and he bolts out the door. We go in and this immense man yells out "HE SURE TOLD YOU! HAHAHAHA! We just got our coffee and donuts and got out asap."
That You?
Confused Picture GIF by Bluey
Giphy
"Not me, cuz I'm a girl, but once, my aunt saw an old picture of my parents and asked who the ugly girl with my mom was. It was my dad. The picture was taken when they were teenagers."
HER?
"When I was about 13 I had a long muff of hair and a part time job pushing carts at the grocery store. A coworker and I were pushing in a big load of carts and this older dude comes up and says to my coworker "I bet she's making you do all the work!" and then walks away. My coworker turns to me and says "did he just call you a girl?" I was slightly embarrassed but not enough to part ways with that glorified shag carpet."
What have we learned? Basic life lesson 101. Assume Nothing! Know you're addressing the person you believe you're addressing. And men with long beautiful hair are still Gods among men.
Want to "know" more? Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again. Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.
For many childhood memories are overrun by living nightmares.
Yes, children are resilient, but that doesn't mean that the things we see as babes don't follow us forever.
The horrors of the world are no stranger to the young.
Redditor -2sweetcaramel- wanted to see who was willing to share about the worst things we've seen as kids, so they asked:
"What’s the creepiest thing you saw as a kid?"
Serious Danger
"Me and my best friend would explore the drainage tunnels under the Vegas area where we grew up. These were miles long and it was always really cool down there so it was a good way to escape the heat of our scorching hot summers. We went into this one that goes under the Fiesta casino and found a camp with a bunch of homeless people."
"Mind you we are like 11 years old lol. And we just kept going like it was nothing. It wasn’t scary then but when I look back at it we could have been in some serious danger. Our parents had no idea we did this or where we were and we had no cellphones. We could have been kidnapped and never have been found."
oofboof2020
Waiting for Food
"I was at a portillos once when I was 12 and I was waiting with my little brother at a booth while my parents got our food. This guy was standing with his tray kind of watching me then after a couple of minutes he started to walk over really fast not breaking eye contact with me."
"He was 2 feet from the table and my dad came out of nowhere and scared the s**t out of him. He looked so surprised and just said he wanted to see if I’d get scared or not. He left his tray full of food near the door and left. My folks reported him but we never went to that location again since we found a better one closer to home."
nowhereboy1964
Captain Hobo to the Rescue
"When I was a pretty young teen, my friends and I were horsing around in San Francisco and started hanging out to smoke with some homeless guys. Another homeless dude came up and began aggressively trying to shake us down for anything (money, smokes, a ride, drugs- all of it) and wouldn’t take no for an answer."
"We got in over our heads and could tell this guy was now riling the other 2 guys up and they were acting like they wanted to jump us. Some grandfather-looking old homeless man appeared out of nowhere and yelled at us to get the f**k out of here- nice kids like us don’t belong down here at this hour!!"
"Captain Hobo saved our lives that night. My parents sincerely thought we were at a mall all day lol."
FartAttack911
Survival
tsunami GIF
Giphy
"I was 7 and survived the 2004 tsunami in Thailand. Witnessed the wave rise way above the already massive palm trees (approx. 40ft?) and my family and I watched/heard the wave crash into the ground from a rooftop."
faithfulpoo
These Tsunami stories are just tragic.
On the Sand
Scared The Launch GIF by CTV
Giphy
"We were a group of kids who went to swim in a local lake. And there was a dead body on the beach with their hands raised and their legs bent unnaturally that local police just took out of the same lake. I've never put my foot in these waters again."
oyloff
Be Clever
"I was walking to school and I was about 5 or 6 years old and some guy pulled up beside me in his car and asked if I would get in. He also offered me sweets to do so. I said no. The creepy bit was when he calmly said ‘clever boy’ to me, then drove off. I’ve never even told my parents or anyone else about this as it would most likely freak them out."
OstneyPiz
Bad Jokes
"Dad's side of the family pranked me by burying a fake body on our back property and had me dig it up to find valuables. Was only allowed to use a lantern for light. They stuffed old clothes with chicken bones. Sheetrock mud where the head was... Random fake jewelry as the treasures... I was like maybe 10 or 11.. I remember digging up the boot first and started gagging because it became real at that point."
Alegan239
YOU
Who Are You Reaction GIF by MOODMAN
Giphy
"Woke up to find my little brother staring at me in the dark, asking, Are you really you?"
PrettyLola2004
Siblings can really be a bunch of creepers.
No one should talk to others in the dark though.
Not all pet owners have the same relationship with their pets.
While anyone who decides to become a pet owner, or pet parent as some say, love their pets equally, some never ever let them leave their side.
Taking their pet with them to work, running errands, even on vacations.
Many pet parents even allow their pets to share their bed with them when going to sleep.
For others though, this is where a line is finally drawn.
Redditor Piggythelavasurfer was curious to hear whether pet owners allowed their pets to share their bed with them, as well as the reasons why they do/don't, leading them to ask:
"Do you let your pet sleep in your bed? Why/why not?"
The Tiny Issue Of Water...
"Absolutely not."
"I have fish."- Senior-Meal3649
Everyone Gets Lonely Eventually...
"I adopted an eleven year old cat the day before Halloween."
"She has mostly lived in my closet since I got her, and she hasn’t been too interested in coming out."
"Last night, she came out of my closet and jumped up on my bed, and crawled under my covers and curled up by my feet to sleep."
"I was so happy!"- YellowBeastJeep
The Comforting Reminder That You're Not Alone...
"I recently lost my Greyhound but I used to let him sleep on my bed with me."
"The company was nice and he was no trouble to have on my bed."- HoodedMenace3
Hungry Cookie GIF by De Graafschap Dierenartsen
Giphy
What Do You Mean Allow?
"I have no choice."
"She is a cat, cats do whatever they want."- Small_cat1412
"He lets me sleep in my bed."- Poorly-Drawn-Beagle
Wouldn't Have It Any Other Way
"I carry my old boy upstairs to bed every night."- worst_in_show
Hug GIF by The BarkPost
Giphy
Who Needs An Alarm Clock?
"I let my two cats sleep with me."
"They're so full of love and just want cuddles all the time."
"And so do I."
"We've all developed a lil routine."
"Get to bed, oldest sleeps on my feet to keep them warm, youngest lies in my arm while I lie on my side (she the little spoon), then when I snooze my alarm for work in the morning the youngest paws at my face and meeps loudly to wake me up."- GhostofaFlea_
Whose Bed Is It Anyway?
"Yes."
"They're also kind enough to let me squeeze into whatever space they've left for me."
"Although I do get a few dirty looks off them."- Therealkaylor
"I found this tiny kitten screaming her head off under a car."
"Would not come out."
"Got some food and some water in dishes."
"I stood by the tire so she couldn't see my feet."
"She got curious about the food and water and started gobbling it down."
"I thought she would bolt when I squatted down."
"She was too busy eating."
"I grabbed her by the nape of the neck and all four legs went straight out and she tried to scratch me to death."
"I got her in the door and tossed her toward the couch."
"She ricocheted off the couch as if she was a ping pong off a table and I lost sight of her."
"I put out food and water and a sandbox and did not see that kitten for three days."
"On the third day, I came home and she was on my bed pillow."
"I thought she would bolt when I came near, but she didn't."
"I wanted to sleep so I tried to scoot her little butt off my pillow."
"She would not go."
"I put my head down to sleep and that is the way it was from then on."
"She ran the roost."- Logical_Cherry_7588
sleepy kitten GIF
Giphy
Sleeping Is A Prerequisite...
"No, he's a cat and he cannot keep still during the night."
"He walks across the headboard, opens the closet doors, jumps into the windows and rustles the blinds, etc."
"If he would sleep he could stay, but alas, he's a ramblin' man."- Spong_Durnflungle
Saying No Just Isn't An Option...
"'Let'."
"Lol."
"It's a cat's world and I'm happy to be on her good side."- milaren
Felines Only!
"The cat does, the dog doesn't and the horse certainly does not either."- Xcrowzz
Angry Tom And Jerry GIF by Boomerang Official
Giphy
Is That My Hair On That Pillow?
"My dog is perfect."
"She comes up, cuddles til we start to fall asleep, then gets down to sleep on her bed so she doesn't get too hot."
"Jumps back up in the early morning for wake up cuddles."
"The hair everywhere is the only downside but she is so cozy, what can you do."- HoodieWinchester
It is easy to understand how some people are able to fall asleep more easily knowing their friend and protector is there, in bed, with them.
Though we can't blame others who don't want to run the risk of being scratched or bitten in the middle of the night either...