Pet Owners Describe The Most Bizarre Thing Their Fur Baby Has Ever Done
Animals are weird. They just are. And the more time you spend with them, the more you begin to realize they each have unique personalities, talents and ... shall we say "quirks."
What we're saying is if you own a pet, you're going to end up at least once staring as your pet does something ridiculous and asking "What is wrong with you?"
My partner, kids, and I have always loved animals - so we've pretty much had a small zoo between us. My partner grew up with peacocks and emus (both of which are species deeply loathed to this day.)
Lots of animals means lots of chance for weird. We've had a fish who liked to play ping-pong and be pet and a dog that insists on holding hands while hanging out.
... and then there's Optimus Prime.
He's a 90 lb pit bull that makes Marley from "Marley And Me" look like a zenmaster. He likes to get high on CBD (he knows where it's kept and steals doses) and then let himself out and sunbathe. Yeah, the dog likes to wake & bake. If he were a human, he'd listen to a lot of Phish and smell like patchouli - guaranteed.
But that's not his most "inconvenient" trick. That award goes to his ability to open doors. Doors of all kinds. Gate? Front door? Sliding door? Cage door? None of it has been able to stop him.
When we took him to get neutered, he let himself out of the cage at the vet's office to visit all the other animals... and maybe to pop into exam rooms while the vet was seeing other patients. Thankfully, our vet is used to our "interesting" pets.
Still, that wasn't his most bizarre adventure.
A few days after we adopted him, he let himself out the front door, walked down the street, found an unlocked front door, let himself into a neighbors house, ate their treats, played with their dogs and helped himself to a nap on their couch. We got a phone call from a very confused neighbor wondering why our dog was just casually hanging out in their living room.
So yeah... awkward way to meet the neighbors.
I imagine they sat around watching the Ring doorbell video of a giant dog opening their door, closing it behind himself, and basically throwing himself a puppy frat party with a look on their face like:
Reddit user abasicgirl asked about weird pet behaviors and started a thread you absolutely don't want to miss.
The people who responded kept us laughing - so here are some of our favorites!
Squirmy Wormy
My dog is fascinated by worms - he doesn't eat them or anything, but he gets totally hypnotised by their wriggling and can stare at one for literally hours. 🐛
Usually after he picks up a girthy branch and there are some underneath. So he just stands there with the heavy branch in his mouth for minimum 20 minutes. There's probably something wrong with him but it's hard to tell because is dog
The Rug
When I was a kid, we had this big area rug in our living room. One day our dog kept trying to lift the edge with his nose like he was trying to get under it. As soon as anyone walked in the room he would stop like he got caught doing something bad.
So one day, I spied on him from the stairs and realized what he was trying to do. As he lifted the edge of the rug, he started rolling it up. He kept going until the rug was completely rolled up. He then proceeded to get on it and hump the living sh!t out of that thing like it was his last day on Earth.
I busted out laughing which spooked him and he darted out of the room.
The Lying Faker
My dog's understanding of the 2 window system at fast food drive thrus is that the person at the first window is a malicious no-food-having lying faker a-hole, then the person at the second window is a genuinely nice person who has food. She HATES the person at the first window.
She will be her happy go lucky self until we pull up to the first window to pay. As soon as we pull up, she turns her head away and scowls. She refuses to even look at the jerk in the first window. When I pull away, she immediately goes back to being her happy self.
- opkc
Collared
One of my cats (who sadly passed in 2016 at the age of 11) when he was like 1 or 2 years old went outside of our garden, he was gone for 4 hours and he came back without his collar. About 5 minutes after he came back he leaves again, and he's gone for another 2 hours, he comes back with his collar in his mouth, and drops it at my mums feet.
Cat did the walk of shame and realized he forgot his underwear and had to go back and get it.
- Hock3y
It Fits
My parrot sticks his beak up my nose and just sits there (he's a smaller parrot, so it fits. Ugh.)
Paws
My cat will shove her dirty poop burying paws into any open glass of water and then... nothing, that's it. She doesn't drink it or lick it or anything. Drives my wife up the wall.
Wrestlemania
My grandparents have a massive staircase in the middle of their house. It had a little landing in the middle. We used to bring our dog over to their house because he was best buddies with their dog.
Well, one day my dumb dumb dog decided that he was going to climb to the landing of the stairs and then jump down on top of their dog. He wasn't chasing anything or whatever, he was just being a jerk.
Luckily both dogs were both pretty small (no more than like 25lbs) so there were no injuries, but I still think about that little moron every time I see that landing. I miss him.
Green Beans
I don't know if it's bizarre but my cat loves green beans. I'm talking like I buy a bag of green beans and she knows I have them before I even walk in the door.
She acts like a puppy who hasn't seen me in years when I have them, begging me and jumping on me until I dump them into a bowl for her to then sort through them and find the perfect green bean. She then picks one out with her teeth and will toss it around the house for herself like it's a live rat.
She doesn't eat them. Just throws them around the house to play with until it's dead enough that she wants a new one then will howl at the fridge until we let her pick a new one out to play with.
Okay, I guess it's pretty bizarre....
Play Dead
We tried giving my hamster some medicine because he had a small kidney problem and he faked a death , VERY VERY exaggeratedly, like stuck his tongue to the side of his mouth and going limp.
- Zenyk07
Like A Bat
My roommate's cat clings to the underside of my bed, cutting through the box spring with her claws, upside down. She hangs there like a bat and meows loudly until someone gives her attention. When I look under, all I see is murder eyes.
Morning Routine
My alarm went off and I sleepily sat up in bed. My cat who had been sleeping a split second before, suddenly streaked off my bed and out the room. As usual I desperately needed the loo and went to the bathroom. There was my cat, sitting on the toilet seat, peeing into the toilet and refusing to make eye contact. I had to do a credible version of the toilet tango while he finished up and eventually jumped down to demand breakfast as I finally managed to get my own relief.
At least I finally knew why the toilet water was constantly yellow even though no-one else lived there. When I moved to my current home, the new toilet seat was slanted and he went back to using the litter box.
Our family's Maltese/Poodle was a sweet, friendly, thing to everyone in the world unless you did us the service of delivering mail. Then you were a monster and she'd bark her fool head off while shredding letters. But it was her perception that blew me away.
One day I ran a chore and invited her for a car ride, something she loved. Her head was on a swivel as she took in the passing scene. Then we stopped at a light and I heard this low growl. What the fu--? Among all the pedestrians on the sidewalk, she had spotted, across the street, a mail carrier in uniform, waiting in a bus queue.
- carmium
Rude
Our African Gray parrot, Desi called our Orkin man "fat*ss", and the guy could have been the spokesperson for Bigger & Taller. He only did it once, and it wasn't to his face - but to the guys backside when he was bent over spraying the baseboards.
He also knows when french fries enters the house, and demands tribute.
I could come home, and go front door straight to my office with fries, and he never gets a chance to see me, and I will hear him banging for fries.
- Kukri187
If we think back to our childhood and school years, we likely can remember someone who was always getting into trouble.
The assumption at the time might have been that this child was going nowhere, but as some will point out, these troubled kids can wind up being just as successful as everyone else, if not even more so.
Redditor bluewhalebluejay asked:
"Teachers of Reddit: Do you have a former student who you thought was doomed but ended up making it big? What's their story?"
Being Someone's Beacon
"I've had a few kids stand out."
"One of my first ones was a kid who was in my grade 10 drama class. Nice kid to me, with no major issues. Funny, not super academically inclined, but started to really like drama and we got along."
"He missed class somewhat frequently for excused absences that were noted as 'court.' I assume mostly weed related... just because of reasons. But I never asked."
"Anyway, halfway through the semester, he came in and announced it was his last day because he was being sent to juvie and he was upset he wouldn't be able to continue in drama (his other courses they could manage through distance education type things)."
"Was subbing back at the school the following year and ran into him. He'd caught up on all his missing credits while in juvie because he 'had nothing better to do so why not get some s**t done.' He was going to now graduate on time and was super proud of himself. Not sure where he's ended up now ten years later, but weed is legal now so as long as he's not dealing, so hopefully he's doing okay."
"Different school and where I ended up getting a permanent position so I stayed in the same place for a while, had this girl show up in grade nine and had her for Arts and English. She was... a lot. She would fully shut down and just not do anything. Or talk. Or she'd have a full-blown tantrum. She was exhausting."
"I drug her along through the Arts class and got her participating some days, which was apparently huge because in elementary, she was just left to do nothing all day because she wasn't disruptive. I jokingly suggested she take Drama with me the following year, but she hated speaking in public so figured that was a no-go."
"Did get her to do the lighting for the school show, though. She took drama every year. By the end of grade 12, she engaged with people, she could speak in front of the class, and she was completing credits (slowly and with a lot of support), but you could get work out of her. Apparently, I became her favorite teacher and I was one of the only ones she would do work for initially. But my god was she a lot of work some days. Glad I stuck it out because we got there eventually."
- somethingclever1712
Imposed Limiting Beliefs
"I had a teacher tell me I'd probably end up managing a Borders, but they went under in 2011, so the joke's on her."
- Kyengen
"My math teacher in high school moved me to the back of the room and told me to sit there and just look out the window. She said I’d be working at McDonald’s one day. I made $300k last year. She’s dead now."
- albatross_the
Reality Check
"Not a teacher, but I knew a kid who was your stereotypical couldn't give a f**k student."
"He never did his work, p**sed off teachers, cut class, did all kinds of drugs, and always had detention. I remember the highlight of his work was writing an essay on why he was Black, despite being white. About mid-senior year, he dropped out, and he kinda just disappeared. I honestly thought he'd end up in jail at some point."
"In 2019, my job sent me over to a site to do a survey for a company installing our AV equipment. Lo and behold, the guy leading the project was the same wild and crazy kid from high school."
"We chatted and caught up on things, but the guy really turned his life around. He got his GED, quit drugs, took up trade jobs, and worked his way up to a senior position in that AV installation company. It's interesting to see how people change like that when they enter the real world."
- draiman
Lack of Interests
"I had a student who was supposed to be a high school dropout but ended up graduating law school with honors."
- Somerset76
"That sounds like that was a case where the kid was smart but bored and needed a passion to find."
- whatproblems
"This sounds like my father and his brother. They were the same, screwing around in high school with bad grades, smoking weed and drinking and pulling pranks and playing poker all lunch, until college when they found what interested them. Now my uncle is a surgeon and my father is a scientist."
- jkssratmolo
Such a Small World
"I taught geography to a very talented (and now famous) footballer. He wasn't particularly academic but is now a multi-millionaire. The tabloids loved his scandals, but I dare say he's loving his retirement now."
- reiveroftheborder
Mental Health Assistance
"I did some volunteer work in mental health services for teens, specifically with music."
"Probably obviously, teens with mental health problems can be incredibly self-conscious and reserved. This one girl, in particular, was quite timid most of the time when there was anyone with her who wasn't a close friend."
"Over the course of a few years, I managed to coax her into singing in front of me, then to the group, then at a fundraising event for the group."
"The last thing I heard about her was a post on Facebook that a friend showed me. She was complaining about there only being about 50 people at a gig that she was playing! I still remember having to talk her into that first performance with just one or two people there!"
- Raephstel
Unbelievable Outcomes
"Son of two teachers, not a teacher. Our class criminal was acting out in grade school. He was a bully. He'd push kids down the stairs. He grabbed the boobs of the first girl in our class to have them."
"When he'd get in trouble, he'd run away from school, and the principal would get in his VW Bug and chase the kid down."
"In Junior high, he was suspended as often as he was in class it seemed. The same was true in high school. He didn't so much as graduate, as was passed on a plea bargain."
"Many years later, I saw him on Facebook. He's an oil man in Texas. His house is bigger than my yard, by a lot. He has a beautiful wife and daughter. On the surface, he made it and is living the dream."
"Now, he may still be a criminal. Financial success doesn't make one a good person. I don't know who he is these days. All I can say is growing up, I pictured him in jail or maybe in a trailer park as an adult. I never pictured him in a mansion living the high life."
- mike_e_mcgee
"The money may be nice but I'd rather have a small house than work on an oil rig, that's a dangerous life."
- whoamIreallyam8
"I bet he started on a rig or in a field, but he looks like a suit and tie guy these days. I agree 100%, though. My job gets me by (barely), but I'm safe and have a good work-life balance. I'd rather barely scrape by than be financially well off and either in danger or stuck at work all the time not enjoying the fruits of my labor! 40 hours a week is as much as I care to put in (I'd prefer less to be honest)."
- mike_e_mcgee
Deeply Underestimated
"I taught a first-year university course. It was the fall semester, so for many students, it was their first semester at university ever, and I had one student who struggled. She was young, it was her first time living away from home, and she seemed perpetually overwhelmed."
"I think she was just naive and inexperienced. About a month into the semester and her grandmother passed and they were very close. She came to my office to tell me she had to go home for the funeral and would miss a couple of classes."
"She was sobbing and I comforted her and told her not to worry about class. When she left my office, I honestly thought that I would never see her again and that she was going home permanently."
"I was wrong. She came back a week later and she was laser focused. She started speaking out in class and asking questions, she came to all of my office hours and study groups, and she began to make connections with other students in the class."
"She absolutely blew it out of the water, aced the final exam, and finished the course with the highest grade. We stayed in contact and I was actually her reference for an intensive internship that she was very excited about (and she got it)."
"I will never forget her and she truly humbled me. Was really a lesson for me not to underestimate people."
- littlepinch7
Measurable Success
"I worked administration in an elementary school. But I did take kids with low reading scores to the side to give them tutoring whenever I could."
"One kid stuck out. 15 words read per minute despite being eight years old. She had no confidence in herself, was too terrified to talk to anyone, and burst into tears at any mistake she made."
"Let's just say her family was... unsupportive and difficult. I did not see progress for MONTHS. I was worried about her future in school if she continued to lag behind and be too anxious to make it in the world."
"But eventually, she started talking to me. She stopped crying at mistakes, repeating my mantra ('It's okay to make mistakes, mistakes mean you're learning'). The words per minute score went up little by little as she began to show interest in different reading materials."
"By the end of the school year, she was looking forward to seeing me and her teacher said she was excited when the class took library trips. That teacher and I convinced the school to let me continue monitoring the student into the next school year. They agreed."
"One more year of tutoring passed. That shy, terrified girl became confident and happy. She talked to everyone, helped out in class, and demonstrated a fascination with learning new things. The new teacher told me how this kid was always trying to sneak books in-between classwork. In second grade, when we began, this student was one of the lowest-scored readers in her grade but by mid-year of third grade, she was the highest score. She was even helping out other kids!"
"I worked for a couple of years after she 'graduated' from my tutoring so I got to see her in the hallways. She always liked to tell me what she read in class, what she read in her personal time, and see what I'd recommend for her to read next. By the time I left my job, she was going to middle school and I knew she'd be just fine."
- SkysEevee
The End of the Bullying Era
"I had this classmate in high school who was the biggest d**k I saw in my entire life."
"He would beat people up if he didn't like the way they walked or whatever, would make teachers so angry in class that one of our teachers was rushed into the hospital due to hypertension."
"One day in our senior year, his mom and dad were tragically killed in a car crash, leaving him responsible for his three younger siblings."
"I didn't see him for a few weeks then one day came back and the principal was kind enough to accept him again back to school, but was informed that he may not graduate due to his very low grades."
"I have never seen such a sudden change of personality in my life. The dude became so focused and determined on graduating high school, it was scary."
"Fast forward 20 years to the year 2022, I had some legal issues to deal with, and one of my friends recommended me to a lawyer, and I was surprised when I saw him. All changed, turned his life around, saw the graduation pictures of his siblings displayed on his office wall, and has a beautiful wife and a daughter."
- Newbietron21
Talk About Leveling Up
"A stoner kid I knew who did nothing but doodle on everything ended up being some big shot at Lucasfilms and then Disney."
- hahahahthunk
Coming Full-Circle
"I am a coach and through a coincidence, two kids who used to be my neighbors came through my team. When we were neighbors, their house was known as the crack house. It ran off a generator for a while and the dad was siphoning gas out of neighborhood cars to run the generator."
"Their dog was left outside barking for two nights in a row (another neighbor and I decided if it went to night three, we were taking the dog, the weather was fair). Finally, the house was foreclosed and the pics of the inside lived up to the crack house name."
"Fast-forward some years and I took one of the kids on my team home. We happened to go past my house and he pointed and said he used to live down there. I put it together and asked if he used to have a dog named Oscar, and he did!"
"So it turns out his dad eventually went to jail for stealing cars and his mom was in recovery for addiction to pills. They had to move in with his grandfather in the local trailer park who was an alcoholic."
"So the older brother did well. He's in college in the next state and is gonna be okay. The younger brother, though, is about to graduate high school as the valedictorian and has a full ride to Cal Tech."
- kjm16216
A Different Perspective
"My husband had a teacher tell him with his efforts he would always be a B student, a B husband, and a B father. Another teacher, when learning of us getting married a few years later, said of me, 'Bless her heart.' He was a difficult, under-challenged student."
"I consider him an A+ husband and father, who runs his own 35-person company, a company that puts employees over profit. I'm just sorry those teachers didn’t see what has always been clear to me."
- merryrhino
An Irreplaceable Teacher
"For my primary school teachers, I was probably that kid. Never spoke and could never finish a worksheet to save my life. Had all the tutoring in the world and I just couldn’t understand numbers. Didn’t understand punctuation for a while, either. Luckily, English just clicked for me one day and I went from an F to an A in a week."
"Turns out I had undiagnosed Autism and the way they were teaching these fundamentals didn’t slot into my head right. God bless my extra help teachers because they sat me down and gave everything the most arbitrary rules so that it would make sense."
"I can’t remember them properly now but I just remember explaining my young self's logic of the world to her and she made all the punctuation and math symbols slot into those rules so I could use full stops and multiply things without going crazy."
"Now I’m in university studying STEM, probably still applying a lot of Mrs. Brown's logic without realizing it. Bless that women’s patience because I wouldn’t have been able to get into top classes in secondary school without her."
- h0n3yst
The Perfect 'Thank You'
"I was the special ed kid who was regular all along."
"I was semi-nonverbal as a kid, and wouldn't really do school work in Kindergarten through third grade. I didn't really have a support system at home and had no interest in learning to read or do schoolwork, really. I just wanted to go home and play Nintendo."
"Towards the end of second grade, they started actively monitoring me and another young child. They would sit in on my school day, take notes about my behavior, and leave. They wouldn't talk to me at all, and I didn't realize their presence had anything to do with me until much later."
"Based on those reports, they moved me to Special Ed. I'm not sure if they thought I was just slow or on the spectrum, but every day, I would leave class for half the day and go to direct one-on-one class with an aide. She taught me all kinds of fundamentals I should have had before then. I was in the third grade before I learned how to tie my shoes, for example. She taught me how to read. She taught me how to communicate."
"By the fourth grade, I didn't have to go to Special Ed anymore. I was vaguely normal. It would take until the eighth grade before I finally made friends, but it would have never happened with her."
"Unfortunately, much of my childhood is kind of a vague blur. I can't even remember which of the elementary schools I went to where she was. I wish I knew how to unlock this memory and find her if just to write a heartfelt letter of appreciation."
"Wherever you are, whoever you are, thank you for saving me."
- Mmmslash
These stories were both surprising and heart-warming, and they are a great reminder that no two lives look exactly alike, but also, a tough start does not necessarily mean a dark and terrible life.
CW: violence, fighting, and assault.
We'd like to believe humanity exists with plenty of examples around us of people doing good things for others.
Sadly, the harsh reality is that there are just as many individuals who have no respect for others and wish to cause harm.
People who've had bad encounters with someone they've never met shared their experiences when Redditor Jemuzu8304 asked:
"Whats the most f'ked up thing a complete stranger has done to you?"

Drivers and passengers recall their rude interactions.
The Prank
"One time I was in south Philly and a car pulled up with two guys in it. They called out to me asking for directions so I walked over. As I was explaining where to go the dude in the passenger seat spit in my face and they sped off."
– the_humbL_lion
Willing Victim
"You just reminded me of a similarly gross interaction:"
"Years ago after a doctor's appointment, I got into my car and turned it on, at which point a small child started leaning/sitting on the hood. His heavily pregnant mother stood by doing nothing, apparently distracted by her phone. I rolled down my window, and asked if she would mind getting her child off of my car, as I needed to leave, and was concerned he could get hurt."
"She asked if I had insurance. Confused, I answered '...yes?', to which she said 'Well I hope you DO hit him so I can get some MONEY!' She proceeded to lean in through my passenger window, and started spitting on me. The kid was no longer on my car, and I desperately wanted to get away from her, so I put my car in reverse. She then hurled her pregnant belly into my sideview mirror, and shrieked in such an exaggerated way, as if I had hit her."
"I eventually found a new doctor."
– TheHaydnPorter
Unwanted Car Wash
"Stopped at a red light one time. Someone from a building adjacent to the light threw a bag of ice and water on my car, from a few stories up. Dented the roof and shattered the windshield."
"Wasn't even a nice car, I was driving a Dodge neon sh*tbox."
– IAmPandaKerman
You never know the capabilities of strangers you encounter.
The Violent Thief
"I got held up at gun point 2 weeks ago in philly 10 feet from the door to my friends apartment. They stole both our watches. My watch was given to me by my dead uncle. https://imgur.com/a/V59aebW"
– xcpain93
Hit By A Hard Object
"Reminds me of something. Some a**hole tossed a lock, like the combination type out of a car at me and hit me in the knee. I had trouble walking correctly for damn near a month."
"I always thought if they'd have stopped at a light I'd have hurled that b*tch right back."
"Good thing they didn't. I wasn't in any condition for a fight."
– Ok_Relationship_705
Moving Targets
"I also have a drive-by experience but it was with a f'king paintball gun. My friend and I were in freshmen year, just walking to the park to play some ball and with no warning he suddenly recoils and shouts in pain. I had no clue what happened. He reaches at his back and when he turns around I see a bright red paint splat on his white shirt. I look up and see the car that just passed us turns around, pulls up next to us with the kid in the passenger seat hanging the gun out window saying 'Sorry bro, I’m just so surgical with this thing,' and speeds off. Pretty hilarious story in hindsight within our friend group now, but at the time we were pissed. Luckily we got their plates and the cops showed up at their house and they got in trouble. F'kers."
– zakxk
Wrong Target
"I was about 11 and me and some friends were standing on a small bridge over a lake. All of a sudden I was picked up and thrown over the railing into the lake below. I tried to grab onto anything I could as I fell and scrapped my arms up pretty good. I still have scars 30 years later. So I swim to the side and some older kid comes up to me and just say - sorry, I thought you were someone else."
– discostud1515
Attacks happen when you least expect it.
Random Attack
"Punched me, for no reason. I was standing. Waiting for the community bus. A stranger got out of the car and punched me. I filed the Police report but nothing happen."
– Hallo-Mapskollegen
Hitting The Elderly
"My grandmother was at the movies and a guy walking up the aisle punched her in the side of the head. He told the cops he was mad because he was on a bad blind date."
"Like...great excuse to wallop a 75-year-old woman minding her own business."
– BarracudaImpossible4
The Ferrari Guys
"Had a similar thing happen when I was in Downtown Los Angeles. I was crossing the street and just came up onto the sidewalk. Some dude in a Ferrari steps out of the car, walks up to me and tries to swing on me in broad daylight. I sidestepped this dude, and he then spun to try to hit me again, calling me a motherf**ker and not to dodge. I caught him with a nut shot with my foot and doubled him over."
"His buddy hops out of the car, and another of his buddies (I assume) gets up from the side of the sidewalk and both are yelling at me, and I'm like, 'ah, f'k, I'm not ready for this.'"
"These absolute legends who had been watching all this sh*t go down just appear out of nowhere and jump these guys for me. Like, six different people from out of the woodwork. Nutshot and Scrub (Ferrari guys) hop in the car and just take off, scraping the car and taking the right side view mirror off. Their (assumedly) other homeboy gets left behind, but he tries to stumblef'k his a** away after having taken a couple of hits to the head. One of the guys who helped me jogs up and punts this dude in the side right after he falls over, doubling him up. Meanwhile, everybody else is checking on me and making sure I'm good."
"Cops show up, detain us, figure out what's going on, let us go, and arrest homie that couldn't get away. Come to find out, these guys have been doing this for weeks, and the people who helped me were local residents who had been on the lookout for Nutshot. Arrested homie later squealed, and all the guys involved got a couple of years for aggravated assault."
– feronen
My bad interactions with strangers were all random but definitely premeditated assaults.
I was mugged twice in New York City while I was typically minding my own business.
Also, while I was in Barcelona, I had a team of youths pick-pocket me and run off with my wallet containing my passport and credit cards. Fortunately, the friend I was with saw what happened and ran off after them. She sucker-punched the young lady who had my wallet, causing her to drop it.
Be careful out there, folks!
As the saying goes, you can't believe everything you read.
But every now and then, you might find yourself reading or hearing a piece of information that you at first think couldn't possibly be real.
Until you are presented with verified, reliable information to back it up... Then you have to eat your words and put your disbelief behind you.
Perhaps the most surprising instances of these are statistics, which at first glance you can't possibly believe are accurate and find yourself proven otherwise.
"What is a fact or statistic that seems fake but is real?"
And You Thought Sharks Were Dangerous...
"Horses kill more people every year in Australia than all the other beasties combined."
"Everyone thinks it's the spiders and snakes that'll get you, but it's the horses you've really got to watch."- Gingerbread_Cat·
The Dangers Of Scientific Advancement
"It took us more time to go from bronze swords to iron swords than it did for us to go from iron swords to nuclear weapons."- IMJUSTABRIK
Frightening People For Generations!
"Sharks have existed longer than trees have."- Capital_Indication_4
The Great Unknown
"I saw a scale model of the earth, moon and sun in a museum."
"The sun was about the size of a basketball, and the earth was on the opposite side of the room, the size of a small marble, I'd guess about 30 metres away."
"The moon was the size of a tiny pinhead, about 10cm away from the earth."
"On this scale, the nearest star to earth, Proxima Centauri, wouldn't be in the same building, or even in the same city."
"It would be 10,000km away."
"And that's just one star, the nearest one to us, in a galaxy containing billions of stars, which is just one of billions of galaxies."
"The scale of the universe really is mind bogglingly big."
"Far bigger than we can begin to comprehend."- Qabbalah
Zero Points To The Lost World For Authenticity...
"We live closer in time to Tyrannosaurus Rex than the T Rex did to the Stegosaurus."- reiveroftheborder
From Bad To Worse?
"After the British made head protection mandatory in WW1, the amount of head wounds increased."
"It's due to they were no longer KIA, but 'only' a head wound."- WouldUKindlyDMBoobs
Sarah Palin Can Confirm...
"USA is only 2.4 miles from Russia."
"2 islands in the Bering Strait, the body of water in the Pacific Ocean that separates Alaska from Russia, are 2.4 miles from each other at the narrowest point; one island is owned by Russia, the other is owned by USA."- Qabbalah
But Where Did "Ginger" Come From?
"In English, the color orange was named after the fruit."
"Before that, orange was just considered a shade of red."
"That's why gingers are called redheads."- I_might_be_weasel
At Least We Can Be Sure He Didn't Lie About It
"George Washington didn’t know dinosaurs existed."- Silver34
But What Did They Want To Do With Those Cobras?
"New Delhi hired people to hunt cobra snakes which led to people having Cobra Farms to earn money, then the government stopped the project which led the Cobra Farmers to release their snakes, causing twice as many snakes than they first started."- cathabit
The Truth Lies Between The Lines...
"Barcode scanners scan the white lines, not the black ones."- the_blast_radius
But Does It Make It Easier To Avoid?
"Wombat poo is cube shaped, to stop it rolling away."
Perception Can Be Dangerously Misleading
"The Oxford University in England existed centuries before the rise and fall of the Aztec civilization."- RefrigeratorStatus96
"Time Is The Longest Distance Between Two Places..."
"A million seconds is 12 days."
"A billion seconds is 31 years. "
"A trillion seconds is 31,688 years."
"People have a lot of trouble comprehending numbers that big."- sunbearimon
One thing that makes science so remarkable is how difficult it can be to believe.
And yet, scientists have been working since the beginning of time to prove that facts are, indeed, facts.
Do you have anything to add? Let us know in the comments below.
People Share The Best Real-Life Examples Of 'You Can Have A Ph.D. And Still Be An Idiot'
Earning a college degree, especially a doctorate, takes a heck of a lot of work and definitely requires intelligence. Expertise in your usually narrow field of study definitely doesn't guarantee expertise in other areas — especially common sense, it seems.
Redditor SgtSkillcraft asked:
"Richard Feynman said, 'Never confuse education with intelligence, you can have a PhD and still be an idiot.' What are some real life examples of this?"
Too Much Ketchup
"My ex-boyfriends mother was a linguistics professor and knew over 10 languages. She was also one of the dumbest people I've ever met. Some examples: she believed that in case of emergency stewardesses catapult out of the plane; she was also convinced donating blood causes some blood disease and you can die because of it. But my favourite one was when she said her son's orthopaedic problems are not a result of a serious injury he had. His knee hurts because he eats too much ketchup."
- ImnotUK
"Man that ketchup is going straight to my knees. Ima need to sit for a minute."
- myrevenge_IS_urkarma
You'd Think An Engineer Would Understand Physics
"I had a boss who was an engineer who put a couple hundred dollars in change in a bank’s pneumatic drive through tube where it got stuck and they had to use a jack hammer to get it out. He was upset that the bank was charging him for this because he didn’t know this would happen. They had large signs saying not to put change in the tubes, including on the tubes themselves."
- RumBunBun
Self-Powering Power Strip
"My first call at my first IT job was in a medical laboratory. There was a doctor who had been in the job for years and she called saying her computer would not power on. I walked her through some troubleshooting and nothing worked. "Is the computer plugged in? Ok, is the monitor on? Ok, when did the problem start?" type of questions were asked and she answered them all. I go up to her office and indeed the computer is plugged in to a power strip which is plugged in to itself. Cleaning crew had deep cleaned her office and never plugged anything back in. Dr. plugged the power strip into itself thinking that as long as it was plugged in, that's all she needed."
- acheron53
Liquid Displacement Isn't That Complicated, Is It?
"I was at a keg party at college and the (gravity keg) was set up. Someone complained that the beer was not flowing, so I check that the keg was still almost full. Turns out someone closed the air intake on top. I opened the intake and poured myself a beer. Problem solved. A few minutes later someone else complains the beer is out. I told them the keg was full a few minutes ago and it was a tap problem that I fixed. They told me they just came from the keg. I go back to the keg and find the intake was closed again. Opened it and poured the young lady who said it was empty a beer. As she is leaving my suitemate comes in and goes to the intake can closes it. Now my suitemate is a straight A student who gets all As mostly due to his photographic memory."
"Back to the keg. So I tell him that he needs to leave the intake open to let air in to displace the beer coming out of the lower tap. He then proceeds to tell me that since the beer is carbonated air is not needed to replace the liquid volumn lost when the beer is dispensed. So I asked him two questions; If it is not needed, why is there the upper tap, and does he really think the amount of gas the carbonation gives off in a glass of beer is equal to the volumn of the liquid beer? He thought for a few seconds and his only response was, "I have a 4.0, what is your GPA?" Then he walked away."
- vpniceguys
Med Students Aren't Immune To The Bystander Effect
"Not quite PhD. But I was at a party (in the uk) full of med students and stereotypically everyone was off their face drunk. Well some guy fell over and broke his collar bone and immediately got rushed by a dozen of them all fussing and asking him the same questions over and 'going through the checklist'. Half an hour later and he's still on the couch in pain and I go in to ask if anybody knows why the ambulance is taking so long. Nobody had an answer because nobody had called one. A party full of medical students hadn't called an ambulance or made any transport arrangements for a guy in severe pain with a broken clavicle. Idiots."
- Reiseoftheginger
"That's actually super common in emergencies when there's a group of any kind. One of the first things you learn in a lifeguard certification course is to identify a single person to instruct to call 911. Never just yell out 'someone call 911' or assume that it's been done because everyone in the group is assuming someone else did it already."
"It's not necessarily that everyone forgot about it, just that everyone assumed it was the logical first step that someone else would have taken already."
- Bangarang_1
He Just Hadn't Had His Coffee Yet
"I had a professor for higher mathematics who had real difficulties figuring out how to extract a cup of coffee from the vending machine. Bless him."
- onesmilematters
Laser Focused Intelligence
"My wife has two Masters and a PhD, is internationally recognized in her field, and is an absent minded doofus. My role in her life is to ensure that her car works, that she takes her meds, and that she eats things other than yogurt and eggs. She can be brilliant one minute, then walk into the side of a moving bus the next."
"I love her dearly but she's a numpty."
- Lost_One_1963
Dump Dinners Were Designed For This Person
"As someone who did two trades and then decided life is better with education - my experience currently going to Uni is how clueless so many people are in Uni. I wouldn’t say they’re an idiot, but tons of ignorance develops living in a student bubble your whole life."
"I rented a room to a guy who did his masters, and it would take him hourssss to cook dinner. I watched him one day, and he just couldn’t wrap his mind around cooking things that take different amounts of time to cook."
"Like, he’d start cooking potatoes and wait til they were done before moving on to the next thing he was going to eat them with."
- XavierOpinionz
Doctors Are Brilliant...and Not So Brilliant
"I work with medical doctors all the time for work. Doctors are some of the dumbest smart people I have ever met."
- Secksualinnuendo
"Yup. I know a plastic surgeon who thought it was a great idea to sue Yelp for bad reviews his business was getting. This ensured that tons of news stories were written about him that repeated those bad reviews to a bigger audience."
- heimdahl81
"My friend's dad is a surgeon, I never forget when we were 13-14 and her mom called her to ask if she could go home and make something to eat for her dad because he was starving."
"That's when she told me that he had never ever made a meal himself for his entire life, he cannot even work the toaster, literally! So the guy was just starving at home because he cannot make a simple meal. And the next day he's fixing someone's heart."
- _reykjavik
"As someone who works security in a hospital, I can say a good 90% of the doctors there are smart but lack any type of common sense, and sometimes I wonder how they function on a day-to-day basis"
- Ray_Ray_86
Doors Are Hard
"I used to work at a university, and tons of academics are incredibly educated in their chosen field, but have the common sense of your average dachshund."
"My favourite was probably an entire group of geology professors and PhD candidates who got 'stuck' for a good few minutes in an entryway because they didn't think to check if the door required a pull rather than a push. Bearing in mind that they'd just entered with that same door not an hour before."
- Koras
Children Require Supervision At All Times
"My ex had a real lack of knowledge and common sense when it came to children."
"She's currently completing her PHD in biochemistry and molecular biology. She was confused though when I said I couldn't go out after putting my toddler to bed as I had no one to babysit. In her mind, once my daughter was asleep she no longer needed anyone here to take care of her."
"I chalked it up to cultural differences and never being around children. Eventually though our opinions on raising kids differed too much and I had to end things for my daughter's sake."
- RetroDad-IO
Just Read The Documentation
"Worked at a tech company, was made team lead. One of our team members was a PhD in astrophysics. He would ping me constantly for how to do things that we had well documented. How to install certain programs, how to gain access to servers or code repositories. Literally we would sit in zoom calls together and I would just read the instructions out loud and watch him do them. I was utterly confused as to how he could breathe by himself."
- Woodhouse_20
It's Not Supposed To Be A Soup
"A long time good friend, absolutely brilliant. Can literally beat you at chess blindfolded. Engineering in college and one of the smartest people I’ve ever met. But he’s a big picture guy, sees how things develop and great long term vision. Incredibly successful. But little things? Guy couldn’t pack a suitcase, wouldn’t know how to book a flight. Was making boxed Mac-n-cheese and couldn’t figure out why it was so watery. Ya, he didn’t drain the water after the pasta was cooked."
- PapaChoff
India Is Definitely Not A Continent
"Mother in law has a PhD in some thing related to botany. She thought India was a continental island like Australia. To this day I still have no idea how that happened when this came up she was in her mid 60's."
- SavingsCheck7978
Computers Aren't That Hard To Understand
"If you work IT you feel this. Every lawyer, doctor, celebrity and CEO I've ever worked with is computer illiterate. They can email, they can Twitter and that's it. They confuse the mouse, they openly call themselves Luddites, they kick the power plug out and claim the 'box broke'. Mega-millionaires, too. Smart in other regards, but computers are kryptonite."
- zeift
"not IT, but, I worked in tech support for Verizon fiber optic services a long time ago. they provided internet, TV, and phone services."
"my favorite call was a dude who couldn't receive calls, and this was a Big Deal™ because He Was A Doctor - that might've been something he repeated a few times. anywho, I walk him through basic troubleshooting as he's dramatically exhaling after every sentence because I should obviously just be sending a tech. I wasn't allowed to do that without going through the steps, though."
"everything in the house checked out, but, after an attempt to remotely reset the system to no avail, my last required step for the guy was reporting the state of some status lights in the terminal on the wall outside the house. I get the guy to pop the front panel, and I'm explaining that he needs to tell me which of these lights is on and off, and what one of the digital panels says. guy cuts me off to say, 'oh, hey, there's a bunch of phone and internet cables in here,' to which I reply, 'yes, there are, but, we don't need to pay attention to them at this time, we just need to know what the status of the system is.'"
"dude says, 'well, these don't seem to be plugged into the right ports. let me see if I can correct-' this was when I interjected with, 'sir, please don't mess with any of the wired connections, those are setup on installation and everything is already mapped to your home layout-'"
"that's when he cut me off with, 'I think I know what I'm doing - after all, I'm A Doctor.'"
"the line immediately went dead. obviously, I tried to call him back... but, his issue was that he couldn't receive phone calls, and we didn't have a cell phone number for him. shucks."
"I've often pictured the guy standing outside his home, realization of his mistake settling in, all while his brain starts to focus on the fact that he had to wait on hold for over fifty minutes to even speak with me. f**king glorious."
- extralyfe
We can't all be smart in every area of life, but it's good to be able to acknowledge your weaker areas as well as your strengths.