“Oxen Are Just Employed Cows”: People Share 40 Things They Learned Embarrassingly Late In Life

Talking doesn't scare the fish, grandpa just wanted us to shut up.

Puffer fish fill up with water to inflate. Not air. I don't know where I thought the fish got the air from.

My cat used to never drink a lot of water and she would just spend a lot of time staring at the bowl, turns out she was experiencing whisker fatigue so I got her a wider bowl.

Poor cat.

When you say no because you don’t feel comfortable doing it and someone pushes you to do it anyway, just don’t do it. I just learned about boundaries and I’m freakin’ over age 50.

Human skin doesn’t have the ability to sense water. We can only tell that something is wet because of temperature or pressure, but we don’t have the proper receptors for water itself.

That’s why sensory deprivation tanks with room temperature or barely warm water work so well, and why you can’t tell if clothing left out to dry is damp or if it’s just cold.

When I read that somewhere, it was a huge mindf**k. Now I think about it constantly.

Edit: We know that humans don’t have these receptors because we know that certain animals DO. Including fruit flies and cockroaches. Which is weird.

Edit: To all the people saying that they test an object’s wetness by placing it against their lips or cheek, this is still exactly the same principle I’m describing above. You can’t feel the wetness, you’re feeling the sensation of air moving against the wetness. It’s no different from holding the object in your hand. We rely on cues like temperature and pressure to decide if something is wet.

Edit: A lot of people are saying this is b******t and I made it up because you CAN tell when something is wet. Congrats, you’re restating exactly what I already said. We rely on environmental cues to determine it. Also, what I’m referring to is hygrosensation. Do your own research. Google it.

There are people who do not have an internal monologue. I was like WTF.

That the “Spanish flu” probably started in Kansas soldier barracks and spread due to WW1. The only reason it’s named the Spanish flu is because Spain was the only country that reported on it- many other countries had a media blackout on it.

It wasn’t new information, but through the footage during severe storms from massive waves crashing on ships today, realizing how terrifying it would be to cross the ocean in the 1400s.

Octopus predate dinosaurs.

Oxen are just employed cows, not a whole separate species of bovine.

It’s not the stripper that spins- it’s the pole. Blew my mind, I thought those ladies were masters of centrifugal force AND core strength!

To be tea, it has to come from the tea plant. Black, white, green, oolong teas are all the same plant but with different processing and harvesting.

Anything else that calls themselves a tea is actually a tisane - including roiboos.

Eartha Kitt, the woman who sings Santa Baby, also voiced Yzma from Emperor's New Groove.

When they kept liquor stores open at the beginning of the pandemic, it was to ensure that alcoholics wouldn’t overflow the hospitals even more by suffering from alcohol withdrawals.

Groundhogs and woodchucks are the same animal.

That opossums are great for the environment and if your dog attacks them, you should stop them. And if you're brave enough to move them to safer grounds, they will emit a foul odor while playing dead. It stinks, but if you're willing, pick them up like a kitten (scruff of neck)and relocate. Don't worry, like skunks, the smell comes from there a**s, but! they don't douse you with the smell. It's just to deter predators.

Cooking food in a cast-iron skillet increases the iron content in your meal. I don't know why I never thought of it like that until recently...

Linen is not just a particular weave of cotton. It's made from a completely different plant (flax).

That the filter in the dishwasher should be cleaned out monthly. Not my original schedule which was never.

Percentages are always reversible.Example 32% of 78 is same as 78% of 32.