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Taking things literally; any funny stories to share

Suzanne

Suzanne

Well-Known Member
V.I.P Member
Hi my aspie friends

My husband was the first one to alert me to the fact that I take things literally and oh my, talk about a conversation break down because of it! But really, one can find the humor in it.

When ever someone says: I wish I was a fly on the wall. Even though I know what that expressions means, I still think: yuck, I wouldn't want to be a fly thank you very much and so always say: I wish I was a butterfly on the wall.

I am currently watching Mozart and the Whale and honestly the girl is sooo ME. She describes when she was a child how her parents were watching the Olympics and all got excited and said how they broke a record and I watch her, as she takes records into the garden and breaks them up, because it will make her parents happy. Well even though I know that expression, immediately she said it, I too saw a literal record being broken and so it was NO surprise when she went outside.

Another aspie describes how a friend said she is going to lay it on the table now. I was waiting for the aspie to continue to describe the thing her friend was about to lay on the table and yet, I know that expression.

So obviously it is a mental image that comes to the mind?
 
Yes, for me it is as you described. I know all the most common expressions and idioms, I know what they mean and not to take them literally. But still, the literal mental image springs immediately to mind when I hear them. If someone uses the phrase "I have butterflies in my stomach, I think of butterflies being in their stomach literally, and fluttering about, even though I know the metaphorical meaning. I used to have a friend who I'm sure is on the spectrum somewhere too, and we used to laugh a lot over these idioms. Our favourite one was "the stakes are high" but we both imagined beef steaks being high above our heads.
 
what, you mean stakes being high doesn't resemble a tall picket fence?

yeah, i have gotten at trouble twice at work. i'll talk to the manager when he is telling me to do something, and then i'll mention another task that i would like to do, but the manager says "don't worry about that!!". and i walk away thinking: sheesh, i'll never even think about it again. but apparently what the manager meant was: just focus on this job for the moment, and worry about the other task later. After a few days the manager always would come back furious that I had completely ignored the task he told me not to worry about.
 
I was talking to one of my good friends who is often very sarcastic but knows about my autism, so is usually only sarcastic to me when we are speaking on Facebook etc because then he can indicate whether he's being sarcastic or not without me taking him literally.

I was once doing my laundry and told him that I would be a few minutes while hanging my wet clothes up. Came back. He asked me if hanging up my laundry was fun. I said no and he cracked up laughing. It turned out that he had asked me a rhetorical question and that he knew the answer already. I'd taken him literally (but not for the first time).
 
DarkAscent said:
I was talking to one of my good friends who is often very sarcastic but knows about my autism, so is usually only sarcastic to me when we are speaking on Facebook etc because then he can indicate whether he's being sarcastic or not without me taking him literally.

I was once doing my laundry and told him that I would be a few minutes while hanging my wet clothes up. Came back. He asked me if hanging up my laundry was fun. I said no and he cracked up laughing. It turned out that he had asked me a rhetorical question and that he knew the answer already. I'd taken him literally (but not for the first time).
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Yes, lol my best friend, who is also an aspie, will type: have fun doing the washing up and although I know she is being sarcastic, I nearly type: how can that be fun? Although, I do actually enjoy washing up, at times it can be a flipping nuisance and so I say, and she comes back with that and I am thinking: but you know it won't be fun! Yet I actually do realise she is being sarcastic.
 
When I was young (maybe 8 or 9) my grandmother introduced me to a distant cousin who I now know has severe MR. She prefaced this meeting by warning me that my cousin was "a little slow" to which I responded "Oh, so am I" because I assumed she was talking about literal walking/running speed.

So I proceeded to meet this cousin an desperately try to race (yes, like a running foot race) with her because I thought that's what we were meant to do together. I thought I'd really disappointed my grandmother because I never did get my cousin to run a race with me.

It took me weeks to learn what she finally meant by 'slow'. I know many more things like this have happened but this is the one I remember best.
 
When I was a kid my Dad would ask me to wash up the dishes after dinner, which I would do, then go off and do my own thing. I didn't understand for years why he was always annoyed at me later, until one day my Mom explained that he meant me to dry up and put them away too :confused:
 
MicroWeiss said:
what, you mean stakes being high doesn't resemble a tall picket fence?

yeah, i have gotten at trouble twice at work. i'll talk to the manager when he is telling me to do something, and then i'll mention another task that i would like to do, but the manager says "don't worry about that!!". and i walk away thinking: sheesh, i'll never even think about it again. but apparently what the manager meant was: just focus on this job for the moment, and worry about the other task later. After a few days the manager always would come back furious that I had completely ignored the task he told me not to worry about.
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Oh, I'm sure I've made mistakes on this one, I always took it to mean that the task is trivial, not important and that I don't need to do it.
 
Suzanne said:
Another aspie describes how a friend said she is going to lay it on the table now. I was waiting for the aspie to continue to describe the thing her friend was about to lay on the table and yet, I know that expression.
Click to expand...

I misread that and thought the friend was going to lay on the table. When I read it again and noticed you said 'lay it on the table', I too wondered what the things was. Eventually I figured it out..

When I was in the Brownies we were meant to do a good turn every day. So I spun round and said "there, that's my good turn".

I generally can understand figurative expressions or I can work them them out, but like you I get a picture of the literal meaning. At work, people tend to use words for male genitalia as metaphors a lot. This can lead to me getting unpleasant images in my head - in particular in relation to people about whom I don't want to be thinking about that part of their anatomy at all...
 
Sarsaparilla said:
I misread that and thought the friend was going to lay on the table. When I read it again and noticed you said 'lay it on the table', I too wondered what the things was. Eventually I figured it out..

When I was in the Brownies we were meant to do a good turn every day. So I spun round and said "there, that's my good turn".

I generally can understand figurative expressions or I can work them them out, but like you I get a picture of the literal meaning. At work, people tend to use words for male genitalia as metaphors a lot. This can lead to me getting unpleasant images in my head - in particular in relation to people about whom I don't want to be thinking about that part of their anatomy at all...
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Yes I am the same with private things, which makes me feel very uncomfortable actually. And lol I would think: why is me turning around, doing such a good thing lol
 
Spiller said:
When I was a kid my Dad would ask me to wash up the dishes after dinner, which I would do, then go off and do my own thing. I didn't understand for years why he was always annoyed at me later, until one day my Mom explained that he meant me to dry up and put them away too :confused:
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Then he could have said: wash and dry up!! I would too have only done the washing up!
 
Ylva said:
I envy you both your undirty minds.
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Oh no you don't go and envy me, because usually I have a filthy mind, but I like cross stitching and sewing in general and thus, prick to me, means that and plus, I would never use that word to describe a man's penis ( please, do not take that as a dig at you) :)
 
Ylva said:
I envy you both your undirty minds. I can't help picturing a human-sized penis in a suit.
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Lol I wish it was undirty! I get something more like that with 'dick'... and when they said a certain manager at work's 'balls were on the line', my mind did not go to footballs on the railway line...
 
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