I used to think that cats with pink pads on the bottoms of their paws were girls and cats with black or brown pads were boys.

Carrie

I used to believe I would one day marry my cat. I was completely serious about it, and even started designing little cat vails.

Lizzie

My older brother told me all dogs came from Ohio. You knew because they had an "O" under their tails. I believed him far too long!

martha

When my daughter was 3, she saw a cat using a litter box. She thought it was building a sand castle.

Debbie the Bad Swimmer

When I was about 6 my babysitter was telling me about this other girl she babysat for and didn't really like. She said "She's got this kitten that she goes on and on about. She thinks the sun shines out of that cat's bottom". I had never heard that phrase before and was amazed that someone my age could really believe that about a cat. Oh dear, looks like I was the stupid one...

Beth

I used to believe that all garbage bags on the side of the road were filled with kittens that people had thrown away. I think it originated from a Tom & Jerry cartoon. I would cry and beg my mom to stop and pick up the bags but I wouldn't tell her why. I thought she would refuse because we already had 2 cats. It was torture on road trips but mom just thought I was environmentally conscious.

erin

When I was growing up, I always wanted a German Shepard dog. My Mother told me we couldn 't have one because no one in our family spoke German so the dog wouldn't be able to understand us, and we wouldn't know when he was hungry or had to go outside...

Jules

I thought all poodles were female...i mean how can you be a male poodle and live with yourself?

Anon

i used to believe that the tails on animals were meant to be their own personal leash.
i found out otherwise when i tried to take my cat for a walk ...

gloom

One time, when I was about six years old, my grandma took me to a carnival. It was a hot day, so a lot of people had brought their dogs. I was playing with my balloon animal when my grandma said "Look, it's a German Shepherd." I turned but saw only a big brown dog. I was disappointed that I had missed a German guy with a cane and a couple of sheep.

Katie

I used to believe that Poodles were a cross between a sheep and a dog.
I believed that until I was 18 and I started vet school!!!
Bit embarassing.

Amy

This comes from my father. He was told in school that when Huskies are in the snow, and get very cold, they would breathe through their tails. He envisioned a dog covered in snow sticking its tail in the air and breathing through it.

He found out probably 40 years later, watching The Discovery Channel, that Huskies will cover their noses with their tails to make breathing the cold air easier. It finally made sense.

Christopher

I used to believe that our cat was a robot that spied on me for my parents. I thought that they used it to tell when I left my room even when they couldn't see me. Because my aunt gave it to us, I thought she had a control station for it, but my parents had a video screen showing what it saw through its camera eyes.

Lee

When I was about 10, My mom, sister and I were visiting my grandparents. They were all talking when I notice a pink moving thing coming out of the belly of my grandmother's dog. Now, my cat recently had worms, and I was certain my grandmother's dog had a giant worm. Horrified, I asked loudly, "grandma, what is that?!" And pointed to it. To which my grandmother responded, slightly annoyed, "That's his penis."

I was terribly embarrassed.

Anon

I used to believe that dogs from other countries had different languages. So a dog raised in Japan wouldnt be able to understand the barking of an American dog. Actually, that still sounds kind of plausible to me...

Michelle

My dad sold pure-bred dogs. When a buyer came to get a hunting dog, he saw my mixed-breed pet, and really liked her. He wanted to buy her, too. My dad told me, "Mary, this guy says he'll give you fifty dollars for your dog.'

I said, "Well, okay, but I don't know what a dog would do with money."

Anon

When I was about 5 we moved to a new house, which scared the willies out of our (already timid) cat, Roger. Every time he heard a noise he'd run to hide, and his favourite hiding place was inside our electronic organ (there was an opening above the volume-pedal...) Well, for a while there, I was pretty convinced that inside our organ was this giant cat-city where Roger was royalty, and the reason he went there so often was because his feline subjects needed him.

Actually, despite the fact that I grew out of that belief, I still felt a twinge of surprise when I actually looked inside the organ, and instead of the vast, softly lit city I'd always imagined, there was...the back of the pedals and keys, and a whole lot of dust. Bit of a disappointment, actually,.

loyal subject

When I was around 3 my dog Sparky got hit my a car and died. I did not know this, and when I asked "Where's Sparky?" the only answer I got was "He's with God now" To which I was upset, that this guy named God had my dog. "Where does God live?" I asked. My mom pointed up and said "He lives up there."
For quite a while I thought this strange guy named God lived up in my attic with my dog.

Jeff

When I was 4 or 5 years old, I witnessed our cat, Petal, pooping live mice out of her rear end. I was sure that that was what was happening. I had seen cats in cartoons swallow mice live, it made sense to me that that was how they would come out, squirming and gooey from the trip through the cat. Later my Mom explained to me that Petal had had a litter of kittens! D'oh!

Ben

When I was about 5, I asked my mom why her friend didn't have any kids. She told me that her friend had cats instead of children. I took that to mean that one could choose whether to give birth to humans or cats, and decided that I would have cats when I was older.

T