There was an adult bookstore on the main drag in our town. When I was a child, I was pretty bookish, so it was only natural that I'd want to go see what was in "The Book Ranch". I asked to go in every time we drove by, but mom would always change the subject. It wasn't until high school that I knew why.

Anon

I used to sit on the bus and see the big supermarket 'Safeway', I believed it was a place where people could feel safe.

Lisa-Dionne

For a while until I now(I'm 15!) I misunderstood when expensive looking jewelery was called"paste"(fake) I thought that it was literally made out of glue. Though I always wondered how they made the gem stones out of glue...

Glow worm

Before i knew how to read, my sister told me that the grocery store "grand union" was pronounced "grand onion" because she was not actually that good at reading. i figured that they must be well-known for their onions...

Emily

When I was little I would not go on the escalator as I thought if I did not get off on time, I would be taken underneath. Walked a lot of stairs in those days.

Helen Wildman

When i was younger my mother would often take me on trips with her to the grocery store. Sometimes while shopping i'd see the words "Fat Free" on a package. I'd always earnestly encourage my mom to buy the product because i that "Fat Free" meant that you got fat free of charge.

Robyn

I use to believe that if you touched one of those dressed mannequins in the department stores you would turn in to one.

Da Mama

I believed that garage sales were on a special day, like christmas or the fourth of July or something.

Cara

i used to believe that when i heard of a flea market, i thought they used to sell fleas at the super market.
and when i saw a garage sale i thought they were selling their garage.

arlene

When I was little I thought that cabbage patch kids came out of cabbages in the grocery store . I would really upset me when my mom wouldn't let me stop to look in the cabbages.

amy

When I was little I had the worst fear of being locked in a store. When the lady came on the intercom saying the store would close in 10 minutes, I started panicking. I thought I would have to spend the night in the store. There was more than one occasion when I would start bawling when my mom wouldn't leave right away. 0.o I practically dragged her out of the store everytime.

Sarah

Once I was shopping at the mall with my mother and older sister and my sister had seen a coat that she wanted. She jokingly commented that it must be made out of human skin because it was so expensive. From then on (for a longer time than I care to admit), I believed that they really made some coats out of Human skin and I could never figure out why I had never seen them in any store, but I did not stop looking for them every time we went shopping...

Megancita

When I was about 5 my aunt caught me pushing all the buttons in the elevator at the mall. So she told me that a gremlin lived underneath the elevators, he made them go up and down by pulling ropes, and pushing all the buttons at once would piss him off. So until I was about 10 I took the escalator.

Gwen

I thought 'Miss Selfridge' was an actual person. When I questioned who it was that was giving my classmates all these lovely clothes, I was laughed to the ground.

Anon

Up until I was about ten, I used to think that supermarkets could choose whatever name they wanted, like pubs. So, where a pub could be 'The Crown', 'The Anchor', 'The Queen's Head' or whatever, supermarkets could open and pretty much choose what they wanted, like 'Waitrose', 'Sainsbury's', 'Tesco's'. I couldn't work out why they only chose the same three or four names...

Jez

When I was little my gee-gee, in order to make sure we held onto the hand-rails, told us the story of a little boy who got his tennis shoe caught in the grid at the bottom of the escalator and was sucked under and ground up. For years my parents had to walk miles in malls and airports to find elevators because I would become hysterical near escalators..

jen

When my mom took my sister and me to the mall, I would stay clear away from the fountain that was by the food court. My sister had told me that if I got too close and didn't throw money in, the troll that lived in there would get me. I was always scared for those people who sat by the edge of the water and didn't do anything. It seemed like a death wish to me.

Public Pool, anyone?

When i was really little, i thought that pharmacy was a shop where you could buy animals, like pigs and cows.

Anon

Before I learned to read, I would go shopping with my mom. If I wanted to go into a toy store, she would point out the sign on the door and tell me that it said "No little blonde boys allowed."

jeff

When I was little, 3 or so, I used to think the elevator in the department store was somewhere you went while the rearranged everything. I mean you go in the box and come out and everything is different. I never used to get confused if we took the stairs though.

Anon