My literal mind at work

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Last night I'm reading a book and I come across this sentence:

Halfway through the sentence, my mind grinds to a halt. What's a ball diamond? I picture in my head a diamond ball of some sort, like a disco ball made of diamonds. It's about ten full seconds of thinking before I figure it out.

Any other examples to share?

I was at the autism group the other day and we were talking about boundaries again. A member from here who was there talked about her husband and another woman and she mentioned how she pulled the carpet from under her. Then when she mentioned that the lady may not have realized she done it, I blurted out that how can someone not know, you see them on the rug so how can you not see them on it when you pull it. They would fall down. Then the other aspies at the table said it was a figure of speech.


Also when I hear phrases I still get literal images in my head even though I know what they mean. Like 'time flies" I picture a clock on wings. "Raining cats and dogs" I picture cats and dogs falling out of the sky like rain. "Pouring buckets" I picture buckets coming down like rain.

My husband was trying to get me to make the dog mind. No matter what I did, he said it was wrong. Finally he blurted out, "That's not how you do it!"

I turned to him in bewilderment and said, "That is how I do it! You just saw me do it right in front of you, so how can you say that's not how I do it?"

He about died laffing.

I chipped a tooth and got a non-permanent cap on it, and once when I was a teenager the dentist looked at it and said "This can come out at any time." He meant that any time now he could take it out and replace it with something permanent, but I took it literally and thought my tooth was going to fall out any day.

It took me about five seconds to figure out what this had to do with being literal.

I still cannot work it out. Maybe I'm stupid but what is "trying to get me to make the dog mind"? It makes no sense at all.

Trying to get me to make the dog mind = Trying to teach me how to make the dog obey me. The dog won't obey me.

Wouldn't a ball diamond mean something like a baseball field?

Actually what I had in my head was about "That's not how you do it" and to take that literal, you would think someone was telling you you aren't doing it that way when they can see you are doing it that way.

The non literal definition of that sentence is "You are doing it wrong" and that is what they mean when they say "That is not how you do it." They do not mean you are doing it that way and they are too stupid to see you are doing it that way.

I really get annoyed at people who say "you" when they mean "I" or "people, generally." For example, I'll hear someone say, "You never know when someone is going to do something stupid on the highway." They may not, but actually, I usually do. People do this all the time when talking about the behavior of people in general, and I always feel the urge to correct them.

I've never heard mind used in such a way, though I guess I would have understood "trying to make the dog mind what I say".

For some reason my brain went straight to "Making the dog mind" as some kind of activity that involves emulating or creating a dog's mind.

Then I realized this was nonsense, and looked again.

As for my literal interpretations: I know that I often do poorly with hyperbole (especially hyperbole stated as an absolute) because it's obvious that "That does not happen every time."

Once my stepfather asked me to get the door, so I looked for the door he wanted me to pick up. He then amended, "Could you open the front door?"

One I mentioned here before was when I was at my physical, my doctor told me to stand up - so I did, where I was, which was sitting on the edge of the exam bed with the little step thing pulled out. So I stood on the stop thing and she amended, "I meant stand on the floor."

I was talking to my mother about fibromyalgia and being exhausted from simple tasks. She responded, "I think most people get that." I thought she literally meant "most people" and got annoyed because most people don't get exhausted getting out of the bath or walking out to the front yard. But she actually meant "most people with fibromyalgia."

My initial interpretation of the topic "ball of foot" was definitely fairly literal and odd. I didn't reinterpret it correctly until after I'd read another thread.

I mean, okay, there's a reason my avatar and title are what they are.

Yes, that's what it took me a bit to figure out.

thats EXCATLY what i was thinking....

Oh, good - I am not alone.

I feel like I'm constantly compensating for this, stopping to reinterpret and analyze things.

Well, after getting confused by dog minds earlier I thought I'd post one of my 'literal moments'.

Not long ago I had a decorator around at my place doing some work and we were discussing the damp problem that we always seem to have over the winter months and the decorator said to me:

"What you need to do is crack those windows every so often."

And I was thinking to myself....what?...How is breaking the glass going to help me?

It wasn't until an hour or so after he left I understood what he was trying to tell me.