What have you taken literally and it got you into trouble?

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a few years ago i went to a christmas party with co-workers.
at the end of the night everyone had to give a short speech, about end of year/new year hopes, that kind of thing.
it was actually a nice party, my speech went fine, most of the time was spent eating and drinking and talking about the food (rather than actual conversation) so i was feeling a lot less stressed than normal.........until the last speech of the night.

one of my coworkers (the last one to deliver a speech) got a bit more drunk than the others. when it was his turn to speak, he stood up, turned around and looked at me and said "i just want to say that i love you, and you have beautiful eyes."
someone told him to stop joking, and start the speech again. so he did, but said exactly the same thing "i love you" all over again.

i was absolutely mortified. to make things worse, everyone turned around to look at me and i think that they expected me to say something to make the situation better. but of course i couldnt say anything. i mean, what on earth could i say after that? finally, someone else took the initiative and the dinner soon ended.

i have AS. i take things very literally. i honestly believed that he loved me, because thats what he said. considering that he never apologized, and no-one ever said anything to me about it afterwards, i could only assume that he was telling the truth. that guy and I had to sit across from each other in the staffroom for the next 6 months, and I nearly quit my job from the stress. every time i looked up from my desk, he was staring at me. everytime we met in the hall or had to speak about anything, i would become exrtemely nervous (more than usual) and end up running away from him.

just before i left that job, i found out that the rumour going around was that i was crazy and had a total crush on that guy (which was not true).

misunderstanding a drunken remark at that work party made the next 6 months of my life hell, and nearly ruined my professional reputation.

or

whats up?

whatever is not currently held down by some kind of gravitational force is up, i suppose (or going up, at least)

even some of my NT co-workers appreciated this one!!

At work, I took a call from a colleague who works away from the building and who I don't see very often. He asked how I was, as we hadn't spoken for a while. I do understand that very often, 'How are you?' is just a pleasantry, but on this occasion, he really did sound as if he wanted to know. So I told him (that I wasn't doing too good, and what doctor's appointments I was waiting for). He sounded extremely uncomfortable and ended the call very quickly.

When I was in the elementary school cafeteria with the rest of my 1st grade class, the person sitting next to me would lean towards me and say "(insert un-important irrelevant information here), pass it on..."

Its that thing where one kid whispers something to another and expects them to do the same to the next person and the next and so on. But I didn't understand what this classmate meant. Then they would say,

"(My name), pass it on to Sarah!"

Me: "pass WHAT on to Sarah??"

other classmate sitting opposite me "(info), pass it on!!"

Me: ????????

I thought they were referring to something physical/tangible, not something intangible like secrets/information.

Any one of the following statements:

"Daddy won't be home for hours."
"I always keep my word."
"I can keep a secret."
"I love doing this for you."
"I love you."
"I'm a virgin."
"I'm here to help you."
"I'm on the pill."
"It's a temporary lay-off."
"Let's just be friends."
"My credit is good."
"Off course it's safe."
"She's hot for you."
"We're your friends."
"You can trust us."
"You have my word on it."
"You won't feel a thing."
"You'll get over it."
"You'll never amount to anything."
"You're too stupid."
"You're worthless."

... and that's just off the top of my head.

"I've been too busy with work"
"I need space"
"I need time to think"
"I'll always be there for you"
"I'll call you"
"Of course we're friends"

Thinking back on this makes me laugh.

In the 2nd grade, we did a worksheet in health class on drugs. It was something like circling the pictures of things that are good for you, and not circling the drugs. There was a picture of a bottle of pills, and I circled it. The teacher noticed.
"Now, are pills good for you?" she asked.
"Yes," I said.
"No, pills are drugs too."
Remembering that my father took his prescribed medicines on a daily basis, I said "But my daddy takes pills."

They pulled me into the office for questioning and conducted some sort of investigation.

Until I was about thirteen, I always got into trouble for "talking back" to my parents. I thought that it coldn't possibly be literal, because how else could I respond/explain myself?

Also, during my last class today, my teacher told me that I looked tired and said "Well, Lola, you can just crawl under your desk and take a nap if you want." My response? "Actually, I can't fall asleep during the day. Unless I'm sick or something." She just looked at me. "I was just kidding, you know."
Okay, that one didn't get me into trouble. But I did look pretty stupid. I can't believe I thought she was serious!

Maybe not "get in trouble", but I set out to make Yorkshire pudding for the first time, for a party. The directions that my mom had laid out said:

Mix the flour, egg, and water together. Mix together, then add the milk.

Of course, this was different from how they actually made it, where they added the milk, eggs and water together and GRADUALLY added flour.

As a result, it turned into a very thick dough, and no amount of milk-adding would make it even close to the right consistancy.

Luckily, my dad came home and we had just enough ingredients to make another batch, but we kept the "aborted Yorkshire" around for a couple of days so that my mom could have a laugh.

I hate it when people say "how are you"! It makes sense to me that if someone asks, they would actually want to know, even though I know that they probably don't. And if I give the standard response "fine" and it's not actually true, it bugs me because I don't like lying. Usually I'll say some one-word thing like tired, busy, stressed or whatever, and that seems to work okay most of the time (...not that I could really even tell if the other person found it strange/awkward). Or sometimes with certain people who I know really well I'll actually say how I am.

I used to have so much trouble with sarcasm and things like that, although I think I've gotten better at recognizing it. And there are SO many other things, I just can't remember them right now.

Yeah all the time.

I should keep a note book though so I dont keep on making the same mistakes.

For example, one of the latest...

NT: "Well as long as your happy"

me: "Yeah i am happy, thanks!"

NT: &@*#! !! !

Apparently the NT mentioned didn't actualy mean he wanted me to be happy!

PLAYYY FREEEEEEE BIRDDDDDDD!! !! !!

sorry, I couldn't resist!

I always thought when they said "It's better to be safe than sorry" they were actually giving you a CHOICE. I thought if you wanted to chance being sorry, then go ahead and do it that way. I was sorry a lot, but I never realized when I was "safe".

My mother used to ask me something she would say "honor bright?" I had no idea after I hadn't seen my mother for 30 years she was asking me if my HONOR was BRIGHT, i.e. was I lying to her. I had no idea.

I remember my father thinking I was a poor sport and didn't want to play with me because I got upset when I realized all the things he was saying we would have "when our ship came in" was just made up. I cried for days when I realized there was no 'ship' and it was never 'coming in.'

It was my mother that mixed up the tuna fish and the cat food, though, and fed grandma's distinguished friend a light lunch, though.

Merle

PLAYYY FREEEEEEE BIRDDDDDDD!! !! !!

sorry, I couldn't resist!

I always thought when they said "It's better to be safe than sorry" they were actually giving you a CHOICE. I thought if you wanted to chance being sorry, then go ahead and do it that way. I was sorry a lot, but I never realized when I was "safe".

My mother used to ask me something she would say "honor bright?" I had no idea after I hadn't seen my mother for 30 years she was asking me if my HONOR was BRIGHT, i.e. was I lying to her. I had no idea.

I remember my father thinking I was a poor sport and didn't want to play with me because I got upset when I realized all the things he was saying we would have "when our ship came in" was just made up. I cried for days when I realized there was no 'ship' and it was never 'coming in.'

It was my mother that mixed up the tuna fish and the cat food, though and fed grandma's distinguished friend a light lunch, though.

Merle

I don't think it got me into trouble as such.. but the person was very annoyed with me.

Basically, I had my ipod stolen in college about a year ago and this boy said he knew someone who had sold it on.
Apparently, he was joking, but I took i serious and went straight to the police who after a couple of days questioed him and the boy he said had 'sold my ipod on'.

Apparently they were very scared of the fact they were question by the police, but at the end of the day, they shouldn't joke about serious matters... especially to an Aspie! They got what they deserved!



By the way.... police closed case eventually.... never did find out who took my iPod.

Theres the usual jokes, like my neighbour in french class putting her soft toy in my seat and telling me it was taken. Though she did quickly laugh and apoligise when I walked off.

When I was little people would tell me I looked lost, I would say back to them 'I'm not lost, I'm in the (where-ever I was at the time)'

I still get the feeling that I'm missing some telephathic form of communication when I'm talking with a group of friends. I also still get weird looks after I say certain things, so I have the feeling I might be still misinterpreting people, but it is difficult to know when I'm not told if I've said anything worng. Whenever I've asked I generally get the 'no, its fine' response and avoided for a certain amount of time.

Oh and there was the time about age 13 /14 after a class calculating weight/height to determine bmi when I asked a girl I waited at the bus stop with how much she weighed. I was very confused by her reaction and the reaction of people around me, until a girl who used to be friends with me as a child stepped forward and told me that it was rude to ask things like that as it was personal and embaressing.

Still couldn't figuire out why she would be embarressed by her weight when was obviously not overweight.

But thank goodness I'd already "come out" to this person. iA good friend of mine asked me out to see a movie. He came to pick me up. I hadn't fininshed eating yet. He looked so confused and then he asked why I was eating if we were going out tonight. Oops. He'd actually asked me out on a DATE which of course includes the obligatory meal. NT's like to eat with other people in public for some reason LOL. I had no idea the guy liked me that way. I told him this AS thing was real and reminded him that he hadn't actually SAID we would be eating out somewhere, just going to a movie. Obviously this relationship didn't work out. Now my husband on the other hand who doesn't think I really have AS, he thinks I'm just shy and into routines like him (ahem). My husband would have not only discussed the restaraunt (we really only go to two) but what we were going to order. He's in a bit of denial about his AS traits, don't you think?