A few things I thought were normal but evidently are not...

-Having a car blanket: A blanket I keep in my car for winter for while my car is heating up. My sister does it, too. How is this weird? But apparently not everyone gets this.

-Mandibular tori: I seriously only learned the word for this like 4 years ago. It's this little extra bit of bone on my mandible under my tongue. I didn't know it WASN'T normal until I started studying human osteology in college. I just thought everyone gagged on the little black x-ray things at the dentist...then finally a hygenist pointed out the reason for the problem- my mandibular tori make my mouth "shorter" so that there is less room for the bite plate thing. WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME THIS?

-Calling it "pop": So I understand that different regions of the country (and world) have different words for things and or ways to pronounce them. But when I lived in Florida  I was consistently giggled at for saying "pop" rather than "soda". Luckily a guy I worked with was from Australia and called it "fizzy drink"...so I got a reprieve when they heard that one.

-Playing cornhole: Growing up this was never a dirty thing to say. In Ohioan, it translates to "game with little fabric pouches filled with dried corn that you toss into a hole on a game board during an outdoor party". It's just a bean-bag toss game. I guess not everyone calls it that though. Don't google it if you don't like surprises.

-Being friendly to customers: I'm always nice to workers and fellow customers at a store I go to, and usually the clerks are nice back. Everyone has bad days, but in general people are nice to me. I work at a restaurant and I will admit I get impatient sometimes. I also had my moments working in a theme park. But I'm always surprised at how many people comment on how I'm "too happy" or ask me why I'm smiling. I LIKE TO SMILE. Is it not normal to try to be friendly to people? I guess I thought it was.

-Playing euchre: I found that few people outside certain states have ever even heard of this game. It's a card game with 4 players...it's tricky to learn but fun. I can't count how many times my parents had people over to play, or how many times we played it on school or church retreats, or on band trips or whatever. We even have parties specifically for playing and we have tournaments. But when I was in Florida I asked my roommates to play and they had NO IDEA what I was saying. Also apparently "Italian Rummy" is also not a common version...?

-Eating turkey at Thanksgiving AND Christmas: I thought everyone did this. The Griswolds do it. But I guess a lot of people eat ham at Christmas. I found out a few years ago that we never did that at my mom's parents' because my uncle and grandfather don't like ham. We would sometimes have ham at my dad's parents'...but I just thought they planned that so we didn't have 2 days of turkey. My bad.

-Referring to people by relation, "Cousin Doug", for example: Everyone calls people "Aunt" or "Unlce" or "Grandma" or whatever. But some people have big-ish families. My parents both have cousins who are technically not MY first cousins. Like I have my cousins Hillary and Heather, and I simply call them by their first names. But my dad's cousin Chris, I refer to as "Cousin Chris". I might call my aunt just "Kathy" but my great-aunt I always call "Aunt Ruby". I don't know how to explain it, I guess. I just thought it was normal.