The literal Aspie strike again! >.<

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I probably would have done the same unless he said "N for November" and I don't have hardly any problems with taking things literally.

It can work both ways too.

I'm at work yesterday, sitting next to another woman, and she looks in the corner behind me and asks, "Who's leg is that in the corner?"

Thinking she can't possibly mean there's an actual, detached leg in the corner of the room, as I turn to look I'm racking my brain wondering what kind of strange, NT metaphor she's referring to.

Until I see ... there actually is a prosthetic leg in the corner. With hiking boot on it and all!

I work at a ski resort. Turns out there was a 1-legged skier on the slopes yesterday and we were keeping his prosthetic leg in the office for safekeeping for him.

Almost 4 weeks ago my dad got me a pork pie. It said "with jelly" and I thought it would be disgusting with fruity jelly. My dad could tell this by the expression on my face and told me it wasn't that kind of jelly.

Also, when I was younger my parents would tell me that soap operas were just a story. I imagined that it was in a book too as to me at that time, that was where stories came from.

I remember when I was 13 my parents were watching A League of Their Own and at the end I asked if it was all real because it had words at the end about AAGPBL and my mom said it all did happen so I thought all the characters were real because it all did happen she said.
But when I was 14 my dad said it was just a story and I pointed out to him it all did happen so how can it be a story and my mother had to explain to me what she really meant months back.

The following quote reminds me of my time in primary school. lol
I've highlighted what I think is the most important point.

I think that the issues here are cultural differences in communication.
Like the boy mentioned in the example above, my family's style of communication was different to that of my primary school.

No wonder, I had so many problems and misunderstandings!

I don't think it's just aspies that interpret things over-literally.
Anyone from a different culture who wasn't familiar with the communication customs in a school would have similar issues.

If someone doesn't mix socially with a group of people very often (for whatever reason), it's unlikely that the person will pick up all of the subtle communication nuances of that group.

These nuances are evolving constantly and if someone is "out of the loop" (by that I mean not in contact with the group on a regular basis), this person might be perceived as culturally "strange" by group members.

Some days ago reading threads on one forum I came across someone’s signature: “Ask your friends if they want some dog’s honey for heart”. Having entered the link I realized it referred to an abandoned dog looking for its new owner (a dog with personality as sweet as honey) but the very first association of mine was several scandals recently revealed in our country – people killed dogs to make lard of them for sale. For a moment I started to wonder what for heaven’s sake honey could have in common with dogs – after all honey is produced by bees not by dogs and if eating honey really could help people with heart diseases.

Yes people from other countries who use a different language would take things literal too. In our country, we do not have "Pull up your socks" so if you said that to an American, they would think you are telling them to do it than taking action. "Taking the piss" also a phrase we don't use here.

I found out that in some cultures, they do not say they're "on the phone" or "on the computer" if you said that to them, they would think you are literally on it instead of using it.

When I was at school, learning French, we were taught about train stations and how to ask for tickets, etc. We learnt about the left luggage office.

At the time and for years and years afterwards I always wondered why no one ever mentioned the right luggage office....

I know what people mean, but sometimes it's just more fun to take what they say literally

Some recent ones:

He said: "I'm just going to hop in the shower."
I knew he meant: "I will be in the shower for a short time"
But I imagined: a wet naked male hopping up and down

He said: "I never used to like olives, but now they're growing on me."
I knew he meant: in the past he didn't like the taste, but now he is used to it and starting to like it.
But I imagined: a guy with olives growing on his skin.

Just heard one which made me laugh at myself...someone just referred to something as being "up in the air at the moment" and I was thinking what???! !!....OH!! !!

I'm not surprised at your confusion - the sentence makes no sense. Well, it does if the person is offering some 'dog's honey' (impossible - dogs don't produce honey) for a heart or some heart (presumably edible). But it does not mean what it is supposed to mean.

I took things literally a lot as a kid.
Not always because I didn't understand, but sometimes also because I thought it was a silly expression to use instead of just saying things right out.

In Danish, we have a saying similar to: "you can't both have your cake and eat it". We say: "you can't both blow and have flour in your mouth". My dad said that to me, and I wondered if it was true (though he told me that it was just a saying.)
So one day I tried literally to fill my mouth with wheat flour and go out in the garden and blow. And yeah, my dad was right: a big, white flour cloud came out of my mouth!
(But anyway, a part of it remained inside, namely the little amount of flour that got wet inside the mouth.)

Another thing that has occurred in my adult years several times (mostly before I got diagnosed):
I stood waiting at a bus stop, and another person asked me: "Do you know what time it is?"
And yeah, I knew what they meant, they meant the same as "what time is it?", but I thought it was a kind of silly way to say it, so often I'd simply answer: "no", or: "No, I don't know what time it is; that's not something you know, you have too look at the watch."
(Sometimes I'd even answer: "No, I guess it's only Rain Man that 'knows' what time it is" - without realising that I was on the spectrum myself, haha. )
When I came with those answers, people of course looked baffled. If I only said "no", they might ask me: "can you find out?" And yes, of course I could, and became a bit embarrassed... (I used to get embarrassed after such a conversation...)
Funny to find out why! (I mean, why I answered that way.)

i heard that one and was confused when i heard it.
"you can not have your cake, and eat it too" is the english version.
that means if i have my cake, i can not eat it.
that is easily resolved.
if i eat the cake, i will not have the cake, and there will be no cake for me not to eat.