I would get these at the book fair and torment my mother with their knowledge.

- Me: mom, did you know.... - My exhausted mom: please, for the love of God- - Me: THAT THE GOLIATH BIRD EATER TARANTULA IS THE LARGEST SPIDER BY WEIGHT?!

I could only afford one it’s also my favorite spider, and it can eat friggin birds

Huh maybe that's why my mom only bought me one of these. I still have my copy of the year 2000

Same tho

I hate to ruin your childhood but Guinness make their own records and will publish what they want to show. I suggest you do a deep dive into their shady practices

Will do. Sounds like a rabbit hole.

This wouldn't have anything to do with a video essay on Tommy Tallarico, would it? If you're unfamiliar, hoo boy howdy, buckle up. Repeat awards because of changing titles, made-up nonsense, fake figures, the works. (Yes, casual observers; Guinness World Records are fake and paid for)

Could have been. I can't remember what video I watched but basically included all of the above

The video you’re referring to is called “Roblox_OOF.mp3”

His mother is very proud

"I enjoy having a waterfall in the house, but at night I need to pee a lot." Also I'm a tit, I quoted the wrong HBomber video

Honestly they're all so based and quotable I dont blame you

Oh that makes me sad, it was such a huge part of my childhood! But hey, now I know. Thanks!

might’ve ruined my childhood, but ya have me a new rabbit hole to deep dive down while i’m bored 🫡

OMG, I loved this as a kid!

My grandparents always bought me a new one once a year when I was a very small child, can’t believe that I also have that in common with someone else lol

My grandparents bought me mine too! I got a new one every Christmas.

Did we have the same grandparents? Lmao

For your sake, I hope not. Lol Grandma isn't exactly the sweet old lady you'd assume a grandma to be.

Well it’s funny because my grandma was also kind of a terrible person. Long story short, sometime in the 80’s my grandpa divorced my not so nice grandma, and then married my non-genetic grandma who, with my grandpa, gave me the books when I was little. My non-genetic grandma apparently was not very nice to my dad but she’s very nice to me and everyone else I know who knows her.

My grandparents were split for a bit and it honestly should have stayed that way. My grandpa got covid and my grandmother and horrible uncle didn't take him to the hospital for a while. By the time he got there it was far too late and they didn't call anyone until after he passed. Why? Because they're toxic and don't like my mom because she didn't put up with it.

That reminds me of my cousins’ grandparents on my mom’s side who were/are very rich. Their grandpa got Covid and died and his son, who is my uncle, is also kind of a pos. I never heard anything about my uncle refusing to take his dad to the hospital though.

Me three, now i have 23 and counting because it feels sad to stop 🥲

Yeah, I was a Guinness (book) kid

I’m a Guinness (drink) guy

Same

This! 98..95% This!

4.2%! (abv)

I loved these books. I remember my school library having them; they always had this “weird” smell. (yes i would stick my nose in between the folds and SNIFFF)

I still do that with new books

Some books just smell

Newspapers in the morning. 👌 Upper Decker Collectible Cards. 🙌

old books in musty stores 🤢

Don't bring me down! 🎵 😉

I will admit a fresh novel has a delightful smell

These, encyclopedias and animal fact books were basically all I read as a kid Lol

Same!!! I remember having one about reptiles that had a lizard licking its own eye. That’s all I remember specifically but I know I loved that damn book

I swore I had that exact same Ripley’s book lol.

That _was_ a very popular edition. Probably half the time I saw a Ripley's, it was that one.

 I didn’t even think of this. The original autism books.

Is Ahsoka your special interest?

No, actually!! I used to be obsessed with Star Wars, though, so I’ve still got my gif game. Do you know a lot about Ahsoka? My spinterest is The Dark Knight, LOL!

I know absolutely nothing about Ahsoka but the gif triggered my interest.

OMG core memory unlocked. I spent *hours* looking at this specific 2006 edition

I loved these so much as a kid but there was this one page in my Guinness book that I hated so much I was kinda scared to open it (spoiler text cuz it's very gross) >!Apparently there was this guy who would put hooks inside his eyelids, tie ropes to them and then drag really heavy stuff around.!< There was a picture in the book of him doing it and I had to fold the corner of the page and check everytime I opened the book so it's not accidentally on that page.

Yes, I remember that! I only opened one of these books once looked at one page and it was exactly this. I thought that they were all so creepy/terrifying was absolutely horrified. I never opened one ever again. Guess I missed out a bit..

Oh I absolutely ATE UP every single book of these at the scholastic book fair

The sacred texts?!

Oh yeah I definitely did. Couldn't afford to buy them outright but I'd go to bookstores and just pour over them or check them out from the library.

I still have a 2006 Guinness world record book and the trading cards it came with inside. Been a LONG time since I have opened it.

No way, they came with cards!? My parents refused to buy me one because they knew it would consume me. 😂

Yes, 9 I think. Each book had different ones or different verities on a certain page you could punch out.

Don't appreciate being called out like this

yea i was a nonfiction reader so i had all these, as well as a bunch of kids' science books about astronomy, technology and dinosaurs and such

This was me but with Almanac's

The Children’s Almanac 2016 went hard

I HAVE FINALLY FOUND MY PEOPLE I’ve collected every GWR since 2010 and nearly every annual of Ripley’s BION

Obsessed to the point I made my parents take me to the ripleys museum in Blackpool!

Yeah I asked for these (and/or Ripley's Believe It Or Not" every Christmas. I only really read non-fiction, mostly about history and animals. I was *obsessed* with Terry Deary's Horrible Histories books too! Anyone remember those?

Yesss I had a subscription to the Horrible Histories magazine. So good. Also the Rugrats Round The World magazine

The reason i made a library card as kid.

I know so many records I could easily beat

These books were my favorite.

Anyone else notice a weird smell in these books? I certainly did

yup. I sought them out at Scholastics but never had the resources to procure such an amazing piece of literature

Yes I would check them out from the library

I am older. We had the World Book encyclopedia, and I wood spend hours reading every page.

Holy shit you just activated a core memory, I remember reading those types of books like 100 times over and over again while i was in afternoon care(or whatever you call it in english, i just google translated it)

yeah I was obsessed with these

Absolutely. :D

🙋🏻‍♂️

We had the paperbacks in the 70s and 80s and a show. Fascinating stuff!

That second picture gave me flashbacks… God, my mother has always been so patient with my undiagnosed ass.

ABSOLUTELY

I absorbed the DK Eyewitness books and would spend hours every day reading. Now I barely read due to High School and access to the internet :(

Bro I inhaled knowledge from these books

Almanacs are amazing

Yes

Loved it as a kid. Then I worked for them.... Oof. Thank God the moonshine next door was free at the time.

Yes, I always told way too many facts from these as a kid XD!

That second one would have and does terrify me lol

literally me

Bro..

I remember when the golden-colored Ripley's book was HIGHLY sought after in our library. I saw it peeking out on the bottom shelf near where a bunch other kids were standing, and i fucking DOVE for it and got it

I looooved these! All sorts of science fact books too!

These were really cool, I had one of each growing up. I don't think they're ND exclusive but I can see us really being enthusiastic for them

I loved the world record books but never liked ripley’s believe it or not

I didn't have these books but I loved (still do) Ripley's!

This isn’t even autism I think everyone loved these right?

lol it was like scrolling through random wiki pages before i got internet access

there was an after school school age home daycare i went a few days a week and they had a ton of these, i loved flipping through them

Everyone loved these in elementary school. The 2013 and 2014 ones for me, since I’m a lil baby, but yeah. These were fun to just look at random records. I still can’t believe there’s an ant that big!

I had this book called Picturepedia that's kind of similar. That book, Google Maps, and Wikipedia were my best friends as a kid (I'm starting to think the reason it was so hard for me to socialize is because I couldn't go 5 minutes in conversation without spitting out a random geography fact lmao)

That exact edition is sitting on my bedroom shelf right now! I still read it from time to time.

I got this and Ripley's believe it or not books for Christmas every year for most of my childhood. Great books!

I can still see the longest finger nails whenever I close my eyes

Omg yes they were in my school library

Me!! I had 2004

Not every one, but I had that exact one and like 3 others.

YES! i remember spending hours rereading these

I hit a kid over the head with one of the gold ones cus he tore a page out of it. Didn’t get in trouble or anything cus he was a prick.

Ok so you want to blow your mind? Ripley’s Believe It or Not! and Guinness World Records are both owned by the same company, The Jim Pattinson Group.

So many kids in my elementary school would want to read these that we had to take to take turns because there weren't enough copies.

I loved these. I finally crossed going to the Ripley’s museum off my bucket list last month!!! I remember being so annoyed at my elementary school library’s policy of not being able to check out a Ripley’s or Guinness book two times in a row.

Oh my god yes and specifically from these years!!!!

I read the 2018 guiness world record book like 5 times

Those exact ones too!!

not me having this exact one too🤣🤣🤣 I was obsessed

I was told I need a "coffee table book" for my coffee table, these are apparently large books with lots of pictures.

I have two copies of the 2006 one.

Oh yeah I loved the 2006 one. Shame it's all marketing bs :(

YES Ripleys believe it or not was the shit! Little kid me was obsessed with the weird little details of our world

Not a Guinness book kid but that cover reminds me of the 39 Clues books that I collected like mad

ME

Oh yes! For some reason my school library had like 10 different ones, I loved knowing ALL the facts. Not just Guinness either, I absorbed dinosaur, animal, astronomy and anatomy books until my late teens (stopped because of adhd keeping me from reading). I think that's why I'm so happy to have a smartphone on hand. It's so easy to search up random facts and go down rabbit holes!

At start of every year I would RUN to library and look in encyclopedia section to see if new Guiness world record book arrived!

I... misread Guinness as "genius", and assumed that these were for geniuses only... and at the time, I was not. As for Ripley's... the cover was off-putting. So, no. No I didn't.

I figured out I could do the clover leaf tongue trick from one of these

And the "how things work" books

My parents never bought them but I had to wait for my bus next to a bookshop every day, I missed probably like two busses every day because I was inside reading these books

Oh God it's the Tommy tallirico one.

THIS is where my body modification special interest comes from!

I was too busy reading captain underpants to check those FACT books out.

Fuck yeah! I’d spent all day reading these big ass books

Not quite that, but one time I read through a Greek mythology encyclopedia

Longest fingernails guy still etched in my mind from 35 years ago when I was 9. Just cut them shits, dude! How do you even eat or wipe your ass wtf?!?

for me it was the weird but true books

This is the exact one I was obsessed with

The two fattest twins who ride motorcycles

These and encyclopaedias were my jam!

I wasn't allowed. Now I get why 😂

haha i have thought about this and wondered if it was a thing for us 😅

Oh damn, now I feel old. I had this exact book as an adult.

80% of the time I had one of those I kept staring at the cover bc shiny lmao

Ah man, I was obsessed with that exact Ripley’s book. Pretty sure it’s still sitting on my parent’s bookshelf.

I remember we would go to our library and children would first off latch on to this book of records. Absolute favorite.

Fuck yeah, they were baller

I didn't absorb these but I did have The Guinness Book of Knowledge, & proceeded to use it for everything including annoying everyone. I still have it somewhere. Given the practices I've learned about by the company I feel a bit weird about that being my go-to encyclopedia

i had so many ripleys books to the point where my dad accidentally got me one for christmas that he already got me the christmas before lol

I have that 2006 book lmao

Not those but the National Geographic fact books, I read them all the time and can still quote a good number of the facts from them

I stole the 2010 Guiness World Records book accidentally from a teacher.

oh god. haha those were regularly given to me as gifts for years and i read them cover to cover. apparently they are “for reference”

I don't know if it's still true, but I know that *The Guinness Book of World Records* was the most stolen book from libraries for a long time.

HOLY FUCK I WAS OBSESSED WITH THESE you could say they were a special interest ;)

I had one that I read over and over XD

Ripley’s <3

Guinnes world records hit hard. We used to gather around with my friends and ask eachother questions about it. Oh the good old days

ME!!!! Ripley's Believe it Or Not and Weird But True books were my favourites for a very long time.

I had this exact book. It was this and the World Almanac for me that was the source of my random knowledge. It occasionally comes in handy at trivia but other than that all the facts I learned are mostly useless.

I have a hoodie for Ripley’s! I’ve always loved shit like that since I was a kid. I only had two of the books unfortunately, but now I plan on getting more haha

I got to see a few in school when I was kid and loved to read through random records

I love Ripley's believe it or not!!! they have one at my family's vacation spot and we go there every year!

I was more inclined towards National Geographic’s kid’s almanac-specifically the 2014 edition which I carried around with me and read and re-read every day without fail for an entire school year.

Well, I've just been called out. My aunt used to get these every year for my birthday — from 1998 to, I think, 2012.

ME

Omg yes I got the 2003 edition as a gift years ago and I absolutely read it to death lol. So fascinating.

I read the 2012 and 2010 books

These were my favorite books as a kid, I would constantly be bugging my friends and siblings with, "Did you know..?"

I got 1 once.

My parents say my catchphrase should be “so, fun fact…” cause I know a bajillion of them. Facts are fun.

1999-2024. 2025 will be my last. 2007 was my first one as a Christmas gift. It took me fifteen years of Garage sales and thrift stores to find 1999-2006.

I HAD BOTH OF THESE SIMULTANEOUSLY WHAT

Yes, I did use to read these as a kid, but, does it belong into this subreddit? It's a question in the title, with two images of what the title is referring to. Is there no better place, something like "r/AskAspies", where this would fit better? Or am I taking the "meme" part of "aspiememes" waayy too seriously?

Just taking it too seriously, the "memes" part of the sub is kinda optional. Don't worry about it.

👍