‘What strange obsession did you have a child?’ – 23 people who were amazingly eccentric kids

When we become adults and embark upon the 50ish year grind of work and responsibility, we forget the wonder and curiosity we felt about the world as children.

Sometimes kids see the magic in things like flowers and insects. And sometimes, it turns out, they become enraptured by altogether odder things.

They’ve been chatting about this on the AskUK subreddit after user shitthrower shared their own fabulously eccentric youthful interests…

‘What strange obsession did you have a child?

‘When I was younger, for some reason I was so excited about the launch of BBC News 24, I made my whole family gather round to watch the launch of it, and then every morning for I’d wake up super early and watch it with the volume down (so my parents didn’t hear).

‘Eventually my parents had to put a child lock on the Sky box to stop me accessing the channel. I can still remember the flags waving around (which was the branding of the channel).

‘I also was really obsessed with the PhONEday, where landline phone numbers got an additional 1 added, we were on holiday on the Isle of Mann at the time, and I made a fake TV show about it with my dad’s video camera, where we’d film people on the street asking them about it.

Incredible. And they prompted lots of other people to relive their own bizarre childhood fascinations. Check these out…

1.

‘Catalogues. As soon as a new Argos or Index catalogue was out, I’d read it from front to back and memorise everything in there.

‘I’d get my parents to take me to get them as soon as I saw a TV advert saying ‘new Argos catalogue out now’.’
–rezonansmagnetyczny

2.

‘My mum sometimes reminds me that I had a mild obsession with Moira Stewart, when I was a toddler. Whenever she came on the TV, I’d stop what I was doing and concentrate on her. She reckons it was her soothing voice that did it for me.’
–Ok-Zookeepergame8691

3.

‘I had a real thing for John Major when I was about 4/5. I don’t know if it was the distinctive voice, or the glasses, or what. I just enjoyed seeing him on the telly.’
–InsertObligatoryPun

4.

‘I used to like looking at the food hampers at the back of catalogues.’
–Most-Top-8952

5.

‘I REALLY coveted the look of a farmer when I was about 8. I’d wear flat cap, Barbour style coat and my mum’s leather gloves. I don’t know where I got the idea that this was the “farmer” look (or why I wanted to look like a farmer in the first place) but that was my thing for a good year or so.’
–Recent-Walrus-3366

6.

‘Star Trek, original series. BBC2 repeats at 6pm in the 1980s. Watched it, then discovered the James Blish TV adaptions in the library, got several out every week. Begged for Star Trek toys.

‘Would only wear black trousers and a blue top. Learned to raise an eyebrow and do the Vulcan salute. Quoted it. Made my sister role play it for 2 years straight. Trips out in the family car – the car was the Galileo and we were going on an away mission. Wanted to name the pets after characters in it (that was vetoed).

‘This all resulted in a ban. No watching it, no reading it, no role-playing it. I started writing fanfic instead.’
–Emergency_Crayons702

7.

‘When I was about 8, I was really into shredding paper. My parents sometimes gave me a whole pile of scrap paper to shred. It was like legal drugs.’
–ans-myonul

8.

‘On a similar odd TV-based obsession, I remember collecting all those BBC 2 idents on tape in the 90s. One thing I remember was if you recorded the closedown at the end of the night, you’d get an extra long version and get to hear the music properly.’
–BlakeC16

9.

‘Collecting novelty rubbers, I had honestly drawers and drawers full but would never dream of actually using them as stationary.

‘Also used to practise my handwriting obsessively, would copy my books into notebooks and sometimes hide under my covers to write when I should have been in bed. When we got a family computer I used to then use that to practise typing.’
–wrappedinplastikkk

10.

‘I used to love playing Monopoly on a Saturday morning. Didn’t matter if I won or lost, had to be Monopoly. I must have broke my family as after that period they still refuse to play it with me. Don’t know why I was so obsessed.’
–CosmicLunar_

11.

‘I became obsessed with the film Young Sherlock Holmes when I was about 7. I taped it off the TV and proceeded to watch it almost every single day after school. This continued for a few months. Then the tape was “lost”.

‘A few months later, I found it at the bottom of a box of family photos. I of course reinstated my obsession and proceeded to watch it every day again. After another few weeks, I went to watch it and found that the whole tape was nothing but that “snow” you get from an untuned TV. I guess my obsession was not universally approved of.

‘I didn’t get to see it again until I picked up a VHS copy on eBay about 12 years later. I somehow ended up with a woman in my bedroom one night just after I got the VHS. Rather than trying it on with her as any normal 18-19 year old would, I put that film on. She left shortly after.’
–ThisIsAnAccount2306

12.

‘The colour cards from B&Q. I had dozens upon dozens, sorted by rainbow. I used to hold a stack of them in my hands just to feel the edges pressing into my palms, and loved reading all the names. Got to the point where my parents would drop me off at my Nana’s so they could go to B&Q in peace.’
–Demo_Bec