You've never met people who take what you now call obvious hyperbole absolutely seriously and literally?
I guess you're going to continue to get surprised by how often you get criticised in this specific way, by many, many other people.
Hint: when someone doesn't understand you, you were in fact not obvious, no matter what you think — communication is a multiplayer game, not a single-player endeavour.
[dead]
I am starting to suspect that this playing dumb is entirely disingenuous.