So I wanted to share this with all of you, as my life almost came to a most undignified end this morning at around midnight. I’m a cop in NYC and I was walking my foot post on 125th Street in Harlem, crossing Lenox Avenue, when I hear this lady yell, “Trailer!” I have no idea what’s going on, so I look behind me and I see that a trailer used at movie shoots as a portable bathroom, as broken free of the truck pulling it and is chasing me. I step to the side quickly, and it crashes into a lamp post, spilling fluids everywhere.
I was thinking, what if no one warned me and it hit and killed me. I would be killed by a porto-john. The paper couldn't even try and dignify that. But it taught me about how fragile life is and how you just gotta laugh at stuff like that. Just curious to know if anyone else has almost met their demise in less than dignified circumstances. Take care....
Sorry, DreamWorks, but I couldn’t help but be struck by the humor in a line-of-duty death by portable toilet. I can just imagine Mayor Giuliani rushing to your hospital bed trying to be solemn. The inspector’s funeral, with cops from departments around the country standing at attention, and the bagpipers playing Amazing Grace, while the eulogies go on about the nobility of your demise while protecting the city against the menace of portable toilets. And then the Mayor’s resulting “zero tolerance” policy against port-o-johns.
Anyway, once it was all over, how did you call the incident in? Is there a radio code for exploding public toilet? Is there a different code if there is leakage of, um, fluids? What did the dispacher say? Who got to clean up the mess?
And most importantly, would the port-o-poty have been a cop-killer? It could be a whole episode of Law and Order! “I WILL NOT STAND for this city to be over-run by cop-killing toilets!!!” Seriously, Dreamworks, I find it a bit disturbing that a LOT of people weren’t screaming for you to get out of the way. One person? Yikes. Glad you made it out unscathed.
I attended a wild NYE party in which lots of booze, a frozen pond, a Spudzooka, fireworks, and a bonfire all figured predominatantly. I kept saying that the whole situation had “Darwin awards” written all over it.
Oh yes, I’ve nearly been killed at least three times by my own stupidity.
Once I was playing badminton and got the birdie (does anyone say “shuttlecock”?) stuck in a tree. For some reason that I can’t recall, I dissasembled one of the poles holding up the net and threw a piece at the birdie to dislodge it. The piece of pole started coming right down on top of me and it was then that I realized I had thrown the bottom section – the one with the pointy tip that is supposed to help you get the pole into the gorund. It was now headed straight for my eye. I dove and it stuck into the ground where I was standing. Headline: Death by Badminton: Boy killed by stuck birdie.
Another time our car was stuck in the mud and I was the only one around. The rear wheels would just turn and turn – no traction. So, I LEAVE THE CAR IN REVERSE (tires still spinning) and hop out to PULL IT (from behind, mind you) out of the mud. After about 20 seconds of effort, it occurs to me that, if successful, I will be run over.
Finally, in junior high, I got the bright idea that I could use the quick release on my bike’s front tire as a punishment for someone if they stole my bike. So, I opened it before going to play tennis and FORGOT TO CLOSE IT for the ride home. At the base of our driveway, when I’m going full speed, the wheel flies off Emergency room, stitches, totalled front fork.
Chin up, DW, you’re death would have been mentioned in the
“Stupid ways to die” catagory for years to come.Most of us won’t even get that.
I can think of a really nice (non-pizza) tombstone for you of a stone image of you in uniform standing with your foot on the seat of a stone toilet, plunger in hand, kinda like Washington crossing the Potomac. Very dramatic and romantic.
BTW, I can’t help but think that your police officer job that you say you have is all a ruse. After all, look at your username and the fact that you were nearly crushed to death by a trailer that is used on a movie set, and I cannot help but wonder if you are secretly Speilburg or those two other guys (Geffen and Katzenburgersteinbaum?) that formed DreamWorks.
As for “death by stupidity” for me, it will probably be " Death by sarcasm". One day I’m gonna be strangled by someone who I just called a Felcher and they will know exactly what I mean.
When I worked at a title insurance company, one of our clerks brought a death certificate in form the Hall of Records. She knew we would never believe it, so she copied it. It listed the cause of death as “fell into automatic washing machine while intoxicated, and drowned”. How proud his children must be…
I used to play Pyroball as a kid (we’d set a quart cup of rubbing alcohol on fire, douse a tennis ball with it, and play catch) but nobody ever came close to getting burned. Danny got some alcohol splashed in his eye, though, which was bloodshot for a week.
Possibly my closest experience was when I was whipping a tree trunk with telephone wire. It made this really cool “pow” sound as the tip of the wire went supersonic. Well, after doing this for a while, I felt something hit me in the arm; I thought I’d knocked some bark off.
After a few minutes, I noticed there was blood on my shirt. I went inside and looked underneath; there was a little pinhole in my arm. When I touched my arm, blood gushed out through it.
To make a long story short, a little bit of that supersonic wire had broken off the tip of the telephone wire, splashed into the flesh of my arm, and stopped when it hit the bone. I spent a few hours getting it removed surgically.
If it had only been a few inches to the right, it would have gone right through my heart.
