My house is basically set up on the ground floor as four square rooms forming a square. The northeast room holds the door. The northwest room holds the kitchen. They all have six foot by seven foot openings between the rooms, except the northwest to southwest room which has a normal door.
One day, years ago, my friends and I were swimming. For some reason, I needed to get something from my room. Soaking wet, without towling off, I run inside. I ran from the northeast to the northwest room and rounded the corner to the southwest room. The kitchen, I might add, had been freshly waxed linoleum. Waxed floor + dripping wet child = no traction. As I cut around the corner, my body flies out from underneath me, and I slide sideways, flat on my stomach, on the ground. I start to get up, but realize I cannot move.
Somehow I had managed to be the perfect height to wedge myself squarely between the kitchen counter and the wall. After I stopped laughing, I had to holler for help because there was no way I was going to be able to get up by myself.
That, and yesterday one of my co-workers locked me in the glass case at work. You know the glass cases at Best Buy? The ones they store the memory, hard drives, and other expensive stuff in? I was sitting in the bottom, arranging some stuff, when I ducked my legs inside. As soon as I did this, he slams the glass shut, locks it, and walks away. He came back a few minutes later, but by then customers had seen this wierdo locked in the glass case.
I can’t remember how old I was, exactly. Probably somewhere between 13 and 16. I was standing in the bathroom at the sink when I felt a sneeze come on.
ah… Ah… AH…CHOOOOOO!!!
Now keep in mind that sneezes go at something like 750gazillion miles/hour. I slammed my head down so hard on the bathroom countertop that I saw stars and almost passed out. I had the hugest bump right in the middle of my forehead for, like, a week. I don’t think I got a concussion, though. But perhaps that explains some other problems I have…
Picture the combination of a really tall person standing up from a couch that is located underneath a moving ceiling fan. Then picture him doing it another time.
I also have major issues with televisions that hang down in the middle of airplane aisles and pretty much any doorway in any house.
I expect to be a blithering idiot by the time I am 30. Well, even more of a blithering idiot.
I’m more apt to run into things than bang my head on things, but years of horseback riding (and riding stallions, no less) has contributed quite nicely to my head trauma resume. You’d be surprised how HARD sand is when landing head-first into it.
I have so many stories. I could tell you how I officially broke my right arm 5 times (it was actually 6 but one time I was never taken to the doctor) and my left arm once but I will save that for another thread someday.
I think I will tell you how I got a really nasty knot on my head. I was at a hotel and at the swimming pool going to get a soda. Well, the pavement was very slippery and for some reason I slipped on the concrete and fell headfirst into the shallow end of the pool landing on my forehead on the bottom concrete step. I am very happy that I am not paralyzed from it.
Another one, I was jumping on my father’s bed and doing backflips off of it. For all my clutziness I was pretty good at gymnastics at one time. Anyway, I was doing backflips off the bed and one time I stumbled and flew back into the wall on the doorway slamming the back of my head into the wall (this was shortly after my forehead healed from the above incident, you would think I would learn) anyway, first thing I see is stars. I was home alone (obviously otherwise I wouldn’t have been jumping on the bed) so I call my elder sister up and she tells me to go look in the mirror and see if my eyes were dialating. They were wildly. It was very hard to focus. I laid down and was dizzy for days over that one.
There were several gymnastics injuries. Those are kind of boring though. So, I will leave it with that. And not tell you guys any more of those stories.
SwimmingRiddles -Last year I was kicked in the head by my thoroughbred gelding. I was bending down to take off his bell boots and he reached up with a back foot to brush away a fly. WHAP!! right on the temple. It rolled me over and stunned me, but fortunately I was wearing my helmet still. Which is odd, since I usually take it off as soon as I’m off my horse.
SqrlCub - my brother once broke his arm trying to ride a horse in it’s stall. Did your boyfriend ever get choose a name?
Coldfire gave himself a hernia when I told the tale, a few months back, of one of my self-inflicted head-traumas…
STORY A:
I innocently was teaching first year physics students the wonders of pendulum motion with the well known “bowling ball on a rope strung from the ceiling” demo, where the instructor (or a student volunteer-victim) pulls the bowling ball towards them up to their nose and lets it go, demonstrating that it will never come back up as high as it was released, yadda yadda yadda. I do this without any incident, then do the reeeeeeaaaaly smart thing of taking a step towards the swinging ball, and turning to speak to my students to make the observation about the ball never swinging back as high… only to get smacked in the head by said bowling ball, right in the temple, knocking me out cold. Students got a kick out of this, and I got a fractured skull. STORY B:
Again, innocent little me, going to a professor’s office to pick up prof evaluation sheets for one of said collegue’s classes (profs aren’t allowed in the room when students fill in the eval sheets). On my way there, there were 2 sets of heavy metal “firewall” doors. Upon approaching set 2, I noticed the door was being held open by one of those nifty mechanisms for the handicapped. So, I walked to the door, which was swung open towards me. As I get close to the door, the mechanism lets go, and this baby SWINGS shut (they always swing shut and close with a loud clang - very heavy and fast)… and I walk right into its sharp corner. Result? Passed out little me on the floor, blood trickling down my forehead, and yet another skull fracture. I spent a week with a bump the size of a small apple on my forehead, thank [insert diety name here] that the skin broke or else it could have been really dangerous.
Yeah yeah, you may now all go ahead and laugh at me.
StGermain, he has posted a few times under DCnewsman. He really wanted to use stet but has been unable to get it to work properly. I personally thought ChpMnk was the best one.
I have been relatively lucky but…
About ten years ago I was jogging/walking into work, just leaving the parking lot, slight drizzle, running late. There was a double sided guardrail that we had to either go around or over. Didn’t want to walk 100 yards out of my way to go around so I was going to jump over. Decided about halfway through my 2 1/2 foot jump up that I didn’t want to jump completely over the rail and tried to land on top of it. Right foot made it ok. left foot made it ok. Now standing on top of said steel guardrail, still had inertia, still drizzling. Led off with left foot to continue and pushed off with right…slipped, lost footing, lost inertia, went straight down, vertical, feet straight up in the air. I’m about six feet tall, standing on a 2 1/2 foot steel object. Head clangs off the guardrail (I was told it made quite a noise, yes, there were many witnesses) and the top of my head completes an 8 1/2 foot fall by slamming squarely onto the concrete. I couldn’t see, speak or move for about 3 minutes (no kidding, that F*&^$%G hurt!) so I laid there all crumpled up with my feet twisted over the guardrail. My friends and co-workers (compassionate bastards that they were) couldn’t help me…no, no. They were busy flopping on the ground themselves, in hysterics, tears in their eyes, sides hurtin’ as my eyes rolled back in my head and I flopped around like a drowning fish. (apparently I fell with a certain style and grace that could only be interpreted as comical) Nasty lumps on side (guardrail) and top (concrete) of head for about a week. And a sore neck to boot. The kicker is that somebody has a video tape…the aforementioned compassionate bastards made the security guys dub a tape for them…
E.