Last night as I was tidying up the apartment for company, I lit a scented candle and placed it on the table. Then, as the place was feeling kind of stuffy, I turned on the fan- right in front of the candle. The melted wax caught fire and suddenly my expensive L’Occitane Lemon Verbena candle was an OMG foot high flaming torch!
So. Important Lesson learned at age 27: never put a lit candle in front of a fan.
What important lessons did you learn late in life?
When using an apple slicer like this, don’t flip it over and use your thumb to push the rest of the apple pieces completely through.
I did this for quite a while until one day I shoved a little too hard and it sliced a good chunk of my thumb. Almost fainted from seeing all the blood :smack:. Haven’t touched the thing since.
Just found out that apple slicers exist.
26 years old!
I was visiting my buddy this weekend and he had just put together his new ping pong table in the garage. Now, it was 8 degrees fahrenheit outside, but where I come from, new ping pong tables don’t go unchristened, regardless of weather conditions. Anyways, after the first game, I look on top of his refrigerator and notice a frozen, bloated soda can. I pick it up to show it to him and joke that I hope it doesn’t blow up in my hand. Of course, it’s completely frozen, so I’m not actually worried about that - ice can’t just spontaneously explode, regardless of CO2 content, right? Heh, I learned my lesson a couple of seconds later, as the can loudly detonates in my hands, showering the garage in a crescendo of ice. The side of the can had a split down the side from top to bottom and the top of the can flew about 20 feet across the garage. Thankfully, the can split away from me and I was holding the can chest level parallel to the floor. I was lucky to escape with a small cut and welp on my left hand. At some point during the night, another can exploded on it’s own accord, which bewildered me even more. I had thought that the heat from my hands had triggered the detonation with the first can.
Twenty three years of existence can’t teach common sense, but a split second of terror hammers the message home pretty immediately.
I’m not one for sigs. But it I were, I’d be stealing this!
Also, don’t let the candle inside an old style metal and glass lantern for a long time. The melted wax also catch fire in this case, with identical results. More specifically don’t do so when you’re asleep in the same room. Though you might be awoken when the glass of the lantern explodes.
Then, when you rush to the stairs to pick up the fire extinguisher, half-awake and panicked, don’t jump down the stairs. Falling flat with with a sprained ankle won’t improve the situation.
Learned at 31.
Turkeys (domestic) can’t fly…god as my witness
Also : when you’re using an ashtray to find the best way to ignite pyrotechnic materials, don’t subsequently keep the ashtray close to you in case an absent-minded smoker would accidentally use it.
At least not if you’re yourself an absent-minded smoker.
If you failed to follow this advice, however, you’re encouraged to show up in the middle of the night at a small local clinic dressed up as a vampire with your right hand in a pan of cold water you’re holding with your left hand. It will provide an appreciated humorous relief to medical personnel present.
Learned at 28.
I seem to re-learn “think before you speak” every day - or at least be reminded why I should really get around to taking it seriously…
Righty-tighty, lefty-loosey.
Until I was about 25, I never noticed a pattern.
I started a fire recently too, learning that simple vegetable oil will go up in huge flames if it’s left on high heat.
Haha yeah, never knew they existed until a few months ago! (22 here). In reality, all it is is an apparatus with 6 razor blades just waiting for the chance to take off a finger or two. 
I usually just snap off the edible pieces, then break off the core and poke it with a fork or spoon handle, which usually frees all the apple parts I need to eat or throw away. Sometimes the core-breaking will loosen the apple enough for removal without the poking being necessary. As I type this, it occurs to me that all this complicates things rather more than it should, but I could never get the apple off without injury any other way, and I’m such a klutz that cutting apples up with regular knives is best not thought of.
Most do-it-yourself craft products are designed to limit the quality of work the consumer can do. This is presumably either to protect the jobs of professional craftspeople or the market for commercially made goods.
Rivet that shoulder strap to your leather bag and you had better be prepared for it to give way or take it to a luggage or shoe repair person. And if your local shop is out of business, well, that’s your tough luck. Craftsmanship may be in retreat, but the idea that you have no business trying to be self-sufficient making things - at least things smaller and fiddlier than home improvement - still applies.
Push the slicer as far through the apple as you can. Grab the apple pieces in one hand, press down on the slicer with the other, and yank up. If you’re not strong enough to do it this way (it’s not bad, really), you can do it per-piece, but it’s a lot messier. Do all this on a cutting board or flexible mat – not your thigh.
And no, I’m not going to tell you how many times I used one before I figured that out.
