Most stupid thing you,or I, ever did

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
141

Well, let’s see now. I’ve done enough stupid things to fill a book with.

I believed* her when she said she was breaking up with him.

I believed her (a different her) when she said he was ‘just a friend.’

I set off one of those little rocket engines on a sand ramp, believeing that it would rocket down the street – which it did, then looped around and chased me across the yard before getting bored and rising into the sky to fire it’s parachute charge.

I carried a tear gas pen into a strip club, got plastered and accidentally knocked it out of my pocket – not knowing that it was cocked – and it went off. I cleared the bar that night and spent a few hours in the holding cell of the local police station because the bar tender had no sense of humor. (No charges were filed.)

Bought a $1.25 beer at a strip club, gave the bartender a $20 and went to the can as my order was being filled. I returned to find my beer there, with $3.75 in change and the guy who had been sitting next to me gone – along with the other $15.00.

CAREFUL! We don’t want to learn from this!(Calvin and Hobbs)

142

All my stupid moments have to do with head truama and the a comment at the wrong time.

#1 Over at my friends house pogosticking in his driveway. When I do it I hear this really
wierd noise so I say “listen to this” and of course just then the pogo stick decides to lose grip with the ground flies out from under me and my forehead connects with the cement. Now my friend thought this was the funniest thing and didn’t stop laughin the whole time he walked me home while a huge bump appeared on my forehead.

#2 Over at a different friends house climbing in a tree lose grip on tree fall out of tree land on my back. Did I mention that the tree was over the sidewalk. Well at first I can’t move so I yell “I can’t move! I can’t move!” then my arm finally moves under my command and so logically I say"Wait maybe I can" Everyone thought that was funny. then they helped me up to find blood running down my back from my head.

143

Age 10 or thereabouts. Before retiring for the evening I find myself on the business end of a mighty tongue-lashing from my father, on the subject of my report card sucking ass (I think he worded it better though). I’m sitting on the bed, my father is sitting on the floor in front of the bed
(it was a long lecture, I guess his legs got tired) about three feet in front of me. Dad wraps things up, I nod and don’t mean a “word” of it, he gets up, and some change falls out of his pocket. He kneels back down, turns his back to me, and goes to retrieve it. I happened to have a toy
gun sitting on the bed next to me for whatever reason. I get an evil smirk on my face and point this gun at the back of his head in a pretty silly display of prepubescent frustration and fantasy. What D- student Me fails to realize is that a small desk lamp in the corner of the room will cast shadows on the opposite wall. So dad, still turned around, glances up at the wall and is greeted by the silhouette of what appears to be his own son about to cap him execution-style. What transpired next, in a way, speaks volumes about my father’s trust in his own next of kin at such a tender age. Keep in mind this is a good decade or so before kiddies toting handguns were in vogue. So anyway, dad’s fight or flight instinct kicks in. He lets out a yelp of panic, spins around and probably would’ve tried to wrestle the fluorescent green toy out of my hand had he not noticed its uncharacteristic coloration for an
instrument of death. It was one of the few times the old man gave me a good licking, and in retrospect I think he should’ve hit me a hell of a lot harder than he did. Just typing this out makes me shudder, as I really can’t believe I did something that stump dumb and/or depraved.

I’ve done tons of equally stupid things in my day, but this is one of the few good stories that I have yet to repress.

144

many thanks to the various posts that have just about made me split my sides. in fairness, then, i share my own moments of mayhem:

as a budding young pyrophilic, i was bored when my parents were working on our boat (hauled out of the water for the winter), so i went wandering around the boatyard. you’d think adults would be smart enough not to smoke around wooden hulls and marine fuel, but i managed to find several half-used books of matches scattered around the place. thinking purely in scientific lines, i started accumulating odds and ends of materials and comparing their combustion rates and methods. a couple of adult strangers surprised me at my experiments, causing me to drop my latest test material. it blurs a bit in memory at that point, but i slipped/bolted off, and tried unsuccessfully to play hide and seek, hoping my parents would finish up and we could leave before the posse arrived. no such luck. sitting down was a carefully choreographed event for several days afterwards.

my other offering for “Great Moments In Stupidity” would probably be the time i was trying to work with my pony. since he hadn’t been ridden for a couple days, and (as best i can recall) we were going someplace the next day where his being on his best behavior was highly recommended, i took him to the training ring to try and work off a little of the “high spirits” he would probably be feeling. [SIDEBAR–little known fact to non-riders: horses are somewhat like batteries hooked up to a charger; if they’re not used actively, they tend to build up quite a bit of “juice”.] anywho… i’m working him on a long line, going through his paces–walk, trot, canter hey! COME BACK HERE! snotty little mumblemumble… after the third time or so, i got tired of his pulling the rope out of my hands and having to chase him around the ring. in what {then} seemed like a moment of brilliance, i decided he couldn’t pull the rope out of my hands if i had it tied around my waist. :: sigh :: it doesn’t take a lot of math to figure out what happens when the mass ratio of 10:1 is applied against the smaller of the bodies involved. let’s just say i had a very practical demonstration regarding vectors, tangents off circular paths, and Laws of Inertia (as in “A body in motion tends to stay in motion until acted upon by an outside force”–in this instance, the solidly-set fencepost for the ring). after my own moans woke me up again, i managed to call for help until someone at the barn either heard me or noticed that The Bun was doing unsupervised laps around the ring. Intensive Care Units are not the places to get a good night’s sleep…although the painkillers may make your own plight bearable, listening to the moans of other patients tends to be distracting.

of course, the topper to that one was…about 10 days later. the day i got out of the hospital (semi-healed broken ribs, part of vertebra, variously concussed internal organs), i went out riding. alone. on The Bun. oh yes…and did even manage to fall off while on the trail. but the Power of Youth prevailed. i still went out to the Hunt Ball that night.

never let it be said that i only screw-up in a half-hearted fashion.

next one who says “Fates a bitch” gets whacked with my measuring stick.

145

Oh my gosh, I just figured out mine…because it happened yesterday. I am an intern in my university’s writing lab, and many of our class discussions take place on an e-mail listserve - this listserve is sent to all 7 of us interns, as well as the professor. I was extremely frustrated with the way our final project was going, and e-mailed (so I thought) JUST the editor of the newsletter, telling him that I would be in to help with layout “after I finish getting my paper ripped to shreds by the good Dr. (our supervisor).” However, when I went back to check my sent items to reply to, I found out that I had sent it to the entire listserve…including the professor. I’ll let you know how it goes after my previously scheduled appointment with the professor…God, I feel dumb. :o

Christopher Robin Hood - he steals from the rich and gives to the Pooh.

146

It’s 1970, I’m just going on twenty, and moving out of a miserable student apartment. I’m packing.

I haven’t vacuumed or swept for a while, so it’s pretty dusty, and I’m sneezing, so I take a Chlor-Trimeton (antihistamine). It’s June in St. Louis, 3 p.m., so it’s broiling hot, so I have a beer, then another one.

When I wake up, it’s about ten p.m., and while I was passed out someone has stolen everything worth stealing from my U-Haul.

147

My late husband used to tell of the time when, in his mid-teens, he and a friend were scoping out the effects of Hurricane Connie on the farm and surrounding areas. The two were greatly impressed to discover the South Branch of the Raritan River flowing mere inches below a railroad bridge instead of the usual 15 feet or more, and as they sat on the tracks trailing their feet in the floodwaters, Gary was struck with a brilliant idea:

“Hey, wouldn’t it be neat to jump in, float down to the ol’ rope swing and climb out!”

Uhhhh–maybe not! they realized the microsecond they let go of the bridge, but it was far, far too late to do anything other than try to stay afloat and aim like hell for that one slim rope they hoped would be still dangling in the current a turbulent quarter-mile downstream.

Fortunately, they were strong swimmers accompanied by dumb luck; had they missed the rope, most likely their drowned bodies would have washed up miles away.

I don’t know if he ever DID tell his folks…

148

2 things come to mind,both when I was much younger
1-in the old day you could go to the local gas station(closed of course)and empty any remaining gas from the hose.Several of us had built a tree house that was about 40 feet in the air and had a long pipe which we imagined to be a cannon, into said cannon we would pack gas soaked paper and “fire away”.After a several “shots” we got bored and went on to other things till someone noticed the smell of smoke, we had set the ground below as well as the tree we were in on fire.Never knew we could climb from tree to tree like that!
2-Our father had built a above ground cinder block swimming pool,after watching a few WW2 submarine movies decided to stage a mock Depth charge attack using ash can fire works (the only kind at the time you could submerge and still have em go Bang) we had envisioned a hugh plume of water being sent skyward but alas all that happened was a small burp-along with every seam breaking loose.Never got over how fast that pool emptied!

149

It was my senior year of high school, somewhere in metro Atlanta. Two friends and I decided to vandalize our major rival’s school the night before the big football game. The rival school had a ‘commons’ area where all of the students ate. Along the top of the front and back walls of this area, there are huge panes of glass. We decided to get on the roof, and spray-paint the name of our school. Well, after we did it, it was a sight to be marveled at. In retrospect, we’re extremely lucky that we didn’t get caught by the patrolling policeman.

150

One other stupid thing

I was attending a university party in one of the dorms. My friend comes up to me telling me he broke a mirror in the bathroom. I go check and he was right he did break a mirror. It was just a small mirror above the sink. So the night goes on…I go to a different bathroom. By now I’m drunk, really drunk. As I’m washing my hands I look at myself in the mirror and think… I can do better than that!! So I wind up and roundhouse the mirror with my foot. Only this mirror is a lot bigger, about 5 by 15 feet. You could not imagine the sound that made as the glass crashed down on all the sinks and the floor. I got busted and fined. My girlfriend was not happy with me because it was in her dorm. I think she received the savage boyfriend award or something like that.

151

Oh, where to begin. These go back a long way, so get comfortable.

When I was very young, my stupidity involved several brushes with death.

  1. When I was about 1-year-old, I swallowed a whole bottle of aspirin that I found under my parents’ bed. I don’t remember any of this, but apparently I was rushed to the hospital and given charcoal or something.

  2. When I was about 5, my mother asked me to carry a box of tools downstairs. On top of the stuff in this box was a small pair of garden clippers. At the bottom of the stairs was a vacuum cleaner plugged into the wall. I looked at these two items and couldn’t resist the temptation. All I remember as I cut the cord was a blinding flash of light somewhat reminiscent of cheap cartoon explosions, and waking up a moment later across the room. The only thing that saved my life was the fact that the clippers had a rubber handle.

  3. Another stupid incident almost involved the death of my sister. I was maybe 12. We were out in the backyard with the whole family, and she was sitting on my shoulder. We had this cheap swingset that wasn’t anchored to the ground, and had a lot of sharp, rusty metal sticking out of it. I walked underneath it with her on my shoulders, and she grabbed on to it. I then proceeded to walk out from underneath it, but she didn’t let go. I kept walking forward and she fell backward off my shoulders, landing on her back with the rusty metal of the swingset imbedded in her forehead, right between the eyebrows. Forty stitches and 10 years later, she still has a big-ass scar on her forehead.

  4. Still more of my stupidity involved my friend Darin. He had knack for getting in trouble, which is one of the reasons I liked hanging out with him. He made me look a whole lot more responsible. :slight_smile: Anyway, one time in the middle of August we were playing with magnifying glasses in the field behind his house. We were making little fires, but we knew they really wouldn’t spread because there were a lot of rocks. However, his mother apparently noticed the smoke and came running wildly towards us with a bucket of water, screaming at the top of her lungs. That was more amusing than it was stupid.

  5. The other stupid thing I did with Darin almost got me arrested. We found this beat up old shack by a little beach in our neighbourhood. The shack was all destroyed, and held nothing of value, so we proceeded to amuse ourselves by bashing it up further. Well, the owner heard the commotion and came running, catching us on the roof with cinder blocks in our hands. It turned out that the place had been destroyed like a week earlier, and the owner thought we had done it and come back for more. Fortunately, we managed to convince the police otherwise, and ended up paying $12 each in restitution.

The rest of my stupid incidents revolve around the various lifeguarding jobs I’ve had over the past few years.

  1. I started working when I was 16 at this university pool. After about a week, my boss asked me to carry some garbage upstairs, but I was new and the building was pretty confusing, so I quickly got lost. I walked through this door, which immediately slammed shut behind me, trapping me in this small hallway.

Now, the interesting thing about this building is that it has what’s known as a field house. It’s a very large recreational area with a ceiling held up by air pressure. All the regular doors are like airlocks. However, I was in the middle of an emergency exit. On one side was a row of doors (with no handles) that led into the field house. On the other side was a row of doors that led outside. I realized I was pretty fucked, standing there in my bathing suit with a box of crap. To make matters worse, I took a step forward and set of some alarm. Now, I realized that I didn’t really have any options, so I opened one of the doors to the outside with the intention of walking back around the building. However, when I did so, the field house began to depressurize. This was bad. I couldn’t even get the door closed because so much air was rushing out. I started to walk around to the front of the building when one of the security guys came out and started yelling at me for almost making the roof collapse. Needless to say, I was pretty mortified.

  1. Another of my shining moments involved a quart of Smuggler’s Cove rum (45%), a cottage party, and two wet, naked girls. I won’t go into detail, but needless to say, but girlfriend wasn’t too impressed.

  2. Another flash of stupidity came when I was 19, and I decided to wear sandals on my first pub crawl. We were at this dance bar, and I was nicely toasted and dancing with a bunch of girls. All of a sudden, I feel a bit of a pinch on my foot. I look down and it seems I’ve stepped on broken glass, and my foot is spurting blood. I my alcohol-induced haze I remember thinking, “Oh, this is kind of bad.” The girls started freaking out, and the only help I could get from the bar staff was a band-aid and a dirty rag. I ended up having to call my parents (who didn’t know I was on a pub crawl) to have them drive me to the hospital. At the end of the summer, I got the “First and Worst Pub Crawl Award.” Good times.

  3. The final, crowing moment of sheer stupidity happened less than a year ago. I was on yet another pub crawl, and I was dancing with this girl. We went out for “some air” and started fooling around in the bushes. In my drink-addled state, I decided this wouldn’t do, and invited her back to my place. Now, the problem with this was that I lived with my parents. Even better, my room was right next to theirs. I don’t know how I ever thought I’d get away with it. I was just about to leave to drive her home the next day, when my mom got up and opened the door. She was less than thrilled. She asked what I was doing, and all I could say was, “nothing” in a very sheepish voice. (The girl and I ended up dating for a while, so it all worked out in the end) :slight_smile:
    Well, those are just the stupid moments I can think of off the top of my head. I’m sure there’s more though.

152

Oh, where to begin. These go back a long way, so get comfortable.

When I was very young, my stupidity involved several brushes with death.

  1. When I was about 1-year-old, I swallowed a whole bottle of aspirin that I found under my parents’ bed. I don’t remember any of this, but apparently I was rushed to the hospital and given charcoal or something.

  2. When I was about 5, my mother asked me to carry a box of tools downstairs. On top of the stuff in this box was a small pair of garden clippers. At the bottom of the stairs was a vacuum cleaner plugged into the wall. I looked at these two items and couldn’t resist the temptation. All I remember as I cut the cord was a blinding flash of light somewhat reminiscent of cheap cartoon explosions, and waking up a moment later across the room. The only thing that saved my life was the fact that the clippers had a rubber handle.

  3. Another stupid incident almost involved the death of my sister. I was maybe 12. We were out in the backyard with the whole family, and she was sitting on my shoulder. We had this cheap swingset that wasn’t anchored to the ground, and had a lot of sharp, rusty metal sticking out of it. I walked underneath it with her on my shoulders, and she grabbed on to it. I then proceeded to walk out from underneath it, but she didn’t let go. I kept walking forward and she fell backward off my shoulders, landing on her back with the rusty metal of the swingset imbedded in her forehead, right between the eyebrows. Forty stitches and 10 years later, she still has a big-ass scar on her forehead.

  4. Still more of my stupidity involved my friend Darin. He had knack for getting in trouble, which is one of the reasons I liked hanging out with him. He made me look a whole lot more responsible. :slight_smile: Anyway, one time in the middle of August we were playing with magnifying glasses in the field behind his house. We were making little fires, but we knew they really wouldn’t spread because there were a lot of rocks. However, his mother apparently noticed the smoke and came running wildly towards us with a bucket of water, screaming at the top of her lungs. That was more amusing than it was stupid.

  5. The other stupid thing I did with Darin almost got me arrested. We found this beat up old shack by a little beach in our neighbourhood. The shack was all destroyed, and held nothing of value, so we proceeded to amuse ourselves by bashing it up further. Well, the owner heard the commotion and came running, catching us on the roof with cinder blocks in our hands. It turned out that the place had been destroyed like a week earlier, and the owner thought we had done it and come back for more. Fortunately, we managed to convince the police otherwise, and ended up paying $12 each in restitution.

The rest of my stupid incidents revolve around the various lifeguarding jobs I’ve had over the past few years.

  1. I started working when I was 16 at this university pool. After about a week, my boss asked me to carry some garbage upstairs, but I was new and the building was pretty confusing, so I quickly got lost. I walked through this door, which immediately slammed shut behind me, trapping me in this small hallway.

Now, the interesting thing about this building is that it has what’s known as a field house. It’s a very large recreational area with a ceiling held up by air pressure. All the regular doors are like airlocks. However, I was in the middle of an emergency exit. On one side was a row of doors (with no handles) that led into the field house. On the other side was a row of doors that led outside. I realized I was pretty fucked, standing there in my bathing suit with a box of crap. To make matters worse, I took a step forward and set of some alarm. Now, I realized that I didn’t really have any options, so I opened one of the doors to the outside with the intention of walking back around the building. However, when I did so, the field house began to depressurize. This was bad. I couldn’t even get the door closed because so much air was rushing out. I started to walk around to the front of the building when one of the security guys came out and started yelling at me for almost making the roof collapse. Needless to say, I was pretty mortified.

  1. Another of my shining moments involved a quart of Smuggler’s Cove rum (45%), a cottage party, and two wet, naked girls. I won’t go into detail, but needless to say, but girlfriend wasn’t too impressed.

  2. Another flash of stupidity came when I was 19, and I decided to wear sandals on my first pub crawl. We were at this dance bar, and I was nicely toasted and dancing with a bunch of girls. All of a sudden, I feel a bit of a pinch on my foot. I look down and it seems I’ve stepped on broken glass, and my foot is spurting blood. I my alcohol-induced haze I remember thinking, “Oh, this is kind of bad.” The girls started freaking out, and the only help I could get from the bar staff was a band-aid and a dirty rag. I ended up having to call my parents (who didn’t know I was on a pub crawl) to have them drive me to the hospital. At the end of the summer, I got the “First and Worst Pub Crawl Award.” Good times.

  3. The final, crowing moment of sheer stupidity happened less than a year ago. I was on yet another pub crawl, and I was dancing with this girl. We went out for “some air” and started fooling around in the bushes. In my drink-addled state, I decided this wouldn’t do, and invited her back to my place. Now, the problem with this was that I lived with my parents. Even better, my room was right next to theirs. I don’t know how I ever thought I’d get away with it. I was just about to leave to drive her home the next day, when my mom got up and opened the door. She was less than thrilled. She asked what I was doing, and all I could say was, “nothing” in a very sheepish voice. (The girl and I ended up dating for a while, so it all worked out in the end) :slight_smile:
    Well, those are just the stupid moments I can think of off the top of my head. I’m sure there’s more though.

153

Oh, where to begin. These go back a long way, so get comfortable.

When I was very young, my stupidity involved several brushes with death.

  1. When I was about 1-year-old, I swallowed a whole bottle of aspirin that I found under my parents’ bed. I don’t remember any of this, but apparently I was rushed to the hospital and given charcoal or something.

  2. When I was about 5, my mother asked me to carry a box of tools downstairs. On top of the stuff in this box was a small pair of garden clippers. At the bottom of the stairs was a vacuum cleaner plugged into the wall. I looked at these two items and couldn’t resist the temptation. All I remember as I cut the cord was a blinding flash of light somewhat reminiscent of cheap cartoon explosions, and waking up a moment later across the room. The only thing that saved my life was the fact that the clippers had a rubber handle.

  3. Another stupid incident almost involved the death of my sister. I was maybe 12. We were out in the backyard with the whole family, and she was sitting on my shoulder. We had this cheap swingset that wasn’t anchored to the ground, and had a lot of sharp, rusty metal sticking out of it. I walked underneath it with her on my shoulders, and she grabbed on to it. I then proceeded to walk out from underneath it, but she didn’t let go. I kept walking forward and she fell backward off my shoulders, landing on her back with the rusty metal of the swingset imbedded in her forehead, right between the eyebrows. Forty stitches and 10 years later, she still has a big-ass scar on her forehead.

  4. Still more of my stupidity involved my friend Darin. He had knack for getting in trouble, which is one of the reasons I liked hanging out with him. He made me look a whole lot more responsible. :slight_smile: Anyway, one time in the middle of August we were playing with magnifying glasses in the field behind his house. We were making little fires, but we knew they really wouldn’t spread because there were a lot of rocks. However, his mother apparently noticed the smoke and came running wildly towards us with a bucket of water, screaming at the top of her lungs. That was more amusing than it was stupid.

  5. The other stupid thing I did with Darin almost got me arrested. We found this beat up old shack by a little beach in our neighbourhood. The shack was all destroyed, and held nothing of value, so we proceeded to amuse ourselves by bashing it up further. Well, the owner heard the commotion and came running, catching us on the roof with cinder blocks in our hands. It turned out that the place had been destroyed like a week earlier, and the owner thought we had done it and come back for more. Fortunately, we managed to convince the police otherwise, and ended up paying $12 each in restitution.

The rest of my stupid incidents revolve around the various lifeguarding jobs I’ve had over the past few years.

  1. I started working when I was 16 at this university pool. After about a week, my boss asked me to carry some garbage upstairs, but I was new and the building was pretty confusing, so I quickly got lost. I walked through this door, which immediately slammed shut behind me, trapping me in this small hallway.

Now, the interesting thing about this building is that it has what’s known as a field house. It’s a very large recreational area with a ceiling held up by air pressure. All the regular doors are like airlocks. However, I was in the middle of an emergency exit. On one side was a row of doors (with no handles) that led into the field house. On the other side was a row of doors that led outside. I realized I was pretty fucked, standing there in my bathing suit with a box of crap. To make matters worse, I took a step forward and set of some alarm. Now, I realized that I didn’t really have any options, so I opened one of the doors to the outside with the intention of walking back around the building. However, when I did so, the field house began to depressurize. This was bad. I couldn’t even get the door closed because so much air was rushing out. I started to walk around to the front of the building when one of the security guys came out and started yelling at me for almost making the roof collapse. Needless to say, I was pretty mortified.

  1. Another of my shining moments involved a quart of Smuggler’s Cove rum (45%), a cottage party, and two wet, naked girls. I won’t go into detail, but needless to say, but girlfriend wasn’t too impressed.

  2. Another flash of stupidity came when I was 19, and I decided to wear sandals on my first pub crawl. We were at this dance bar, and I was nicely toasted and dancing with a bunch of girls. All of a sudden, I feel a bit of a pinch on my foot. I look down and it seems I’ve stepped on broken glass, and my foot is spurting blood. I my alcohol-induced haze I remember thinking, “Oh, this is kind of bad.” The girls started freaking out, and the only help I could get from the bar staff was a band-aid and a dirty rag. I ended up having to call my parents (who didn’t know I was on a pub crawl) to have them drive me to the hospital. At the end of the summer, I got the “First and Worst Pub Crawl Award.” Good times.

  3. The final, crowing moment of sheer stupidity happened less than a year ago. I was on yet another pub crawl, and I was dancing with this girl. We went out for “some air” and started fooling around in the bushes. In my drink-addled state, I decided this wouldn’t do, and invited her back to my place. Now, the problem with this was that I lived with my parents. Even better, my room was right next to theirs. I don’t know how I ever thought I’d get away with it. I was just about to leave to drive her home the next day, when my mom got up and opened the door. She was less than thrilled. She asked what I was doing, and all I could say was, “nothing” in a very sheepish voice. (The girl and I ended up dating for a while, so it all worked out in the end) :slight_smile:
    Well, those are just the stupid moments I can think of off the top of my head. I’m sure there’s more though.

154

Oh, where to begin. These go back a long way, so get comfortable.

When I was very young, my stupidity involved several brushes with death.

  1. When I was about 1-year-old, I swallowed a whole bottle of aspirin that I found under my parents’ bed. I don’t remember any of this, but apparently I was rushed to the hospital and given charcoal or something.

  2. When I was about 5, my mother asked me to carry a box of tools downstairs. On top of the stuff in this box was a small pair of garden clippers. At the bottom of the stairs was a vacuum cleaner plugged into the wall. I looked at these two items and couldn’t resist the temptation. All I remember as I cut the cord was a blinding flash of light somewhat reminiscent of cheap cartoon explosions, and waking up a moment later across the room. The only thing that saved my life was the fact that the clippers had a rubber handle.

  3. Another stupid incident almost involved the death of my sister. I was maybe 12. We were out in the backyard with the whole family, and she was sitting on my shoulder. We had this cheap swingset that wasn’t anchored to the ground, and had a lot of sharp, rusty metal sticking out of it. I walked underneath it with her on my shoulders, and she grabbed on to it. I then proceeded to walk out from underneath it, but she didn’t let go. I kept walking forward and she fell backward off my shoulders, landing on her back with the rusty metal of the swingset imbedded in her forehead, right between the eyebrows. Forty stitches and 10 years later, she still has a big-ass scar on her forehead.

  4. Still more of my stupidity involved my friend Darin. He had knack for getting in trouble, which is one of the reasons I liked hanging out with him. He made me look a whole lot more responsible. :slight_smile: Anyway, one time in the middle of August we were playing with magnifying glasses in the field behind his house. We were making little fires, but we knew they really wouldn’t spread because there were a lot of rocks. However, his mother apparently noticed the smoke and came running wildly towards us with a bucket of water, screaming at the top of her lungs. That was more amusing than it was stupid.

  5. The other stupid thing I did with Darin almost got me arrested. We found this beat up old shack by a little beach in our neighbourhood. The shack was all destroyed, and held nothing of value, so we proceeded to amuse ourselves by bashing it up further. Well, the owner heard the commotion and came running, catching us on the roof with cinder blocks in our hands. It turned out that the place had been destroyed like a week earlier, and the owner thought we had done it and come back for more. Fortunately, we managed to convince the police otherwise, and ended up paying $12 each in restitution.

The rest of my stupid incidents revolve around the various lifeguarding jobs I’ve had over the past few years.

  1. I started working when I was 16 at this university pool. After about a week, my boss asked me to carry some garbage upstairs, but I was new and the building was pretty confusing, so I quickly got lost. I walked through this door, which immediately slammed shut behind me, trapping me in this small hallway.

Now, the interesting thing about this building is that it has what’s known as a field house. It’s a very large recreational area with a ceiling held up by air pressure. All the regular doors are like airlocks. However, I was in the middle of an emergency exit. On one side was a row of doors (with no handles) that led into the field house. On the other side was a row of doors that led outside. I realized I was pretty fucked, standing there in my bathing suit with a box of crap. To make matters worse, I took a step forward and set of some alarm. Now, I realized that I didn’t really have any options, so I opened one of the doors to the outside with the intention of walking back around the building. However, when I did so, the field house began to depressurize. This was bad. I couldn’t even get the door closed because so much air was rushing out. I started to walk around to the front of the building when one of the security guys came out and started yelling at me for almost making the roof collapse. Needless to say, I was pretty mortified.

  1. Another of my shining moments involved a quart of Smuggler’s Cove rum (45%), a cottage party, and two wet, naked girls. I won’t go into detail, but needless to say, but girlfriend wasn’t too impressed.

  2. Another flash of stupidity came when I was 19, and I decided to wear sandals on my first pub crawl. We were at this dance bar, and I was nicely toasted and dancing with a bunch of girls. All of a sudden, I feel a bit of a pinch on my foot. I look down and it seems I’ve stepped on broken glass, and my foot is spurting blood. I my alcohol-induced haze I remember thinking, “Oh, this is kind of bad.” The girls started freaking out, and the only help I could get from the bar staff was a band-aid and a dirty rag. I ended up having to call my parents (who didn’t know I was on a pub crawl) to have them drive me to the hospital. At the end of the summer, I got the “First and Worst Pub Crawl Award.” Good times.

  3. The final, crowing moment of sheer stupidity happened less than a year ago. I was on yet another pub crawl, and I was dancing with this girl. We went out for “some air” and started fooling around in the bushes. In my drink-addled state, I decided this wouldn’t do, and invited her back to my place. Now, the problem with this was that I lived with my parents. Even better, my room was right next to theirs. I don’t know how I ever thought I’d get away with it. I was just about to leave to drive her home the next day, when my mom got up and opened the door. She was less than thrilled. She asked what I was doing, and all I could say was, “nothing” in a very sheepish voice. (The girl and I ended up dating for a while, so it all worked out in the end) :slight_smile:
    Well, those are just the stupid moments I can think of off the top of my head. I’m sure there’s more though.

155

Can I have an honorary stupidity award? My stupidity seems to have run out. But I get the award for getting this dug up thread on the SD front page. Thank you all.

progressive rock will come back…soon…maybe…

156

Life is just a series of near misses, isn’t it?

My former favorite was canoeing at night on Lake Washington without a light. I saw the gravel barge (totally silent, being pushed by a tug) obscure a shore light just in time… I’ve never paddled so fast in my life.

I have a new one though, from last Friday. Heavy-duty industrial motor starter relays are usually enclosed in cabinets that have two protective devices to keep you from opening them when the power is on. One can be defeated while the door is closed, and the other can be defeated when it’s open, to turn on the power anyhow. Yes, I defeated the door-open lever. Yes, I reached for a network cable inside with a ring on my finger.

Yes, I know what 480V AC feels like. It’s not at all pleasant. If I’d had a tool in my hand or a better grip on the door, this post would be coming from my next-of-kin.

Turns out that electrocution, unlike pregnancy, can be partial. I still type funny because the ground path went through my left index finger.

Remember that is is a partial list. The final entry will be engraved in granite…

157

Allrighty, you want to talk about stupid things, i am the KING i tell you.

#1 it all started long ago at my aunts first wedding rececption, i am 6 i think, well it was in a boyscouts hall or some such thing, so there was a kitchen and all that stuff, well, in one corner there was an old industrial freezer, not a walk in, probably only 3 feet deep. well, being a crazy and curious 6 yearold, i look inside, what do i see? but a pile of buttons, the white ones that look like pearl, so i figure i can keep the door open with my foot while i get the buttons, well, i think i came up a little short, so i let go with my foot to grab the stupid buttons, slam goes the door,light goes out and i about shit my pants. i scream and yell and cry and kick and cry some more, but this is a thick heavy door, i cant budge it, after what felt like 3 days, my mom opens the door, and i am set free, all this over buttons. oh did i mention that the only reason my mom looked in the freezer was that someone had seen me BY it a while ago, and my mom couldnt find me. top that for stupididy.

#2 i was about 8 or 9, and somehow i managed to get myself stuck behind the fold down seat of a 1980 ford F-150, it took my dad 15 min with a crowbar to get me out, did i mention i was claustrophobic at the time? still am.

#3 lets just say i was a pyro maniac, i live in redding CA, it gets really really dry here in the summer, didnt catch anything on fire but what i was burning, but could have wiped out the entire county.

#4 fire again, last day of burn season, my dad wanted me to light the pile of brush that we had collected over the winter, its about 6 feet tall, and about 10x10 feet, well it had to be burnt and out by the end of the day according to my dad, so i bust out the lawnmower gas, its a 5 gallon can, I pour it all over the pile, that is 5 gallons of regular unleaded, i thought i was being conservative (told yall i wasa pyro) then i pour a line about 10 feet out, as a fuse, well, the gas had evaporateda bit in the 10 min or so. i whip out my trusty Zippo, and light it, i was probably a good 10 feet into the fuel air vapor when it lit, 50 foot fireball, with me right inthe middle, lucky me i was still soaked froma dip in the pool, my arms were bald for a week, and the concussion from the fireball knocked me back about 5 feet. needless to say, there wasnt much left of the pile, actually it was burnt up and out in about an hour. now i saw some pretty dumb stuff, but nothing that stupid.
ALex

158

Allrighty, you want to talk about stupid things, i am the KING i tell you.

#1 it all started long ago at my aunts first wedding rececption, i am 6 i think, well it was in a boyscouts hall or some such thing, so there was a kitchen and all that stuff, well, in one corner there was an old industrial freezer, not a walk in, probably only 3 feet deep. well, being a crazy and curious 6 yearold, i look inside, what do i see? but a pile of buttons, the white ones that look like pearl, so i figure i can keep the door open with my foot while i get the buttons, well, i think i came up a little short, so i let go with my foot to grab the stupid buttons, slam goes the door,light goes out and i about shit my pants. i scream and yell and cry and kick and cry some more, but this is a thick heavy door, i cant budge it, after what felt like 3 days, my mom opens the door, and i am set free, all this over buttons. oh did i mention that the only reason my mom looked in the freezer was that someone had seen me BY it a while ago, and my mom couldnt find me. top that for stupididy.

159

This one may not win an award, but it was pretty stupid. One of the computery screw ups.

I went into Windows 95 display properties, to the appearance tab, and put in the largest number possible for each of the items in the drop down list.

Result:
format c: /s

160

This one may not win an award, but it was pretty stupid. One of the computery screw ups.

Screw up:

I went into Windows 95 display properties, to the appearance tab, and put in the largest number possible for each of the items in the drop down list.

Result:

The start button was so huge you could only see 2/3 of it on the entire screen. It filled it up completely. And when it showed My Computer, you could only see the “My” in the name, it was so large.

Which lead to:
format c: /s