My Son is an Idiot... It is official

My youngest is a very good kid… he does well in school and is set to attend a prestigious university next year. He mentors grade school kids. He has worked three jobs and saved a lot of money. Overall I’m very proud of him.

This is his senior year of high school. A large group of his friends (and chaperones) booked a trip to Cancun for spring break. He paid for it and it is at a very nice all inclusive resort. He is 18 and guess what the drinking age is in Mexico. I know he is going to drink… I went to Mexico in High School and may have had a sip or fifty.

I gave him one basic rule… “Don’t be stupid.”

Less than 12 hours into the trip the group found a cute animal on the resort grounds and I’m not sure if it was a dare or his idea, but he decided to pet it. It was a porcupine. The good news is that he is taking good care of his punctured hand and using antibiotics. I’m sure the Tequila is also helping with any pain.

It could have been a whole lot worse. On my personal scale of ‘stupid things I did while drunk as a teenager’ that would barely rate as a 3 out of 10.

I think there needs to be an established pattern before anyone is officially declared an idiot. What your son did was stupid, I agree. Let’s see if he tries that again.

You can pet a porcupine.

As I was reading the OP I thought this was going to turn out really bad.

It was stupid. But if that’s the stupidest thing he ever does, I wouldn’t worry.

Do porcupines carry rabies?

Yeah, I wouldn’t have thought that petting a porcupine would turn out so bad, as long as you petted with the grain instead of against it.

Then again, I’m sure there’s a good reason the lady in that video is wearing leather gloves.

Last summer, one of my daughters touched a cactus “just to see” if the spines are really sharp like we said they were.

Some people just value first-hand experience a bit too much.

So … are they?

“Tell people there’s an invisible man in the sky who created the universe, and the vast majority will believe you. Tell them the paint is wet, and they have to touch it to be sure.”

― George Carlin (Supposedly)

My son once wanted to change the oil on this car. He first wanted to hose the engine down with water first to “make sure I got all of the old oil out”

I wasn’t sure who the bigger idiot was, him or me, because I am obviously unfit to father a male child.

You don’t have to be dumb to do that. We were on safari in Botswana and I wanted to see how sharp an acacia thorn is. Sharper than a needle, as it turns out. The merest touch drew blood. :smack:

I was in the USAF at Wiesbaden air base Germany when their very young son died having choked on his own vomit while unconscious. He had never touched alcohol, so of course, the usual crowd just had to get him drunk, and he died.

It was a major scandal at the time - rightly so.

There is nothing - nothing - amusing about permitting a child to go somewhere where he or she can get drunk and subsequently be unsupervised when trouble happens (altho in the Roger’s case, he was at an infirmary and they failed to attend him properly).

I’m curious. Did he not understand what a porcupine was or he did and decided to go for it?

Not quite where this came from. He is 18… he can serve his country in the military, carrying a gun and defending our freedom… he can vote for the president and his vote counts the same as yours or mine. He is of legal drinking age in the country where he is along with many other countries in the world. The mother of his best friend is staying in the condo with him. There are probably about 20 other parents staying at the resort. It is a very highly rated and safe resort (I work in the industry so I know). I feel confident that he will return safely and start the pre med program that he is enrolled in.

In three years when he is 21 should I not let him go anywhere in the US? He decided to see is porcupine quills were as sharp as they say… they are. Two of the parents on the trip who are MD’s checked him out and made sure it was properly cared for. They thought it was funny. Glad you jumped to your conclusions though.

I’m pretty sure it was a “how bad could it be” kind of thing. A day later and he is no worse for the wear and has a great story.

Cat Trying To Eat Cactus - YouTube (SFW)

Would you like to hold the pretty Gila monster? It’s tame.

OP’s son has been transformed into a feline? What fresh Hell is this? :eek:

Yes. I was relieved when the story turned into something rather a bit more amusing. And in his future medical career, he’ll be able to relate to any patients who do the same thing. Not that I necessarily recommend first-hand experience just to gain empathy …