Stupid (Adult) Injuries

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Following right along on the “I am NOT old” post, I’d like to hear about the stupidest injury you have received as an adult. Not things you deed in your early teens, mind you but late teens or later.

Let’s hear about the spectacular injury you gave yourself by doing something stupid.

Mine was a couple years ago. There was a party at my brother’s house, and we were all playing with this silly air powered rocket (the kind with a big bladder type thingy that you stomp on and it sends a rocket up into the air).

To make it a little clearer, this toy was not intended for the 30 and over guests, it was intended for their kids, my cousins, who ranged from 8 to 12 or so.

However, it was found that the adults could get the rockets to go much higher, so we were amusing the kids by stomping on it for them every once in a while.

I got the bright idea to see what would happen if we dropped an old bowling ball my brother had around onto the bladder. Pretty cool, it launched the rocket up nice and high, but it was a little unwieldly, so I went to the garage and got his Bocce ball set. I figured I could take one of the heavy balls and slam it down on the bladder really hard and get a good launch out of that.

So, I tell the kids to “stand back, because the ball could bounce anywhere!” and proceed to slam the ball onto the bladder.

For some reason, I found myself lying on my back, with my hand over my face. Yep, there’s blood on my hand. My cousin is saying “Thanks for showing us what NOT to do, cousin joe”

None of the adults at the party have realized what happened, and I am feeling like someone hit me in the forehead with a sledgehammer. Finally, when a few people realized I was laying on the ground with a bunch of kids looking at me funny, I was offered some ice.

I definitely needed some alcohol after that one.

Ok, your turn!

2

oh yeah, and the rocket didn’t go up very high, either.

3

I tried to take a window air conditioner out of the window by myself. 69 stitches later, I looked like I had tried to commit suicide. It was actually interesting, in a morbid kind of way, because I skinned my left forearm like a deer - you could see all the tendons and muscles and everything.

4

I’m confused…either you have awfully big windows, or something seriously wrong happened. I can’t imagine how I coudl get assistance getting the window AC unit out of my 2nd story bedroom window…one person barely fits in front of the window, and the second person would have to be outside, on a 15 foot ladder, and that person would have to be crazy!

5

I once slipped on dog shit and put my hand through a plate glass window. It came out with a four inch piece of glass embedded on the front of my wrist. I still have the scar.

I also had a wasp sting my finger while I had a cast on my arm. I’m allergic to stings, and my arm was so swollen the cast started cracking. It had to be removed and a temporary splint put on until my arm got back to normal.

6

A couple of minor ones (both recently):

I was cutting a lemon and thought to myself, “This knife is really sharp” I immediately sliced into my finger. No stitches, but the throbbing was fun.

I have a bunch of old video tapes I’m going through and tossing the ones I don’t want. I have them stored in those plastic boxes you used to see at the video rental places. I figured it would be a good idea to try and break these apart so I could fit more into the trash can. BZZZZZTTT!! WRONG ANSWER!! The plastic snapped and struck the middle finger of my right hand. It hit hard enough to numb the finger for about 15 minutes and nearly took off a small chunk of skin. Again, no stitches, but a couple of days later, it looks like I tried to feed my fingertip to a wolverine (10 points for the reference).

7

You know, I forgot the REALLY stupid thing I did last winter (as if trying to launch a rocket with a bocce ball isn’t stupid enough).

I was using the snowblower, and the chute got clogged. For some reason I kept my hand on the engagement handle (you know, the thing that keeps the thrower things spinning) while clearing the chute.

That was in January. My finger just stopped hurting when I put pressure on it last month. Never turned purple or looked broken in any way, no loss of dexterity or anything, just sore if tried to crack my knuckles or anything.

8

No scars but a bruise… coming home I shrug one of my handbag straps off my shoulder and fish out my keys. With those in hand, ready to unlock the door, I do an overhand arm motion to get the bag strap back on my shoulder and stab myself in the neck with my keys. What makes it really stupid is that’s the second time I’ve done this.

9

I had just cooked a meatloaf in a cake pan and a lot of the fat had cooked out of the meat and was liquid in the bottom of the pan. instead of draining as I usually did with a spoon, I decided to tilt the pan over a discarded can and let the liquid pour into the can. I tilted the pan but was having trouble getting it to drain. I decided to tilt the pan almost vertically to get the last of the grease out. The meatloaf came unstuck and landed full on the back of my right hand. Remember that this had been in the oven for an hour at 400 degrees. I got a really bad burn over 2/3 of my hand which took a long time to heal. Remarkably, I didn’t have a scar after healing.

10

Refilling a stapler, when pushing the two parts back together, pushed on the “spot where the staples come out” with my thumb.

I’ve done this twice. The worst part was, the second time, I was distracted by thinking about the last time I did it.

Puncture wounds, no matter how small, hurt like a mutherfuck!

11

I locked myself out of my house and thought it would be a good idea to try to take out one of the panes of glass by wrapping my hand in my shirt and punching it out…the glass came out but managed to slice open my little finger quite nicely at the same time.

12

If we can rat on SO’s (sorry dear, if you read this :wink: )…

The first apartment that Mr. Kiminy and I lived in did not have a dishwasher, so we had to wash dishes by hand. We had a set of nice, tall, glass tumblers (a K-Mart blue light special) and one of them cracked in the sink one day. I recommended that we throw the glass away, before it (inevitably) broke completely, but since we were poor, starving college students, he insisted we keep it and use it until it actually broke. It broke the next night, when he was washing the glass by sticking his hand inside the glass, and wiping the inside of the glass with a soapy sponge and a lot of pressure. He ended up cutting his hand very badly, which meant calling a cab to go to the hospital (cheaper than calling an ambulance, and biking to the hospital was out of the question) and have stitches put in. The cab ride alone was more expensive than buying a new set of glasses to replace the broken one.

For myself, about a year ago, I developed a severe pain in my neck and shoulder–to the point that I could not sleep confortably, or use the computer for any length of time. I even went to see a doctor who did lots of neck and shoulder X-rays to see if he could see the damage that was causing the pain, but there was nothing visible on the X-rays.

The pain started during the second week of a two-week break in September between courses at the college I teach at–a break where I spent a lot of time home alone, because Mr Kiminy had to work, and the kids were in school. The pain gradually went away by itself by the third or fourth week of the next quarter. It wasn’t until my Thanksgiving break in November (where I have Mon, Tue, and Wed off, but no one else in the house does), when I figured out what the cause was. Not only was/is it completely preventable, but it’s also completely my fault.

You see, I am addicted to computer games. This is not a major addiction, so it doesn’t interfere with work. When I am actively teaching, I have a lot of computer work to do, between communicating with students, grading assignments, preparing lesson plans, etc., and I do most of that work on a school-issued laptop in a very comfortable and ergonomic position. However, when I am on vacation–especially when I have lots of time to myself–my addiction takes over. Usually, its only mark is a blister on my thumb from the PS2 controller or a Gameboy console (I do own my own Gameboy, Gameboy Color, Gameboy Advance, and Nintendo DS). In this case, though, I became addicted to playing Zuma on Zone.com. However, rather than playing on my laptop in an ergonomic position, I was playing for hours on end using a desktop computer with no arm support for the “mouse” arm.

Apparently, since my mouse arm had no support, it pulled my shoulder and neck ligaments so much that it created significant pain in those tendons and muscles. The only way I figured this out was that during that brief Thanksgiving break, I returned to Zuma on the Bad Computer, and the pain started coming back.

Sadly, I have just finished this year’s September break (with classes scheduled to start on Monday), and I have become re-addicted to Zuma during my break. My mouse arm is now in terrible pain, but since I know the cause, I will not go to the doctor’s office this time to try to find a cure. However, now might be the time to invest in Advil stock…

13

I was helping hubby magpye load his truck to go to work. There was some angle iron hanging out the back of the bed of the pickup. Hubby mentions that I look very tired - it was a weekend morning - and I know I could have used some more sleep.

hubby magpye asked me to get a can of paint out of the shed, which I did. I turned to walk toward him, but the early morning sun was so bright, my bloodshot eyes closed almost automatically. However, I kept walking - and walked right into the angle iron. I heard a loud cracking sound, my eyes remained closed, and the most excruciating pain I’ve ever experienced made me double over.

I had walked into the angle iron, “nose first”. It hurt something awful. As I was bent over in pain, I tried to hide the fact that I had just hurt myself (considering how it happened).

hubby magpye is wondering where I am, because I am bent over and he can’t see me from the other side of the truck. When he realizes what happened, he starts laughing hysterically - and tells me he’s truly sorry he’s laughing, but he’s done dumb things like that before. Well, with tears running down my face from the pain, I started laughing right along with him! I do have to say that the laughter made it easier to deal with the pain (somehow).

I went in the house, got a Ziplock bag full of ice and went to the job site with him. To this day, I have never experienced such excruciating pain! It has to be the dumbest thing I’ve done as an adult. :eek:

My doctor said my nose wasn’t smashed/broken, but could possibly have been cracked. My nose remained swollen for at least a week - and it hurt just as long.

14

Wow. You got lucky. I had a co-worker who did the same thing a couple of years ago. His middle finger used to be 1/8 inch longer than the ones on either side. Now it’s 1/8 inch shorter than them!

As for myself, the dumbest thing I’ve done was years ago when using a box cutter to make a display of stacked up cases of juice. (Cutting the front off the cases so that customers could see the product) I noticed the blade was dull about half way though so I switched it for a new one. Using the same amount of strength as with the dull blade, the sharp blade cut all the way across the case and continued across my leg, slicing through my pants and thigh.

Had it been any deeper, I would have gone for stitches. As it was it took weeks to heal and I still have a 2" long scar.

15

I have too many stupid injuries to count, including nearly cutting my finger off with kitchen shears, nearly burning my eyebrows off while cooking, and as described here, I tried to cut my thumb off with a plastic spoon only today.

16

This was quite a few years ago, but I still remember it. I was out for a walk one day with Mrs. FBG when we came to a playground with swings (the kind with the leather strap for a seat). We sat in the swings and talked and started swinging a little bit.

I remembered how, when I was a kid, I would get the swing going fairly fast and then jump out. What I didn’t remember is that my hips were considerably wider than when I was a kid. I tried to jump, the hips got stuck, then I fell. Flat on my back. It completely knocked the wind out of me, and I couldn’t breathe for what seemed like several minutes.

17

Since “late teens” was spcified as allowed in the OP, I present the following act of utter stupidity on my part:

http://www.aracnet.com/~lusus/bikecrash.html

I keep it written up since I like top amuse myself with pretentious ideas that I can write, and it serves as a great icebreaker at parties.

And yes, I am an international man of intrigue and go by many names.

18

I still walk into telephone poles while reading books. :smack: It never stops!

19

Last week I was making toast and decided to move the toaster away from the wall a bit. Without thinking, I hooked my index finger inside one of the slots and pulled it towards me. :smack: It even took me a minute to figure out what exactly I had done wrong. And it hurt for a week.

20

Hmmmm. . . I’ve been an adult (chronologically, at least) for a long time, with periodic episodes of stupidity, so why don’t I just go with a self imposed “last 90 days” limit.

Broke my nose getting the poker chip & card box off a closet shelf. No drugs.

Minor concussion removing a large, broken Willow branch from the crab apple tree. No drugs

Full body bruise, sprained knee, torn rotator cuff & chipped front tooth trying to trim cracked limbs by climbing damned crab apple. Tylenol #3

I then decided that perhaps using a ladder or step stool might be the course of wisdom. Forgot about the “don’t do anything when you’re stoned” part

Full body bruise, cracked rib, superficial scrapes & sprained both wrists from falling off ladder trying to trim cracked branches on aforementioned evil crab apple tree. Upside is, the ladder broke the freakin’ branch all the way off.

Discovered bleeping keys were locked in f&#$ing truck before trying to drive to ER. Bloody gash (no stitches) on right hand from trying to wiggle open wing window while paying more attention to bored YellowJacket.

Didn’t check wind direction when trying to eradicate still bored Yellow Jacket & several of his buddies. This may not count as technically stupid since I was on percocet . . . but then again, playing with aerosol poison while stoned is inherently a STOO-PID action.

I’m glad summer is over :smack: Maybe my brain will come back home where it belongs. I can go 5 years without ever using a bandaid, but I make up for it all eventually.