Stupid Injury Thread

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Somersaulted down a flight of stairs at a hotel in Phoenix, about 18 months ago. I distinctly remember hitting my head, and I found bruises on my back, so I’m DAMN lucky all I broke was my left elbow. Also got a really nasty-looking bruise on my left thigh that has left the muscle permanently deformed (more like an ‘m’ than a wide ‘n’ when viewed from an angle). Oddly, I came to rest on my right side - not quite sure how that happened.

Twisted my ankle - resulting in a sprain that too 3 months to heal - walking down an escalator.

Stumbled while stepping up onto a curb, resulting in face-planting, chipping one tooth, and breaking my right elbow (which was how I knew I’d broken the left one, in Phoenix last year,despite the ER doc saying it wasn’t fractured).

Twisted my ankle, nearly falling, while stepping down one step. Not too badly - but I was holding my 6 month old baby at the time and had I actually fallen, it could have been very, very bad (I was stepping onto flagstones, with bricks / asphalt nearby). I spent 15 minutes in hysterics over that one.

22

One day, I was burning some round hay bales that were no good, and when one of the larger bales was reduced to a three-foot high pile of smoldering ash, I decided it would burn quicker if I knocked the ash column over. So I tried to push it over with the sole of my Nike. Not a good idea. :smack:

I pushed my foot into the middle of the ash column and my foot just sunk into it and the ash pile collapsed on to the top of my foot, trapping hot ashes between the tongue of my shoe and my sock.

Now I’m kick dancing like a Radio City Rockette trying to shake the hot ash from my foot. My Dad, who was watching me from across the field, thought I had really lost it.

I finally kick off my shoe and peel my melted sock from my foot to reveal my new third-degree burn on the top of my foot. (Later to become infected - but I survived)

Even funnier is what happened to my brother while we were snowmobiling.

He was driving an ancient sled with the carburetor located between your legs when you were sitting on it. Some gas had been slowly leaking onto the seat and collecting in the crotch of my bro’s snow suit.

We were stopped having a smoke and a beer when somehow, a spark hit the gas and ignited a crotch fire on my bro. He jumps off the Ski-doo and starts beating his gloved hands on his crotch to try to smother the fire. To his dismay, this only accomplished in spreading the fire to his gloves. He let out a Homeresque shriek just before the “stop, drop and roll” training kicked in.

He dives to the ground face first in the snow, palms down, and begins to hump to snow-covered earth like a caterpillar on Viagra. After 20 seconds or so of frantic humping, the fire was out.
Another ten seconds of hand shoveling snow onto the sled had that fire put out.

I was in tears laughing so hard and fell off my snowmobile. My bro had the crotch completely burned out of his snow suit but he escaped with a couple of blisters and some singed pubes.
.

23

One of my earliest memories is wondering what would happen in I put my little finger in the space between the open door and the wall. My brother shut the door, and my right little finger is still shorter than my left one.

Tasting hot pasta to see if it’s done. Pasta slides off spoon and onto chin. I spend a week explaining how I got a blister on my chin.

24

I’ll tell you about one of the more mundane self-induced injuries.

When I still lived with my mother I had one of those brush-style curling irons. You know the ones where the barrel is a round brush with stiff plastic bristles? I jumped from the bathroom counter onto one and the bristles sank about half their length into the bottom of my foot. It was a real job to pull all the bristles out, and there was more blood than I would have thought. I still have scars, 20 years later.

25

meek’s brother is my favorite so far. “Homeresque shriek”! wiping away tears

26

You know architect’s scale rules? he triangular cross section rulers. They’re really sharp when you’re barefoot carrying your girlfriend. Fortunately I managed to set her down before collapsing with blood gushing from the bottom of my foot.

nd then there was the time after spending three days doing an install and packing the car for the trip home, I picked up the molding cutter to put it in the trunk. Picture a paper cutter on steroids. I cleverly picked it up by the blade. Actually, I didn’t even get it off the ground, just grabbed the blade and let go. Kinda hate the Pittsfield MA ER. And to this day I can’t really move the last knuckle of my left middle finger.

27

I have two. The first happened when I was in the 9th grade and a neighbor gave me a ride to school. Exiting her stationwagon, I decided to close the door with my right hand (I’m a lefty). I managed to close my right thumb in the door and tore it open at the first knuckle right down to the tendon. They’re white…did you know that? ::faint:: :o

The second happened some years later when I worked for the classified dept of the local paper. We used Xacto blades to cut ads from the paper. Mine had a particularly heavy handle. I was absent-mindedly holding it with the blade pointing down while I searched for an ad. The dang thing slipped and dropped full blade into the top of my foot…where it stayed until I yanked it out. ::faint:: :o

28

I have done this. Twice. Then again, I cut up a LOT of apples. On a similar note, I’ve managed to give myself a paper cut with cardboard twice as well.

I’ve also fallen with a baby, and had similar hysterics. Twisting my left ankle, I took the full brunt of the fall on my left ankle, which was impressively swollen for weeks afterward. What I’ve never been able to understand is why the top of my shoe was scratched, on the instep side, when I twisted the ankle inwardly. In other words, did my foot completely twist up upon itself? :eek:
I’m also wiping away tears at some of these stories. I can’t decide if I like brewha’s reverse pile drive or meekbro’s flaming crotch/snow-hump better! :stuck_out_tongue:

29

Ahhh, I have so many of these, I don’t know where to start. (I’m not the most coordinated of individuals.) I guess I’ll just settle for the most embarrassing. I was at work and started down a flight of stone steps. My knee did one of those weird things where it just sort of gives out. Being as there was no bannister, I went head over heels down the entire flight and ended up at the bottom with my head on the floor and my legs up the stairs. In a dress. With knee highs. And pettipants. At the top of the stairs? The CEO and assorted cronies. :o

In defense of this hideous fashion faux pas, it was too damn hot to wear panty hose and the company had a policy against “bare legs.”

30

I love platform shoes. They look so nice, but don’t hurt your feet as much as non-platform shoes with the same height to 'em. But you know what? They’re real easy to fall off of… :smack:

31

I have a few.

First, in grade 4 or something like that, I was with a couple of friends in an open, two-level log cabin type thing on the playground. I was on the second level, which was about 6 feet off the ground, laughing at something or other with my back to the edge of the second level floor (which had no guard rail of any sort). I was laughing so hard that I stepped backwards and failed to realize the balls of my feet no longer had anything solid under them, so down I went, backwards, not unlike a felled tree. For some reason, I remember quite clearly that that my last words were, “Hahahaha – aaAAAAH!” The back of my head landed on the 4x4 beam that served as the base for the entrance to the cabin. I ran around the playground holding my head and whining “Ow, ow, ow, ow!” Well, it did hurt. A lot. I had a nice big knot on my head, but no lasting damage, thankfully. Now give back me shillelagh!

Then, when I was about 10 or 11, I was getting up off my bed from a seated position when I completely failed my negotiations with gravity and fell into the corner of a night table with my forehead. Head wounds bleed an awful lot, even though the size of the cut turned out not to be all that huge. It did leave a scar though, right in the center at the hairline. My head took a beating when I was a kid. Ostrich!

About five or six years ago, the wife and I were moving my computer desk into another room, when I learned an important lesson: Remove all movable objects from a heavy piece of furniture before attempting to move it. This lesson was taught to me by the keyboard drawer as it slid out and landed corner-first on my big toe from a height of about three feet. Lost my toenail and couldn’t walk properly for three weeks.

Then, three years ago at my previous job, I was booking in some tools for repair. This one was still in its tool case, which was held closed with a plastic zip tie to prevent it from opening in transit. So I grab the toolbox and steady it with my right hand, then take a box cutter to it with my left (I’m a lefty). Upon unexpectedly cutting through the last bit of tie sooner than I’d thought, Newton’s first law did what it’s best at, such that the object in motion (the box cutter) stayed in motion until acted upon by an unbalanced force (the index finger of my right hand). Right up to the hilt, enough that the tip was poking out the other side. Not fun, but I’m thankful box cutters only have short blades. It was a good time to do it though, as the crew from a fire truck were shopping in the store part of the building at the time, so they had some gauze and disinfectant on hand, patched me up well enough to live.

32

Vote flaming crotch snow hump!
Flaming crotch snow hump!

Call now! Operators are standing by.

I got one more…

It’s not as funny because I can’t remember the ending. It’s more stupid than anything.

I was teaching a girl I was dating how to snow ski when I decided to show off my skills by passing her going backwards down the hill, looking at her and saying, “That’s right, just do what I do…”

I was told they heard the ringing of the chair lift pole all the way down to the chalet.

I was only concussed and also severed a thumb tendon.

Ahhhh the memories.
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33

I have one recurring stupid injury. I get a lot of paper cuts. Did you know that brand-new manila folders will slice your thumb very much like a knife? I do, now.

My most recent stupid injury was when I was sitting in my chair here at work and leaned down to take my thumb drive out of the USB port in the computer. I was further away from the computer than I should have been to do that, and I fell out of my chair, bumping my left knee and then my left hip. I ended up with a small bruise on my knee, a large one on my hip, and I just sat there on the floor for a few minutes, stunned at how I’d managed to do something like that.

34

I stuck a butcher knife nearly through my palm trying to remove a pit from an avocado. While I was waiting for the hand surgeon to call with instructions for the ER doctor a mother and daughter stopped by the door of my room and the mother said “see Suzy, this is what happens when you’re not careful with knives”.
:smack:

35

My oft told “thumbnail as thimble” story:

I was hemming my Levi’s one day and couldn’t get the needle through the many layers of cloth -
so I pressed the head of the needle on my thumbnail and the head of the needle went through my nail. :eek: :frowning:

36

threnodyangelfire, take heart, some people pay good money to have that done. It’s called a frenulectomy.

I have so many stupid injury stories I can’t count them. I’m sure my middle name should have been Grace.

When I was about 10, I was visiting a neighbor who lived in a cool old farm house. It was built on a hill, so the main floor was the second story in the back. The steps to the back door were 20 feet wide. The steps were wet from the rain, I slipped on the top step and went down the rest on my ass. Nothing hurt, but my pride.

I once trimmed my hair in the bathroom, didn’t pick up all the hair, and ended up with a “hair splinter” in my foot. Hurt like hell. It took a magnifying glass to find it.

The downstairs bathroom in this house is in my glass studio. One would think that “glass studio” would be reminder enough not to walk to the bathroom barefoot, but it isn’t. :rolleyes: I pick glass out of my feet once a week.

My last great accident was well documented here. I cut the end of my non-dominant ring finger off while attempting to lock a broken car door.

37

When I was a teenager, I wanted an airsoft BB gun like my friends had, but my Dad wouldn’t let me. He always said they were dangerous and “I’d take my eye out.”

I thought he was being stupid, and went ahead and bought one anyway without him knowing.

I got it home and unpacked it, loaded it up and thought I could fire one or two shots in my room before I had to put it away and save it for outdoors. Bear in mind that I’m now studying Aeronautical Engineering and even then had a basic idea of projectile motion and collisions and all that, when I decided to fire it into the corner of the room at a toy.

The very first shot I fired came directly back to me and hit me right in the eye. Left a nasty mark, but didn’t do any lasting damage. Managed to come up with some rubbish excuse about it for my dad. So it hurt a fair bit, but no-where nearly as bad as other stupid things I’ve done, but I think this one takes the prize for the most downright stupid injury I’ve ever had!

I told him what I’d done a year ago (I’m twenty now), and he said he’d figured as much and that he was slightly proud of me at the same time and took comfort in thinking I wouldn’t be quite so stupid twice.

38

pretend, my brother did something similar when we were kids. (To be fair, I was about to do it too, but he went first.) We had made little people out of clay and stuck them to the wooden posts of the dock so we could shoot them with our BB guns. My brother’s first BB went right through the clay, richocheted off the wood, and chipped his tooth.

39

—twitch— (I have eye issues.)

My contribution:

You know that trick where you balance a stack of coins on your elbow, then snap your arm down fast and catch the stack before it falls?

You can see a demo here.

Back when I was a teenager, humb-dy-hum years ago, I was working on perfecting this move. I’d gotten up to a fairly impressive stack of coins, having discovered that the trick to doing a lot was to very slightly bounce my elbow up a bit, to suspend the coins a fraction of a second longer, before snapping my arm down to catch them.

I did not also consider that part of the trick is to position oneself a safe distance from one’s bed. Because when I snapped my arm down, I slammed my elbow into the end of the bed.

I couldn’t have hit my elbow on the wood harder if that were my deliberate intent.

No permanent injury, but my arm was noticeably numb for days.

40

Add me to the “sustained a serious ankle injury while walking on flat, smooth ground.” Took three weeks before I could walk normally.

I once managed to get a papercut under my thumbnail. That one hurt.

Several digits have been slammed in various doors and whatnot.

I once nearly knocked myself out by slamming my head in the car door. I don’t know what happened; I’d grabbed my gym bag off the passenger seat and was shutting the door, and…misplaced my head. My martial arts instructor was first concerned when I came in pale as a sheet with a thin dribble of blood from my temple - I manged to catch the corner of the door - and then, when I explained, was very very amused.

There was also the time I was helping my roommate to the bathroom right across the hall. About two hours earlier she’d discovered the joys of tequila. She was very drunk and is quite a bit larger than I am. We get into the hallway, she stumbles, smacks her head into the wall, and just hits the corner of the number-plate on the wall outside our room. Blood ensues. Lots of blood.

I don’t do well with blood. I (stone sober, mind you), suddenly see lots of blood. Then there’s that telltale numbness about face. On the way down I smack my head against a wall. Come to a few seconds later with a very sore head and death threats in mind for my roommate if she ever drinks that much again.

That was a fun night.