# Tales of clumsiness **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 21, 2016, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579 "2016-08-21T23:22:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2018, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/41 "2018-10-25T17:56:27Z")
I have fell up the stairs many times. Those are always special and painful reminders of the anti-gravity features to my home. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2018, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/42 "2018-10-25T18:05:18Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > Heh. Totally unintentional pun on my part. Does that count as verbal clumsiness? šŸ˜ƒ ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/43 "2018-10-26T15:53:08Z")
> [@slalexan](#): > > TL,DR - I was playing a game in PE where I ran at a brick wall, tripped and gave myself a concussion while almost breaking my neck. When I was in high school, the bunch of us in PE were jogging back from whatever weā€™d been doing jumping over a chain across the road. The class clown would pull on the chain raising it a couple inches as we jumped over. Everybody did just fine but me. I hooked a foot on the chain and did an instant 90-degree spin and slammed my head into the pavement. The next few minutes are kind of hazy. I remember being picked up by the arms and being unable to breathe with someone saying, ā€œHeā€™s just had the wind knocked out of him.ā€ Some small part of my mind thought that was a very apt description. After that I got nuthinā€™ until I come to under the shower what had to be a good five or ten minutes later. In those ā€œsuck it up timesā€ I didnā€™t even get sent to the school nurse. ---
**Author:** ![ZonexandScout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zonexandscout/32/544_2.png) [@ZonexandScout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZonexandScout)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/44 "2018-10-26T19:49:34Z")
I know Iā€™ve told this story before in the SDMB: Several years ago I was helping a friend pack his belongings for a move. After loading the (very) first box, I picked up some tape to seal it. My friend did not have a pair of scissors handy, so he offered a small fillet knife to cut the tape. For some reason, I took the knife in my right hand and went to cut the tape I was holding in my left handā€¦and put the knife right into my forearm. I cut several tendons. The worst part was that we had to drive to the emergency room. My friend didnā€™t have a car and he couldnā€™t drive my manual transmission, so I had to drive myself. (I knowā€¦I should have called an ambulance.) He reached across my lap to keep pressure on my left arm while I steered and shifted with my right. It took about 20 minutes. The orthopedic surgeons had to open my arm from my wrist almost to my elbow to reattach the tendons. Fortunately, my fingers all work, but my left palm has been numb for many years. A very, very clumsy and stupid thing to do. ---
**Author:** ![EscAlaMike](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/escalamike/32/4177_2.png) [@EscAlaMike](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EscAlaMike)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/45 "2018-10-26T20:13:57Z")
One evening my wife and I met up with a friend at her place of work. A female co-worker of hers was taking a heavy bag of trash out back to throw into the dumpster. Me, being the gentleman that I am, offered to take it out for her. She came with me to show me which dumpster to throw it into. I gave the bag a heave before I threw it into the dumpster (which was about 6-7 feet high), and when I did, the bag split open and trash and trash juice shot all over this woman. It wasnā€™t exactly my fault, but I still felt so embarassed. Luckily, it was the end of her work day, so she could leave right away. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2018, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/46 "2018-10-26T23:36:37Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > I fat-fingered two other thread titles trying edit open this one on my phone. šŸ˜› > > Editā€“and then made a typo. Two years later, I did the very same thing. The struggle is real, man. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2019, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/47 "2019-01-20T14:29:57Z")
Not really a tale of clumsiness, though the OP in the link contains one about my dad, but I guess a 'Tale of DOH! :smack: ā€™ might go in this thread. Yesterday I got out my [dadā€™s Vulcain Cricket watch](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=869245). Itā€™s 50 or 60 years old, and it ticked away when I shook it. The alarm, which was on, worked when I set the time. I wore it all morning to wind it up, but I noticed a couple of times that it had stopped. _What?_ But it was running so well! šŸ˜• I thought I might have to take it to the watch-repair guy. Then it occurred to meā€¦ The movement isnā€™t automatic. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2019, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/48 "2019-01-21T12:52:43Z")
Kinda like when I watched a pre-schooler use the touch screen on her paper picture book. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2019, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/49 "2019-01-21T13:57:42Z")
The motor on the driver-side window is automatic. Once pressed, it rolls all the way up whether or not you continue pressing on the switch. Before driving off I rolled down the window to exchange question/answer with wife. Noticing window was down I absent-mindedly pressed the up switch. Before retracting head. I mentioned the resulting headaches, though embarrassed to mention the cause, in an IMHO thread with a title like ā€œHeadaches, should I get CT scan?ā€ (Doctor was far more worried about my swallowing problem ā€” do I have esophogeal cancer? :eek: ) Iā€™m so clumsy I sometimes close a door right on my finger! This was only a minor annoyance ā€¦ until I closed the door right on top of the thumb a bumblebee had stung the day before. :eek: (Iā€™m much more careful about a lot of things these days.) ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2019, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/50 "2019-01-21T14:46:37Z")
Dropped a round (#pricey) lightbulb I was putting in the light bar in my bathroom. It broke allover the pedestal sink and the floor. Of course I cut my finger cleaning the mess up. You canā€™t exactly use a broom and dustpan in a sink. Finally got all the shards cleaned up and turned to put the little trash can down and stepped on the screw end of the bulb and cut my foot. Arrgghhhhh! ---
**Author:** ![Shoeless](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shoeless/32/7099_2.png) [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2019, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/51 "2019-01-25T13:54:36Z")
Got a new one this morning. I cut my nose while shaving. Shaving is one of those things where I constantly have to tell myself to slow down, because if I donā€™t then I get a little careless. Like this morning. Going up to shave my upper lip, and caught the edge of my nostril with the razor. 45 minutes later and I still canā€™t get it to stop bleeding. And itā€™s not really somewhere that I can stick a band-aid. I guess Iā€™m going to be walking around holding a kleenex to my nose all morning. The drive to work should be interestingā€¦ ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2019, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/52 "2019-01-26T04:14:34Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > When I was a junior in college, I had a dorm room all to myself (Iā€™d then been in the dorms for three years, and had enough seniority to get one of the ā€œsingles.ā€) I had my bed set up as a ā€œloftā€ (i.e., a bunk bed without the lower bed), with a seating area underneath. When I first set the room up this way, I used my desk chair to get up into the bed. > > That first week in the room, it was fall registration week, which largely meant that it was a week off for me. One morning, I was sleeping in a bit, and the phone started ringing. I went to get out of the bed, and missed the chair, dropping to the floor. I landed on my feet, but stumbled forward, and hit my head on my stereo (which was on the desk, on the far side of the room). > > I then answered the phone ā€“ it was a friend of mine on the line. ā€œGood morning! How are you today?ā€, she asked. I put my hand to my forehead, and it came away bloody. ā€œUmmmā€¦bleeding? Iā€™ll call you back.ā€ > > I went down the hall to the bathroom, looked in the mirror, and saw that I had a two-inch-long gash right along my hairline. My housefellow (RA) called campus security, and they sent a campus police officer to transport me to the health clinic ā€“ he asked what Iā€™d done, and when I told him, he laughed the entire trip. šŸ˜ƒ The doctor at the clinic stuck my forehead back together with butterfly tape, and I got a nice little scar out of the deal ā€“ itā€™s since served as a barometer to illustrate how far back my hairline has receded. Wow. One of my dorm mates had something similar happen while sleeping in a loft bed, but she just rolled out of bed and landed on the floor. If I recall correctly she broke her arm. The hall director had to bring her to the er in the middle of the night. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 26, 2019, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579/53 "2019-01-26T05:32:09Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > Wow. One of my dorm mates had something similar happen while sleeping in a loft bed, but she just rolled out of bed and landed on the floor. If I recall correctly she broke her arm. The hall director had to bring her to the er in the middle of the night. My older sister and I shared a bunk bed when we were in Japan. When we got back to the States, we each had our own room and I got the bunk bed. One night I was sleeping in the top bunk. I neglected to put the guard rail up. I rolled over in the night and had the most bizarre vision of the floor coming up at me. I hit it flat on my stomach and had the wind partially knocked out of me. I crawled into the lower bunk and slept there the rest of the night. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tales-of-clumsiness/763579.md?page=2)