# What is the most ridiculous way you've ever injured yourself? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 4, 2009, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318 "2009-05-04T19:05:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![not\_alice](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_alice/32/7283_2.png) [@not\_alice](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_alice)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/21 "2009-05-05T06:06:00Z")
run over by my own car with no one else around. ---
**Author:** ![tr0psn4j](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/958977/32.png) [@tr0psn4j](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tr0psn4j)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/22 "2009-05-05T07:07:07Z")
So when I was a kid, my dad was twirling me around in the kitchen by grabbing me by the legs and spinning around in circles while my head was kind of low and away from his body. We had a sharp pointy table in the kitchen at the time and I ended up hitting it with my head. ---
**Author:** ![Lacunae\_Matata](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lacunae\_Matata](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lacunae_Matata)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/23 "2009-05-05T07:31:19Z")
I once incurred a concussion during a pillow fight. Same summer that I broke my arm falling _up_ the stairs. My aunt once burned her collarbone trying to iron down a slightly wrinkled collar. While wearing the blouse. My brother ran a lawn mower over his foot once. And my mother nearly sliced her thumb off separating frozen meat patties with a butcher knife. My injuries don’t seem quite as silly in that context. We’re a naturally graceful family, you know! ---
**Author:** ![bartleby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bartleby/32/10491_2.png) [@bartleby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bartleby)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/24 "2009-05-05T11:51:48Z")
I cut myself on a piece of bread almost badly enough to need stitches once… ---
**Author:** ![gravitycrash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@gravitycrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gravitycrash)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/25 "2009-05-05T13:20:22Z")
As far as I know, I’m not allergic to anything airborne so I rarely sneeze but when I do they are hardcore and usually come without warning. I was getting out of bed and heading towards the bathroom when one snuck up on me violently. I felt a sharp pain in my lower back and kind of crumpled into a heap onto the floor. I tried to get up but any movement at all caused pain rivaling getting racked in the balls. The wife ask me what the hell is wrong. (we had been arguing the night before and weren’t really on speaking terms). I told her, she wasn’t too sympathetic and told me to wait while she took a shower to get ready for work. She gets out of the shower and starts putting on her makeup saying that she can’t miss work, do I want her to call an ambulance? I say no but I really need to take a piss. Before she heads off to work she hands me a large dog bowl so I can take care of business. I ask for a pillow and a book and the cordless phone in case you know, the house catches on fire or something. As she stands at the door she says," well, I guess you’re not faking because you would be crawling towards the garage for a cigarette by now if you could move". I finally managed to pull myself into the bed about five hours later. And I forgot to ask for aspirin before she left dammit. All in all a fun day. Horrible pain, nicotine withdrawal, and weird contortions reaching the half filled dog bowl to take a piss. Good times. At least the house didn’t catch on fire. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/26 "2009-05-05T13:46:26Z")
> [@Caveat\_lector\_1](#): > > Unless you mean something other than the children’s three-wheeled bike-thing we call them tricycles too. Big wheel is a brand of em. No, that’s what I meant. For some reason I thought “big wheel” was sort of a pejorative brand name 'round these parts, like Band-Aid. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/27 "2009-05-05T14:10:09Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > No, that’s what I meant. For some reason I thought “big wheel” was sort of a pejorative brand name 'round these parts, like Band-Aid. It’s a special kind. When I think “tricycle” I think of the metal riding-higher kind like [this type](http://www.radioflyer.com/trikes/trikes_34.html). [Big Wheels](http://www.originalbigwheel.com/) are mostly plastic in the body (metal frame underneath in some parts) and are low-riders, almost like a [recumbent bicycle frame](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recumbent_bicycle) for little kids. This way if you do manage to fall off something like that, at least the kid is really really close to the ground. It’s also easier for very young kids to ride since they barely have to climb onto it. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/28 "2009-05-05T14:32:26Z")
I posted this a couple of times already, but the stoopid bears repeating. I was taking a leisurely stroll through my apartment, and momentarily forgot that I live in a split level place. Ever see those Road Runner cartoons where Wile E. doesn’t realize that he walked off of a cliff and is suspended in mid-air? It was pretty much that. I was holding a glass jar full of water at the time. My first thought was to NOT SPILL THE WATER. The jar came down hard on the floor, but miraculously did not shatter. And I only spilled a little bit of water. That was the good news. The bad news is that I broke both of my feet. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/29 "2009-05-05T14:47:11Z")
I still carry the scars from tobogganning down a large hill only to realize that the ground of the park beneath was solid ice, covered by the lightest dusting of snow - and I literally could not stop the toboggan. I went face-first through the fence at the other end of the park. It was actually sort of funny in retrospect, as the “woo-hoo! I am going REALLY fast!” sensation turned to dread as I realized I simply _was not slowing down_. The stagger to the emergency ward wasn’t so much fun - head wounds bleed a lot and I left a distict trail all the way. I had tobogganed that hill hundreds of times before, and never made it even half-way to the fence. It is amazing what some ice can do. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/30 "2009-05-05T14:47:35Z")
This was in college: At work, I took a butcher knife, flipped it up so it would do one revolution in the air, and I would catch it on the handle. I did it once successfully, but no one else saw me do it. So I yell to my buddies “Hey guys! Check this out!” I toss it up again, only this time I catch it on the blade. Split my hand wide open. Luckily I worked in a hosptial kitchen, so the ER was close. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/31 "2009-05-05T15:23:22Z")
I put my hand through a plate glass window whilst slipping on dogshit. Tasting pasta to see if it was done I had it slip off the spoon and attach itself to my chin. I was so shocked it took a few seconds to react, and I had to explain the blister on my chin to several people. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/32 "2009-05-05T15:28:20Z")
I once cut a finger to the bone so badly it need stitches when cutting butter with a totally blunt butter-knife. The butter was hard from the fridge and I leaned on it to cut through - when suddenly it crumbled, and the knife slashed my finger with my full weight behind it. ---
**Author:** ![amanset](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8dc957/32.png) [@amanset](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amanset)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/33 "2009-05-05T15:46:27Z")
I fell through a roof wearing very light shorts. I landed on a bottle which went up my arse, perforating the wall of my rectum. I also broke my left ankle. I ended up having to have a colostomy for six months. I also managed to break my right ankle no more than five minutes into my first ever go on a skateboard. ---
**Author:** ![Rhodes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rhodes/32/273_2.png) [@Rhodes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhodes)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/34 "2009-05-05T16:23:25Z")
First day in my college dorm, put a pot of Ramen noodles on the back burner. Ten minutes later I rested my fingers on the front burner (it wasn’t glowing red) and wondered why the water still wasn’t boiling. I figured it out when I smelled smoke and discovered my fingertips were adhered to the stove. The nerves must have been singed immediately or something. It didn’t hurt a bit, but there was a white crust on several fingers for a couple of weeks. ---
**Author:** ![MsWhatsit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/35 "2009-05-05T16:29:34Z")
I’ve probably told this story before, but I’ll tell it again anyway. My freshman year of high school, I came in from the rain and my umbrella wouldn’t close. (It had collapsed, but it wouldn’t telescope all the way down into the handle, if you follow.) It was kind of half-broken and sometimes you had to hit it on the top pretty hard to get it to close. So I held it by the top with my right hand and slammed it down onto the floor as hard as I could. Let go, and the umbrella stayed attached to my hand – because, you see, one of the spokes had come detached and had pierced the palm of my hand. It didn’t quite go all the way through, and luckily I didn’t hit any bones, but the hallway where it happened looked like a murder scene from all the blood, and I couldn’t use my hand for about a week. Could have been a lot worse, though. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/36 "2009-05-05T16:40:15Z")
> [@amanset](#): > > I also managed to break my right ankle no more than five minutes into my first ever go on a skateboard. Ah, good old Leftie. At the time, I spent most of my social time with three friends. We went everywhere together. Two of them had bikes, and one had in-line skates (this was long before they were popular). Me? I had feet. No wheels. I solved that problem by buying a skateboard. Hey, I wanted to roll with my bros! Second day of having it, I was getting pretty good with it. I decided to get a little fancy and try a turn. Suddenly up was down and down was up, and the pavement was quickly lowering itself towards my head. I instinctively put out a hand to ward off the impending Bricks of Doom. My, did that sting! No worries, I kept on skate boarding. I figured the sting would go away soon. It didn’t. It got worse. It got to the point where I could barely move my arm without passing out. So off to the ER… Fractured wrist and chipped elbow. From that point on I walked. ---
**Author:** ![Rhodes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rhodes/32/273_2.png) [@Rhodes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhodes)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/37 "2009-05-05T16:47:51Z")
Fourteen was a hard age for me. They knew me by name at the ER. I’m surprised they never investigated my parents. I went with my geologist uncle to some hot springs in the Utah desert. He was taking water samples for his Master’s thesis. Near a point where water was boiling rapidly, I took a big step from one clump of grass to another. But somehow I missed the grass. The apparently solid bare spots were in fact thin crusts over underground hot water. The hospital staff suspected child abuse. Boiling quick sand? Yeah, right. The skin on both legs was hanging loosely. A large chunk of skin came off with my socks, and quarter-sized piece ripped off when it stuck to a bathtub. During a game of capure-the-flag, I looked behind me while running full-speed from a pursuer. I came to a sudden stop against the corner of a 3’ brick wall. That same year, I got a toboggan for Christmas. It was not what you’d call a white Christmas, but there were still a few patches of snow in a gully near my house. I snapped my femur on an exposed root. As I was sitting in the mud with a third knee the medics kept asking why the hell I was sledding with so little snow. And femurs get implants, not casts. So none of the assholes at school believed I really had a broken bone, and someone knocked my crutches away to prove it. I spent another week in a bed and now my left leg is shorter than my right. ---
**Author:** ![Belrix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed655f/32.png) [@Belrix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belrix)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/38 "2009-05-05T17:07:37Z")
Deep fried my hand, once, at Burger King. That was good for some second-degree burns and a week off work. Reading the peep story reminded me of heating marshmellows on a fork over a gas stove flame. Good, good, until you use the fork to put in in your mouth and touch your lip to the very hot tines. The sizzle was heard across the room and I had fork marks on my lower lip for a couple weeks. It’s good that I heal well. I’ve always got something healing on me somewhere - usually my hands. Right now it’s a set of deep scrapes from where I fell off a boulder in Nevada while “hiking”\* a couple days ago and caught myself on a tree on the way down. Saved an impact with the ground in that case but left a fairly impressive tear in my skin. \*“hiking” means a two-mile loop, barely a walk in the desert but it sounds good to say we did some hiking on vacation. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/39 "2009-05-05T17:15:07Z")
I just remembered clothes-lining myself on the support wire for a telephone pole. It caught me from right shoulder to left hip so it wasn’t too bad. Still knocked me down. Even dumber was when I was running along the nuisance strip looking to my side. I was flat out sprinting and ran into a “Snow Emergency Route” sign. It also knocked me down, but for much longer. I bet it would be pretty funny to see in the third person. ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2009, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318/40 "2009-05-05T17:29:59Z")
I’ve told this before, but here it is again: _ **How I set my testicles afire** _ > [@](#): > > I was an oceanography graduate student at the time. I’d been to the antarctic and collected a bunch of water samples for dissolved sulfur compounds, and had to analyse them back in the US of A. I had arranged to work with an old flame ionization detector gas chromatograph, which lived in an underutilized outbuilding. I’d put the seawater sample in a gastight chamber and submerge it in boiling water, which would drive out all the interesting chemicals. The chemical gases would go down a tube filled with resins, which was submerged in liquid nitrogen \*, where they would stick, getting concentrated. I would then switch the liquid nitrogen with boiling oil, driving the concentrated gases into the gas chromatograph, where they would hit a pilot light, which would ignite them. The machine would then detect the amount of gas by detecting the burny-ness of the flame. > > This was a very boring process. Water in, sit, boil, sit, liquid nitrogen off, boiling oil on, sit, beep, push button, repeat. The flame kept going out, and the machine would complain, and I had to quick relight the flame with my trusty zippo, or else the sample would be lost. After a week of this, all alone in the world, isolated in an outbuilding, I’m living like a bachelor. I’m reading cheezy mystery novels and wearing my tatty-est, holey-est jeans, and old tee shirts - water in, sit, boil, sit, liquid nitrogen off, boiling oil on, sit, beep, push button, repeat. I discover that I can light the zippo off the jeans of my thigh by rolling the wheel along my leg, then flick the lid down on the zippo to put it out. > > After another week of this, I’m sitting there, :water in, sit, read, play with lighter, boil, sit, read, play with lighter, liquid nitrogen off, boiling oil on, sit read, play with lighter, beep, push button, repeat. > > Happy in my carefree isolation, I fart. The gas shoots out my butt in the usual fashion, but finds an exit to the outside world through the holes in my jeans. The leading edge of noxious gas meets the Zippo flame and ignites - I see a tongue of blue flame shoot into my pants - did I mention drawers were not coming to work anymore? - and feel my pubic hairs burst into flame. > > I yell, leap up, drop trou and, ahem, beat out my testicles. I redress and run to the washroom, so I can inspect the damage. It’s pretty deforested, but I’m otherwise fine. > > Moral of the story? Science is a dangerous calling, just like on the late late show. > > Now that I’ve set the bar nice and low, tell me your embarrassing story. > > \*I also froze my tongue to a banana during this period. Go figure. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-most-ridiculous-way-youve-ever-injured-yourself/495318.md?page=3)