At work I used to scoot about on the wheeled swivel office chair. One night, I gave it an especially hard scoot and it snagged on the carpet. The chair spun round a half turn and ejected me into space. My arms and legs flung outward, I shot about three metres through the air then I landed flat on my back without breaking my fall. After I got over the shock, I started to laugh. Then a line of faces appeared over the counter top - all dementia patients. One said he was going for help (aw!) and shuffled off. I was glad that he would have forgotten what he was there for if he did find a coworker.
Hitting myself in the face with my key on a lanyard while swining it around…twice…in five minutes.
I did gymnastics as a kid, competitive diving in high school and college, have been doing martial arts since I was sixteen, and I taught myself to juggle both balls and clubs. Without thinking about it, I can perform feats that no one else I know can. So of course it follows that I have some bizarrely clumsy moments.
One night I was carrying dinner upstairs waiter-style: plate on the arm, holding another one in that hand, plastic pitcher of water under my arm, glass in the other hand, when I caught the toe of my slipper on the one of the last steps. My first thought was, “If I break another one of her plates, my wife is going to kill me” (Of course I break dishes. Did I not mention the bizarre clumsiness?) Keeping everything from falling, I leaned forward to catch my balance by putting my head against the wall. I judged that I wasn’t falling hard enough to actually hurt myself.
Unfortunately, the section of wall I hid wasn’t backed with anything more substantial than drywall. Yep, there’s a forehead shaped hole in the wall at about waist height at the top of the stairwell. I can’t find matching wallpaper to make a patch, and my wife isn’t sure that self-repair would be a good thing from the landlord’s point of view, so I haven’t fixed the hole. That was sometime last year. I see the damn hole every time I go up the stairs and it bugs the hell out of me.
At least I didn’t break her #§¢*ing plate.
Just about an hour ago, leaving the kitchen, I tripped over my boy Jackson http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii25/marion41/21.jpg , landed flat on my stomach, and spilled Hamburger Helper all over my girl Zachary http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii25/marion41/212.jpg. No one saw it but them. And Zach was OK with the Hamburger Helper.
I tried hitting a basketball with an aluminum baseball bat once. Basketballs are a lot more elastic than baseballs, as it turns out. Hit myself right in the face on the rebound and actually knocked myself to the ground.
(Although there were no witnesses, I told my brother, and then he tried it. Right in the head. True story.)
I was attempting to use fix-a-flat to repair a flat on the lawn tractor. Well this can of fix-a-flat ad been used before and the nozzle was clogged with dried ‘fix’. But I didn’t let this stop me. Well the pressure from the can made the tube blow up spewing chemical all over my face and into my eyes. So I can barely see and I’m first trying to read the can to see what it says to do if this stuff gets in your eyes. Then I find out I have to flush them with water which is fine except I’m a good couple hundred feet from the house. So blinded I make it across the yard to the spigot to wash out my eyes.
This time I actually wished someone was around to see it. I really could have used their help.
Cleaning rat cages (which are very large) and carrying one in front of me over to the tap where I wash them. I ran into a wall, which drove the cage straight into my nose. Owie! Looked like someone punched me (except for the faint criss-cross pattern if you looked closely)
Kneeling on a piece of corrugated plastic and cutting it down to size. Of course, stupidly, cutting TOWARD myself. Yup, utility knife slipped out of the plastic and embedded itself an inch into the flesh just above my knee. That was 3 stitches well earned.
I did that once! Except I was breaking up firewood at my aunt’s house and the branch I decided to hit with the bat wasn’t actually all that dried yet, so it was still springy. Dropped myself right onto the ground unconscious. The family still has not let me live that down.
You realize, of course, that that was a carefully orchestrated tripping so they could get their paws on some Hamburger Helper.
Not me, but a co-worker–was trying to close his garage door manually. Reached up, got his fingertips in the groove of the panels, and pulled down. Got his fingertips mashed in between the panels and couldn’t get them out. Stood there screaming until someone heard him and came and opened the garage door far enough it would release his fingers. :smack:
And here I thought I’d be the first with a rake in the face story. I did that this spring. I still have a slight palpable if not visible bump on my nose. I wish someone had seen it, 'cause I’m sure it was funny.
I didn’t do the rake, but actually clotheslined myself with clothesline. I was a kid and running flat-out through backyards during a game of hide ‘n’ go seek. I’m sure it was a cartoon moment: it caught me in the throat and I landed WHAM on my back, knocking the breath clean outta me. The clothesline was a wire, too, and it left a nice mark.