Back when I was in 6th grade, I had a crush on a girl named Robin. One night while doing homework, I wrote a short poem expressing my fondness for her. I stuffed it in my PeeChee with all my other stuff. A few days later at school a classmate asked to borrow a couple sheets of paper. Yep, one of the sheets of paper had my poem on it. And when he found it he read it to the whole class. At recess later I punched him in the stomach for it. We became very good friends all the way through high school.
It’s been 25 years since I did it, and I still cringe.
I once had a co-worker who was going on about her objection to interracial marriages. I gently reminded her that my wife and I were of different races. Without batting an eye she replied “Well, she’s not a n*****.”
Fast forward. The co-worker had gone on to another job. The company’s owner is in town for one of his rare visits, and he takes everyone out to dinner. I’m sitting next to him, and at some point in the evening, I share that little anecdote with him. Just as I get to the punchline, there’s a momentary lull in the conversation around the room and I can be heard by everyone.
Particularly by the African-American waiter who had just that moment decided to refill my waterglass.
As I slunk under the table the silence was broken only by my wife, who in a calm voice said “Smooth move, dear.”
One of the first days of work at my new job. I had rehearsed the “small talk” thing, having never experienced it outside of college. I got on the elevator and there was one other woman in there.
Me: “Congratulations! When are you due?”
Her: “I’m not pregnant.”
Boy, the rest of that elevator ride was a long one.
Another one, waiting in a long line for the ATM at the airport. The woman at the machine is taking a long time, so I say to the guy in line in front of me: “Jesus, I’m gonna miss my plane! What is this woman, BLIND??!!” Yes. Yes she was.
Good God. I am notorious for foot-in-mouth disease, and am grateful to see I’m not the only one inflicted with this terrible condition.
Lessee…there was the time I was talking to a coworker (teacher) at a TGIF type thing. She was new to the school, having escaped a previous assignment with an annoying, nagging teacher’s aide that would loudly correct and/or argue with her in class, among other things. Then annoying, nagging aide followed her to her new school. “So, have you had any trouble with that aide that was giving you crap?” I ask her. She grins stiffly and points with her eyes. Yup, I was sitting right next to said aide (I didn’t know it was her!!). Thankfully, the aide was engulfed in another conversation, at least as best we could tell.
Another one: I visited a friend I hadn’t seen in a long while. She answered the door HUGE pregnant. I had no idea!! She was a teeny framed person, so I thought it was safe to tease, “Wow, have YOU gained weight!” Instead, I almost made her cry. Having been big preggo fairly recently, I understand all the better. Fat jokes are NEVER funny to a pregnant woman, no matter how NOT fat she is. Doh.
Gosh, I can go on.
In the first meeting of my statistics class in college, I sat in the back and awaited the torture. I’m a humanities type, and so this whole numbers-thing was going to torture me, I knew it. A floppy-haired goofball of a guy, the kind who usually sits in the back row with me and makes crass jokes about the professor and/or the class, came in and sat next to me. “Oof, what do you think about this class?” he asked. “Oh my GOD I am not looking forward to this! I am going to HATE this class. I’ve been dreading this for weeks…all the numbers and dry data and crap. I’ll just do the bare minimum to keep the teacher off my back and get this dang thing over with.” He just nodded, floppy blond hair flapping.
After a few more people trickled into the classroom and I’d finished my rant, he got up…and went to the front of the class to begin his lecture. Yup, he was my professor. Dammit.
I got an A, though.
I shotgun-belched in a quiet, but full, Chinese restaurant. My wife was with me. 
I’ve done the drooling while asleep in class thing before.
Speaking of my wife, I’m sure she can come up with far worse faux pas’. Spouses have a thing about remembering stuff like that. 
One time she walked into the room to find me… er … anyway, she burst out laughing whereupon I woke up from the very nice dream I was having, never to live it down.
However, that was private. She was caught in one of those man-on-the-street interviews about a speech she saw Christopher Reeves make, shortly after the accident. Now my wife has a thing with inadvertent puns and wordplay… it’s the most interesting thing to listen to her and she could make millions in coining ad phrases. (Once, in talking about a lost collection of dolls she had as a girl she said “My Wizard of Oz toys are now gone with the wind.” For a few seconds, she had no idea why the crowd started laughing.)
So the guy asks her “What do you think about Christopher Reeves’ attempts to get the message out about spinal cord injuries?” The lovely MrsT replies, with a serious look on her face, on camera, in the height of the PC-Age “Well, since the accident and rehabilitation, I’m glad that Mr. Reeves is jumping into a number of new projects like directing and activism…”
Needless to say, her bit wasn’t aired.
Once (and I hope she is not a Doper), I attended a black tie wedding in a white suit. On my defense, I was a young teenager and it was the 80’s. Fast forward to uni, I meet this guy who is telling the story of the guy with the white suit who attended his sister’s wedding. It only took a couple questions to assert that it was me, of course. She still hated me for “ruining her day”.
I was trying to get a longtime friend to sign a petition, and she seemed hesitant. I blurted out “Come on, it’s just a petition. It’s not like we’re asking for your first born son.” THEN I remember her first born son was the victim of a murder/suicide by his father.
Then, IMO, she was probably a bitch. If a guy in the wrong color suit can ruin your wedding day, well … I just don’t have much to say about that kind of person.
I thought that only happened on sitcoms. :smack:
There is a doctor our lab works with that I have talked to plenty of times on the phone. She’s easy to identify when she calls because she has a very loud voice and she’s just bursting with energy.
A couple of weeks ago I met her in person for the first time. She’s maybe five feet tall and a hundred pounds. I blurted out, “Wow, you’re not nearly as big as you sound!”
My wife gave me a wonderful welcome-home kiss the other day as I walked in the door. Unfortuntaly, I was needing to go straight to the bathroom for some kleenex to wipe a very runny nose that was about to give way.
Well, the kiss made the tip of my nose deform on her cheek, which broke the fragile equilibrium that had been retaining my nose drip. A substantial rivulet flowed out of my nose straight onto our lips.
The kiss broke off, and she had an odd look on her face, as she clearly wasn’t expecting such a sloppy wet kiss. I shrugged and smiled, and hurried to the bathroom without saying anything, as she walked away befuddled but just assuming that it was one of those squishy sloppy kisses that sometimes happens.
I’d like to puplicly apologize to her now.
It wasn’t saliva, love. It was snot.
My dad’s uncle and former business partner passed away last week from cancer. A few days ago, my dad ran into a guy he and his uncle sometimes worked with, but hadn’t seen in several years. The guy joked, “So, anyone dead?”
He got quiet when my dad told him. He liked my dad’s uncle and the news was a total surprise.
Of course, none of these really compare to the completely oblivious faux pas we all committed when we were children… but it’s OK, 'cause the other kids were oblivious as well.
Like my little five year-old girl. She’s been having power-struggle issues with another little girl in her class, involving a fair amount of tears, etc. So last night we talked to Sophie and said the usual… you need to be nice, if the other kids don’t want to do what you want to do don’t cry… stuff like that.
So we take her to school this morning and she immediately runs up to the other child and says “Faye, my mommy and daddy told me to tell you that I’m supposed to be sorry and that we’re to be friends and I’m not supposed to cry when you’re being mean.” While scratching her butt.
Luckily for us, the other girl bought it and hugged Sophie. Looking down at them, I noticed the other child had her shoes on the wrong feet.
In 20 years they might remember each other. Which is probably all for the better. 
Reminds me of a little poem I read years ago, maybe in a joke card:
“Don’t kiss your honey
When your nose is runny
You may think it’s funny
But it’s snot.”
I was at a party at a friend-of-my-husband’s house. It was cold outside, so the host’s son, who was about eight at the time, was helping his dad get a fire going in the living room fireplace. As the little boy was carefully arranging kindling, I quipped, “Hey, don’t burn the house down.” Both the kid and his dad (the host) turned and looked at me with the strangest expressions on their faces. I didn’t think much about it until my sister-in-law discreetly whispered to me that less than two weeks before this party, the kid had in fact nearly burned the house down by setting off a batch of fireworks in his upstairs bedroom. I just pretended I never said it and figured the kid probably needed to be reminded anyway, but I felt bad that I had said it in front of his dad.
Then one time, talking to my other sister-in-law, I got all snobby about homemade chile con queso saying that I wasn’t fond of the “velveeta cheese + Rotel” recipe that so many people made. My sister-in-law said, “That’s how I make mine.” The worst part is, I’ve always really liked hers. :smack:
Once when I was 6, a friend of the family wanted to get me to say that I loved my mom in front of other friends. He wanted me to say I loved her because of a number of things: she was kind, she was responsible, she was a good mother. Of course I didn’t say any of those things. What did I say in response, to “why do you love your mommy” you ask?
“Because she buys me stuff.”
They all thought it was funny but I think I hurt my mom’s feelings a bit. Sorry mom…
This morning I read this thread and though, wow, I don’t think I ever really did anything half as bad as this stuff. Then today I was helping a blind guy to sign a form by putting my finger where he would sign so he could feel my finger and he signed it perfectly and asked if it was ok and for reasons I will never understand I started to say “deadeye dick” and then halfway through I realized that maybe that’s not a familiar expression and could be misinterpreted by someone who never heard it before so I’d better not say dick. So I stopped short of saying the dick part. I just said, “deadeye!” With that strange, strangled inflection that you only get when you cut yourself off in the middle of speaking. “Dead…eeeeeyeee.”
So good save. Thank goodness I didn’t say dick to a blind man, potentially confusing and offending him!
I have a couple of cousins who are known as being from the shallow end of the gene pool. They are uncouth, ugly, have bad teeth, and they are dumb to boot. Anyways, it should be noted that their mother, my estranged father’s sister, is probably the nicest lady you could ever hope to meet. Also, she wanted a daughter and just got Toad and Brain - Todd and Brian. That what we called my cousins, of course. Anyways, Auntie would spoil me with all sorts of girly things if the one of boys pulled my name at the Christmas exchange.
So Toad picked my name one year for Christmas exchange, which was held yearly at my grandparents’. The present was a VERY nice little suitcase full of clothing for my Cabbage Patch doll, handmade by my aunt. I wish I still had them today, but I digress.
Everyone ooh’d and aah’d, and asked my six year old self who gave it to me. “TOAD!” I brightly replied. Oh snap. :smack:
Dude, don’t get me started. Just don’t. As the memories come flooding back, it’s all I can do to keep from slinking under this desk.
Since the OP did ask for the WORST one, however, I’ll share the worst one I can think of right now:
I was once trying to comfort a woman whose son had just passed away (and I mean JUST passed away) suddenly, and when she sighed that she was grateful to still have her three daughters, I replied, “Girls are better, anyway.”
I just threw up a little in my mouth. I gotta go.
Someone else’s faux pas:
One of my employees called me to tell me that her newborn daughter had died in a tragic accident.
I passed the news on to my supervisor by saying, “Susan has lost her baby.”
Her response, in this horrible, loud screech: “Well, where the hell did she put it??”