About that time you almost won a Darwin..

salm · Post by **salm** » 2003-01-09 06:41pm

Colonel Olrik wrote:All right, until now the Darwin Award goes to salm, for his testosterone-filled, helicopter-rescued, jump to Disaster. That must have hurt.

yeehaw!
i knew it would come in handy some day!

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2003-01-09 06:59pm

Not mine, but a friend once tried to pry a plug out of an outlet with a metal knife and was severely shocked.

InnerBrat · Post by **InnerBrat** » 2003-01-09 07:05pm

HemlockGrey wrote:Not mine, but a friend once tried to pry a plug out of an outlet with a metal knife and was severely shocked.

I don't think it actually qualifies for a Darwin, because at two years old, it's a sign of good healthy scientific curiosity ratehr than stupidity, but...

When i was two, and we moved house, my mother was screwing the sockets into my bedroom wall while I watched. then she went downstairs, turned the power back on, made a cup of tea then came up to find me unscrewing the live socket...

J · Post by J » 2003-01-09 09:43pm

It looks like bicycles and mountain biking are the leading causes of near death experiences for our board members. I knew I had reason to distrust my Bf when he said "mountain biking's pretty safe, sure you take a few falls every now and then but it's not going to kill you! It's not like swimming where you can easily drown and die." Of course he did kinda have a point since I'd just broken my hand from swimming when he said that.

Ted · Post by **Ted** » 2003-01-09 09:45pm

jmac wrote:Of course he did kinda have a point since I'd just broken my hand from swimming when he said that.

How can you break your hand from swimming?

Did you dive and hit the bottom hard or something?

J · Post by J » 2003-01-09 09:55pm

Ted wrote:How can you break your hand from swimming?

Did you dive and hit the bottom hard or something?

I was trying to out-touch my opponent at a big swim meet and I kinda powered into the end of the pool a bit too hard and broke a couple fingers and cracked a bone in my wrist. I won the swim meet though.

I've also mangled my fingers when I dove into some rocks while swimming in the ocean in Nova Scotia. Thanks to these incidents my BF jokingly claims that mountain biking is safer as he's only broken one bone ever, but on the other hand he's had like 5 concussions from biking.

Ted · Post by **Ted** » 2003-01-09 09:58pm

jmac wrote:
Ted wrote:How can you break your hand from swimming?

Did you dive and hit the bottom hard or something?
I was trying to out-touch my opponent at a big swim meet and I kinda powered into the end of the pool a bit too hard and broke a couple fingers and cracked a bone in my wrist. I won the swim meet though.

I've also mangled my fingers when I dove into some rocks while swimming in the ocean in Nova Scotia. Thanks to these incidents my BF jokingly claims that mountain biking is safer as he's only broken one bone ever, but on the other hand he's had like 5 concussions from biking.

Isn't more than three REALLY bad for your mental health?

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2003-01-09 10:00pm

I don't think it actually qualifies for a Darwin, because at two years old, it's a sign of good healthy scientific curiosity ratehr than stupidity, but...

He was 13 at the time.

ArmorPierce · Post by **ArmorPierce** » 2003-01-09 10:01pm

Since there are already so many posts about doing something stupid on your bike I won't add to it.

Nevermind I will.

Back when I was about 11 me and my friends were infront of this house. They were telling me about this pitbull that jumped over the fence and would start chasing them on their bikes. I of course wanted to see. We went and started just staring at the dog and the dog was barking like crazy. The owner of the dog left in his car and shortly after he left the dog jumped over the pitbull and started coming at us. All my friends but one went the other direction from the one I went and the dog was chasing me in particular. From what I hear, the dog was right next to my friend on his bike but he didn't pay him any attention. I was about a 100 meters away from the dog and I was right next to my friends house who's door was opened so I decided to do something stupid. I pulled my left leg over and was sitting both legs toward the right side of the bike that was going very, very fast and I jumped. Fell on my knees hard, scraped them badly. I was still pumping with adrenalin so (I didn' t feel the pain till later) I got up and was running for the door, looked back and saw that the dog was going back to its house cause the kid who owned the dog was calling it back. So jumping off my bike while it was going at full speed was for nothing.

That ain't the only stupid story I got but I don't feel like posting the other stories right now.

aerius · Post by **aerius** » 2003-01-09 10:06pm

Yup, 5 concussions from biking and 8 or 9 total, and I can tell you that it sure ain't good for me. The good part if there is such a thing is that most of them were pretty mild, and only 2 or 3 of them were bad enough to result in extended hospital stays. Like I was saying it ain't good cause I have memory gaps and a couple other side-effects. I'm still normal and functional though, and I haven't become an axe killer yet, but I have developed an unhealthy fascination with edged weapons.

InnerBrat · Post by **InnerBrat** » 2003-01-10 06:21am

HemlockGrey wrote:
I don't think it actually qualifies for a Darwin, because at two years old, it's a sign of good healthy scientific curiosity ratehr than stupidity, but...
He was 13 at the time.

Please read the rest of my post. I was talking about me...

Robert Treder · Post by **Robert Treder** » 2003-01-10 06:47am

I don't know if I would have gotten a Darwin, but it would have hurt like hell:

When I was about six or seven years old, I went to visit my cousins on their farm in Los Banos (to those of you not from this area, yes, that really is the name of a town). One of my cousins there, who's about a year younger than me, woke up with me at about 6AM to go out in the yard and shoot our air rifles.
This was my favorite part of my visits to their house, because I can't very well use my air rifle where I live; it's too heavily populated. Well, I can, and I have, but it's not responsible.
So anyhow, here we are, all excited, and shooting at targets, birds, etc. Nobody else is awake to monitor us. After shooting at a paper target, I walk up to see where it hit. My cousin fires a BB at the target while I am up inspecting it. I realize that the passing BB makes an awesome whizzing sound...
...and we spend the next half hour taking turns firing at the space right next to each others' heads, from about 20 paces.
Finally, my older cousin woke up and saw what we were doing and stopped us.

But if just one of the many BBs we fired at each other had hit in the eye, or any other part of the face, it would have hurt like a motherfucker, and possibly have caused permanent disfigurement.

Well, at least what I lacked in genius, I made up for with shooting accuracy.

Dargos · Post by **Dargos** » 2003-01-10 07:26am

Well...mine involves car maintenance. I was under my first car.. a junker VW Beetle(I was 16 at the time). The car was jacked up with the emergency jack used to change spare tires. You know the really small flimsy kind. As I was working on the transmission the jack gave out and the car fell. Thank goodness my Jenson toolbox was under the car with me. The cars edge landed on the tool box and it prevented to car from crushing me. It just pinned me and I had to yell for help(it seemed like hours but it was only 5 minutes) Scared the piss out of me(and I got my ass beat from my Dad for scareing the piss out of him too). From then on, until this day I use jackstands while working on my cars.

Tsyroc · Post by **Tsyroc** » 2003-01-10 10:01am

I nearly took a header off the flight deck of an aircraft carrier at night in the middle of the ocean while wearing an incomplete life jacket (no co2 cartridge, no bladder, no strobe light, no die marker). Let's just say that even on idle F-14 engines put out a fair amount of thrust even when you aren't directly behind them.

Dargos · Post by **Dargos** » 2003-01-10 10:33am

Tsyroc wrote:I nearly took a header off the flight deck of an aircraft carrier at night in the middle of the ocean while wearing an incomplete life jacket (no co2 cartridge, no bladder, no strobe light, no die marker). Let's just say that even on idle F-14 engines put out a fair amount of thrust even when you aren't directly behind them.

You fell from the flight deck of a carrier and into ocean, at night, with incomplete survival gear...and lived? That is either a really big sea story or you are one lucky SOB.

salm · Post by **salm** » 2003-01-10 11:07am

Dargos wrote:
Tsyroc wrote:I nearly took a header off the flight deck of an aircraft carrier at night in the middle of the ocean while wearing an incomplete life jacket (no co2 cartridge, no bladder, no strobe light, no die marker). Let's just say that even on idle F-14 engines put out a fair amount of thrust even when you aren't directly behind them.

You fell from the flight deck of a carrier and into ocean, at night, with incomplete survival gear...and lived? That is either a really big sea story or you are one lucky SOB.

i think "nearly" is an important word his comment...

Col. Crackpot · Post by **Col. Crackpot** » 2003-01-10 02:15pm

ok, here's mine. near wher i live there is an abandoned, civil war era naval fortress called fort weatherill. for decades it's been known as a place for teens to hang out/drink/smoke/fuck etc. anyway, about 9 years ago (i was 17 at the time) some friends and i were jumping into the ocean off of the cliff near the fort. (another story for another day) after a while we figured we go inside and check out the fort. there were some boards that were broken and we made our way inside. Old naval fortresses like this used to have massive rotating turrets that sat atop them. the turrets here have long since been removed and the round hole cut in the ceiling boarded up. However , each the internal floors below have an identical round hole cut in them directly below the turret. how do i know this? well during our exploration i stumbled upon one....literally. you see, we had but a tiny pocket flashlight with a dying battery and i didn't see the gaping hole infront of me until it was too late. i took one step forward and stumbled into the hole. now what i didn't know was that this was the bottom floor and the hole was only half a meter deep. had i known that i most likely would not have screamed like a 10 year old girl falling down a bottomless pit. My short blood curdling scream was followed by an 'ooph!...um...nevermind' to this day my friends have never let me forget it.

salm · Post by **salm** » 2003-01-10 02:23pm

i just rememberd a pretty cool one. it wasnt exactly mine but it comes close. a couple of friends, one of them an american exchange student, were playing with softair guns on a size where a new house was built. suddently the cops turned up, all of the guys ran (soft air guns are illegal to carry in public in germany

) but the american guy and me were too close to the cops for an escape so we had to stay there. the softairs looked quite realistic and the policemen of course took their guns out pointed them at us and told us to put the guns down. i did it, but peter (exchange student) didnt understand and was, i guess, too puzzeled to react. he was still holding the damn thing. i had to yell at him several times before he noticed what he was doing wrong. luckily they didnt shoot him.

Col. Crackpot · Post by **Col. Crackpot** » 2003-01-10 03:01pm

salm wrote:i just rememberd a pretty cool one. it wasnt exactly mine but it comes close. a couple of friends, one of them an american exchange student, were playing with softair guns on a size where a new house was built. suddently the cops turned up, all of the guys ran (soft air guns are illegal to carry in public in germany ) but the american guy and me were too close to the cops for an escape so we had to stay there. the softairs looked quite realistic and the policemen of course took their guns out pointed them at us and told us to put the guns down. i did it, but peter (exchange student) didnt understand and was, i guess, too puzzeled to react. he was still holding the damn thing. i had to yell at him several times before he noticed what he was doing wrong. luckily they didnt shoot him.

aren't exchange students fun? lol

salm · Post by **salm** » 2003-01-10 03:05pm

Col. Crackpot wrote:
salm wrote:i just rememberd a pretty cool one. it wasnt exactly mine but it comes close. a couple of friends, one of them an american exchange student, were playing with softair guns on a size where a new house was built. suddently the cops turned up, all of the guys ran (soft air guns are illegal to carry in public in germany ) but the american guy and me were too close to the cops for an escape so we had to stay there. the softairs looked quite realistic and the policemen of course took their guns out pointed them at us and told us to put the guns down. i did it, but peter (exchange student) didnt understand and was, i guess, too puzzeled to react. he was still holding the damn thing. i had to yell at him several times before he noticed what he was doing wrong. luckily they didnt shoot him.
aren't exchange students fun? lol

sure, esspecially if they´re from texas and vote liberal and you´re a german baseball player and he´s an american soccer player. (note that baseball is really small in germany, and soccer was damn small back in 95 in the us as well.). very many odities comming together. LOL.

Korvan · Post by **Korvan** » 2003-01-10 04:49pm

Back when I was 10, I was doing some diving off a floating platform, in about 30 - 40 ft of water. My swim mask slipped off the dock and sank to the bottom. Due to my narrow face, this was the only swim mask I had ever found that fit me perfectly, so I wasn't about to lose it.

Diving down, I found that I couldn't even get close to the bottom. I remembered that peral divers would use stones to assist them, and so I transported several large rocks out to the platform using a small raft.

With the rocks, I was able to reach bottom in no time, but once I let go of the rock, I floated up before I was able to grab the mask. Clearly, I needed a way to use the rock for diving, while keeping my hands free.

I accomplished that with a piece of rope, one end around my waist, the other around the rock. I remember thinking that I didn't want the rope to come loose, so I'd better make the knots good and tight.

Everything seemed to work perfectly. I made the descent easily and retrieved my mask without incident. All that remained was to undo the rope and head back up to surface.

They say that you should learn something new every day. That day I learned what happens to knots when they get wet. The rope had swelled making the already tight knots quite a bit tighter. As I worked frantically on the knots, the mad jester of panic started his capering in my mind.

Fighting off panic, I came to the conclusion that the knot wasn't going to come loose in time. I tried launching myself off the lake bed, but the rock was just to heavy to even consider swimming. I needed a rescue, but who would come to save me? God? Budda? The littlest mermaid?

My savior turned out to be Neil Armstrong. In my mind there appeared a picture of Neil bounding across the Moon's surface with great strides. With a new sense of purpose, I picked up the rock and tried walking. It's weight was enough to keep me upright and I was able to walk, albeit slowly.

I tried to focus all my attention on each step, but soon that mad jester made another appearance. This time he was holding an air guage with a needle well into the red. The urge to breathe was becoming irresistable, but the shore was still many steps away.

I could resist no more. I was just about to take a final watery breath when the trough of a passing wave dipped low enough to pass through my hair. With the last of my strength I leapt towards the surface and just managed to get my mouth above water for an instant.

It was long enough. The feeling of fresh air in my lungs revitalized me and I covered the remaining distance to shore in no time. Once I was safe, I began working on the knot, and five minutes later I got it undone.

Being a dumbass nearly got me killed that day, but it wouldn't be the last time either. Fortunatly my tactical abilities have always been enough to overcome my strategic blunders.

Tsyroc · Post by **Tsyroc** » 2003-01-10 06:56pm

salm wrote:
Dargos wrote:
Tsyroc wrote:I nearly took a header off the flight deck of an aircraft carrier at night in the middle of the ocean while wearing an incomplete life jacket (no co2 cartridge, no bladder, no strobe light, no die marker). Let's just say that even on idle F-14 engines put out a fair amount of thrust even when you aren't directly behind them.

You fell from the flight deck of a carrier and into ocean, at night, with incomplete survival gear...and lived? That is either a really big sea story or you are one lucky SOB.
i think "nearly" is an important word his comment...

That it is.

Considering the side of the ship I almost went off I probably wouldn't have survived to hit the water let alone surviving afterwards.

Personally, I wouldn't even want to jump off the flight deck of a carrier it is frickin' high.

Vertigo1 · Post by **Vertigo1** » 2003-01-10 07:17pm

Damn you guys are funny.

One time I was riding my bike when some friends built a ramp out of some plywood. We decided to go jumping with it. I decided to go first. I was moving as fast as I could on my bike (I was 11 at the time) and right when the back tire hit the ramp, the plywood broke.

I went flying off the ramp and fell elbow-first onto the sidewalk. I think I hit my head too, but I was half-awake at the time an adult got to me. All I got was a strawberry on my elbow and a broken chain on my bike. Luckily it didn't leave a scar.

Post by **The Yosemite Bear** » 2003-01-10 07:33pm

I've done a lot of really stupid things

Currently the stupidest for a good reason, not related to mountin biking (I do have my Evel Kenivel Moments too), Involved a mudslide and some debris. I actually tried to stop a falling car, with my body, and proceeded to travel down a nice little hollywood hill TJ Hooker Style, until comming to rest in a nice convient ditch.

Hyperion · Post by **Hyperion** » 2003-01-10 11:26pm

Tsyroc, one of my friends who was in the Navy jumped off the flight deck of the Carl Vinson, I forget now why he did it (training?) but he actually said it was fun, but scary. I also have no idea if it's true or not, but I am leaning towards it probably happened. Some of his stories were rather cool though. Btw, I'll have to tell you about the guided tour I got of the Carl Vinson, not just from my friend, but from the Air Boss and Captain... But that's a pretty long story.

What I know about jumping into water is that the way you hit is what determines the level of damage you take, something I know firsthand.... Belly flop off the 14 foot diving board at Subbase Bangor's MWR pool (was there with some friends), thank God for my pain control, it was like hitting a brick wall, just *SPLAP!* and I just stayed that way until I got the pain under control (and I saw the lifeguard jump in... obviously since I knew I could move on my own, I didn't want the humiliation of being "rescued") my friends were making cracks about my having a "water line" (every part of me which had hit the water was beet red for about 2 hours, and literally stopped dead about halfway up my body, looked just like the waterline on a ship... Never again will I do that one willingly...