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Re: Darwin award

Posted: Sat May 22, 2010 7:24 pm
by Desertroad
I don't want to be seen as too male-centric here.

Mrs O - fess up! - what's the most outrageous story from your tender years?

Desertroad

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Sat May 22, 2010 11:51 pm
by Mrs.Oroblanco
Uh, oh - that's a really tough one to answer. I think I was the person (one of them, anyway), who went that one step too far - but, in my defense (I think), I didn't think it was too far before I did it.

For stupid things, after my dad telling me specifically, DO NOT TOUCH THAT AX - I JUST SHARPENED IT. Well, we know what THAT means - that means "I'll just try it on this little tree now that he's gone". Long story short, I cut my big toe off.
(honestly, that was the only time in my life I have seen my mother faint). But, I wasn't planning to do that :oops:

Most things I got away with - like the time I was absolutely sure that if I tied my mother's big towel to my shoulders, I could definitely jump off the house and be like Superman - uh, ya can't. I just laid on the ground until I could breath again, and never told my parents.

I DID have to tell them when I went sleigh riding in the neighbors stone quarry. It was that real hard-crusted snow - perfect for sliding. Had one of those flexible pieces of plastic they called sleds. The stone quarry was an old one, all worked out - but, I hit a bump and it turned me around and off to the side, to be stopped by one big stone sticking up that looked like a headstone - I broke 3 vertabrae. (no, my mother did not faint), though I spent 3-1/2 months in the hospital :roll: From two days after Christmas until Easter Sunday in April.

We had a big sand and gravel operation up the road from where we lived, and one of our favorite things to do was to climb to the top, run, and jump off. (hey, sand is soft), and whoever went the furthest got "treated" after school for a week by everyone else. I always lost (I was smaller than all the other kids - I was the only girl - all my neighbors were boys), so I was determined to get it at least once. Well, I backed up even further than every time before, ran as hard as I could to the end and jumped off. And, off I went, all right - my jumping off point gave way just a half a second before I hurled myself off the "cliff", which made me pitch forward, and scrambling on the way down (in the air), to stretch my legs forward, I landed not too gracefully and wrenched my kneecap - the doc had to pop it back in. (he said its not supposed to be on the inside of my leg - he was picky.

Horses were one of my downfalls - I loved them, and my parents bought me one. He was the nastiest SOB - what a way to learn to ride. He reared, he kicked, he bit, he would run away with me - but, put that SOB into a ring, and you would think he was the most perfect horse in the world. I had an entire wall of ribbons - from show to barrel racing - but get him out of that show ring, and I could have made him into dog food. Unfortunately for my parents (and me), after having him, I wasn't afraid to get on anything - and frequently did - which is how I broke my left knee. Horse bucked, then fell, my foot stayed in the stirrup and I went with him - and when he got up, I also went with him. Along with the broken knee, I had a few stitches in my head.

As the song says - These are a few of the things I've done. That is why I say, "if I would have known I would live this long, I would have taken better care of myself" :lol:

Really, I guess I made it a habit to go one step too far. My parents hated my favorite statement: "I THINK I HURT MYSELF". It takes some pre-thought and planning to do some of the stuff I've done without getting hurt.

That isn't even 1/2 of my childhood up to 14. It got worse as I got older (though I did manage to stay out of the hospital after 14 - at least for any extended stays ;) .

Yep, I really am not sure the Darwin theory works. One of my sons (my youngest, now 38) has had the same passion for getting himself hurt, and I spent years trying to explain to him to think before he acts. Now THAT was the pot calling the kettle black because he knows the things his mother did. :lol:

Beth (Mrs. O)

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Sun May 23, 2010 8:20 am
by Vulture
Mrs O,
Some of those stories bring back some painful memories, especially when I put my feet on the ground in the AM and the knees and hip just do not want to work properly.

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Sun May 23, 2010 7:33 pm
by Desertroad
I am sitting here laughing so hard ! ! :lol:

You got me beat, Mrs. O - I'm a city kid and never had any thing horse in my youth.

Maybe I'll live through the week and have something to try and match you with...

Desertroad

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Sun May 23, 2010 9:26 pm
by Mrs.Oroblanco
Vulture,

I know exactly what you mean!!! Its not too bad after I get up, but, it takes 10 minutes after I wake up to actually GET up!! :lol: :lol: :lol: I get my left knee operated on every 10 years, give or take, because that darned kneecap break makes deposits that mess with the old tendons, etc. They do it orthroscopically, and sand off those deposits, and I'm good to go for another 10 years. (it helps the pain tremendously, like night and day). I wish I had it done the first time about 10 years before I did. I suffered with knee pain for nothing, and it only takes about 5 days to heal up.

Desertroad,

:lol: Unfortunately - (hanging my head), those things were just the tip of the iceberg that I call my "younger days". :roll:

Beth (Mrs.O)

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Fri May 28, 2010 7:34 am
by Dan
Mrs O, I'd say you've got most of us beat, me included. I have to agree with you that the Darwin thing doesn't always work. Growing up, my buddy's parents' property had a cornfield behind it. You'd be amazed what three 9-year-olds can do with a cornfield. We used to hide in the ditch at the edge when the farmer, Mr Foster, was disking his field. When he made the turn at our end, we'd run after the disker, dive out and grab a hook hanging off the back, and drag on our bellies behind it for hundreds of yards. We used to get into my buddy's dad's black powder stash and make pipe cannons to shoot spent CO2 cartridges into the cornfield. We used to have bb gun fights in the still-standing corn, playing king of the hill for control of the high point in that 250-acre field. We used to blow off M-80's all over the neighborhood, and throw rocks at the older kids from above the street where they walked nearly every day looking for trouble, then ditch them because we knew the woods much better than they did. We used to throw snowballs at cars going by on the highway, throw acorns at cars driving by in the summer and fall, play with snakes and all sorts of wild animals that bite (or worse), and navigate the local creeks with 4 foot X 4 foot cement tubs and poles. We could have drowned, and no one would have found us for months. We got miles from the house on foot, during freezing weather in 2 feet of snow, where we could have frozen to death. And we used to build tree forts 15 feet or more off the ground, some of them pretty flimsy for three or four kids. We did some stuff, unsupervised, that should have cost some of us real injury or death. And our parents didn't know about most of it until years later.

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Sun May 30, 2010 10:21 pm
by Mrs.Oroblanco
:lol: :lol:

You have to watch those cornfields, though, too. A friend of mine managed (and I really don't know how, to this day), got a cornstalk right through his hand. I know he fell while we were running (corn had already been picked and the stalks were dry), and, there must of been one sticking up where he fell, because it went right through his hand. He spent the rest of his (our) childhood telling everyone he got shot in the hand - hmmmpffff. Guess it sounded better than "I fell on a cornstalk".

:lol: :lol: :lol:

I guess the opposite of the Darwin theory is what my grandmother used to say about making you tough. (I think it was a takeoff of that saying "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger"????

Beth (Mrs.O)

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Wed Jun 02, 2010 2:40 pm
by rppp01a
As communication mediums speed the time in which we hear and learn about accidents- no matter how rare they are- be prepared to be peppered with even more fears of going outside without full body armor.

Plus, media outlets (note: I don't say journalism outlets) are about ratings. They show what gets our attention. Mundane news and media bits are boring- but show the one kid that takes his dirt bike and loses control and flies over a bridge to his death and you have it on the news cycle until the next strange thing that happens.

Nothing has changed, except the perceptions of what is and isn't safe. Our laws are beginning to reflect this, sadly.

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Thu Jun 03, 2010 1:47 am
by Mrs.Oroblanco
:lol:

I gotta say - and its not really funny - but there have been a few incidents in my lifetime where something has happened (an accident) that I have either witnessed personally, or was a part of - and when you hear about it on the news media, or in the newspaper - you cannot even recognize it.

As the best example that I can think of is, Roy's dad was killed. He was run off the road and went over the side, into the creek (this was in March, high water, really cold). He managed to get out of his vehicle, and make it to the roof of the car. Someone stopped, but, for some very strange reason, said he thought Hank (my father-in-law) was fishing or something - and he left. The next morning, they found his body - he had drowned.

When the news got to reporting the event, they said he missed the bridge and went off a 1000 foot cliff. The truth was, he went down a 30 foot embankment and they found his body 1000 feet downstream. I can understand maybe one report being incorrect - but - considering there were many news people there, you'd think at least ONE of them would have gotten the story correct. Maybe one of them could have read the police report? Or maybe one of them, while they were standing by the bridge, taking pictures, would have realized there was no cliff - just a cornfield? And, maybe just ONE of the reporters who were there when Hanks body was taken from the creek would have noticed how far away from the car, his body was?

It is amazing to me - total and utter incompetence.

Beth (Mrs.O)

Re: Darwin award

Posted: Thu Jun 03, 2010 3:41 am
by Sandman
Dan certainly has me beat in the Darwin department.

I earned the privilege of owning my first shotgun at age 12 by demonstrating responsibility in owning a BB gun. A BB gun fight was taboo ( but the crows were deemed acceptable) My Dad and I spent some real quality time hunting together for cottontail and quail in areas that are now all built out. One area that was really good in days gone by is where the visitor center for Lake Perris stands and I recall almost stepping on a buzz tail there as daylight faded into dusk.

Growing up near the back fence of the Sherman Indian school provided me with some rowdy friends back in my early teens. The train tracks ran through the orange groves and we had a wide assortment of projectiles to throw. The oranges ranged from green and hard to the moldy ones that had fallen and left to rot. Those made a great splat when they hit and the moldy green substance had just the right amount of slime. We saved the rocks for the carloads of Detroit's finest coming in from the east on the Santa Fe line and the only time we ran was when the railroad and local police teamed up and tried their best to nail us.The heat was on! (throwing rocks at someone and then running away was considered chicken $h1+) Shortly thereafter, we moved our base of operations down to the jungles of the Santa Ana river with it's bamboo thickets and willows.

My first experience with the hospitality of the crossbar hotel was one summer evening in Newport Beach when I was 14. The arresting officer mistakenly thought I was drunk in public and creating a nuisance but honestly, I dont remember any of that. I do remember having a wicked case of the spins followed shortly thereafter by heaving my lunch, dinner and excess libations all over the back of his police car. I remember laying on the cool cement floor of the holding cell until my Dad showed up to drag my sorry drunken hide home. I really should have stayed longer under the protection of police custody but them cops knew that payback was coming when they saw how pi$$ed off dad was.

The whole experience taught me well that alcohol and police usually means trouble and a few years later I found myself in a "little situation". I was out on my own when I was 16 years old traveling around with my thumb in the breeze. Hitchhiking and hopping freight trains, I met quite a few other rowdy friends and sometime just after I turned 18, I was living in Blue River, Oregon..............