Comments (63)

1. Strangest injury - When I was 14 and my brother was 16, we decided it would be a good idea for me and a friend of mine to ride around sitting on the trunk of the car while my brother drove around an empty parking lot.

   I fell off and broke my wrist. We told my parents we were playing tag. I finally fessed up on my wedding day and we all had a laugh.

   posted by Witty Nickname on 1-4-2008 at 2:35 pm

2. After giving directions to a complete stranger, he wanted a hug in return. Um…nooo thanks, buddy!

   posted by Miggs on 1-4-2008 at 2:39 pm

3. 1. i seem to attract the religious crazies a whole lot, but actually the strangest thing i can remember was said to my dad about me. a creepy old man pointed at me and made an offer to my dad buy his son. my dad has only daughters, i just had an unfortunate short haircut at the time.

   2. i dislocated my shoulder in college playing chinese freeze tag (you know, the tag where you’re frozen with your legs open until somebody crawls through your legs to unfreeze you). my shoulder actually aches when the weather changes quickly, i enjoy telling people that “my old freeze tag shoulder is acting up”

   posted by tami on 1-4-2008 at 2:43 pm

4. I’ve had two outlandish things said to me that are worthy of note.

   1)
   I was driving near Stanford when a bum in a neon orange hard hat and camo cargo pants runs up to my car and tell me “You are a scion, you were sent here to find others of your kind but are doomed to fail like Jesus’s plea for your forgiveness.” Ok, weird.

   I was drinking in a dive bar in Mountain View, you know the type of bar with shag carpeting for wall paper when a very old and skinny man sits down at my table and says “You know, i was in Vietnam… the only good thing about Vietnam was the O.J. and i don’t mean the kind you drink. I’m talking about an Opium Joint buddy. We’d have O.J. every morning for breakfast out there. It was the only thing that made life tolerable.” We spoke for a little while. He was a member of the 101st and had to go to rehab when he got back.

   2)
   Weird injuries?. The weirdest i can remember and the most painfull was when my brother flung a flaming marshmallow off his roasting stick and onto my neck. I was running around in circles like a court jester while he was laughing hysterically yealling “Drop and roll! Drop and roll!”. It gave me second degree burns. I had discoloration from the scars on my neck for about 10 years after that.

   posted by Jared Probst on 1-4-2008 at 2:44 pm

5. Jared….

   That is kind of funny… I have a scar on my face from a camp fire when I was little. My cousin accidentally put the marshmellowy post flaming, now smoldering tip of her marshmellow stick out on my cheek.

   Good times…..

   posted by Dan on 1-4-2008 at 2:50 pm

6. tami- I seem to get the religious folks too. It’s like they seek me out, especially on a certain airline that doesn’t assign seats, so I’m their captive audience for 500 miles or so.

   Having lived in Berzerkley for a time, all manner of strange things have been said to me by the homeless (and often mentally ill) population. One of my favorites was “Jesus sees it, even if you wear a condom.”

   posted by Lebetho on 1-4-2008 at 3:05 pm

7. “I have no idea what may have inspired this intimate admission, but we hadn’t exchanged a single word in the half hour or so we were sitting next to each other prior to his friendly overture. Perhaps it was the sporting event being televised at the time, which involved large, athletic men mindlessly smashing into each other and chasing an erratically bouncing ball around a grid-lined field (three of his concussions were football related).

   It also may have been the truly heroic amount of alcohol he had been consuming since my arrival, or maybe it was simply the comradely familiarity bred by proximity and circumstance.”

   or perhaps it was because he’s injured his brain 9 times…

   :)

   posted by Clotho on 1-4-2008 at 3:06 pm

8. my bachelor party consisted of driving around Richmond Virginia interviewing waitresses about their wedding night. I actually had one return a half hour later with the teddy she wore on her wedding night….

   posted by markschofer on 1-4-2008 at 3:13 pm

9. I once got a tick bite on my +ahem+ manhood following outdoor sex. It produced pain and prodigious swelling of the unpleasant kind.

   posted by MP on 1-4-2008 at 3:13 pm

10. 1. A friend and I were at a bar having a few drinks and winding up a night out. The bartender was incredibly hot. I guess one of the inebriated college kids at the bar noticed us looking (staring? Drooling?) as she walked to the other end of the bar and commented on her looks. My friend and I both agreed that she was attractive and he asked if we would like to see her naked then brought out his cell phone and by golly there she was.

    2. I’m not sure this counts as an injury but … I was at a party quite a few years ago and was snacking on a veggie tray. I snorked back what I thought was a green pepper but turned out to be the hottest jalapeno EVER. I downed about 3 gallons of liquid quenching the flames while a few friends laughed a bit. Of course when you ingest a lot of liquid you usually need to get rid of some too. I went back to the little boys room to take care of that. Ya know what? Not many people wash their hands BEFORE relieving themselves. I was almost out the bathroom door when the jalapeno juice did its magic on a VERY sensitive area. I tried to act normal while walking back out but I guess that didn’t work since my friends all asked what was wrong and when I eventually told them they had a bigger laugh than before. Needless to say I’ve been very careful when coming in contact with warmth enducing substances like liniments ever since.

    posted by John on 1-4-2008 at 3:40 pm

11. The strangest thing anybody ever said to me happened in the wee hours of the morning in Key West. Outside of a bar a guy approached me and asked if I wanted meat and potatoes. I didn’t answer, but got in the car as fast as I could. It was a full 12 hours before I realized he wasn’t talking about dinner.

    I was sitting, my sister was standing and facing me. I kicked her knee backward. It didn’t dislocate or break, but it was painful and she fell down. Her only recourse was to throw a pencil at my face, at which point (pun) it lodged itself in my earflap. I ran to the bathroom to take a look, pencil still lodged in the pina, and then decided to cry.

    posted by Phoebe Walker on 1-4-2008 at 3:44 pm

12. A few months ago my best friend and I went to a bar to pre-game before we met up with some other friends at another bar. No sooner do we get our drinks, a rather bookish fellow walks into the bar, sits down beside us and turns to us and asks, “Can I ask you ladies a question?” “Yes” we reply, he asks “What would you do if you were having an argument with a guy you were dating, and he peed on you?”. I couldn’t contain my laughter and almost spit my drink all over the bar. My friend replied jokingly “You’re telling me my life story”. He then went to on to tell us told her he was sorry, but she still wasn’t talking to him. He then got up abruptly and walked away. This is by FAR the weirdest thing that ever happened to me at a bar, and I’ve dated guys in punk bands…..

    posted by Summer on 1-4-2008 at 4:00 pm

13. Ok…

    I get a lot of random weirdness. It’s the one thing I draw, but among my favorite random things people have said to me were:

    1. A prof in the geology department of my college stopped me in the hall and told me “You are made of stardust. Think about that. You are made of stardust.” Nothing else. Just that. I’d never spoken to him before, had never taken a class with him, and I was in the hall because of a completely un-geology related course (the larger classrooms were in the science building). I’ve thought since that perhaps I was scowling and he said it to jolt me out of it. I honestly don’t remember, but I think back to it when I’m not having such a stellar day, and oddly, it makes me smile.

    2. I get a lot of random people telling me ghost stories and walking away like nothing had happened. My oil change guy, for example. That’s weird and fun….

    Weirdest injury? Heh heh… Umm… weird injuries are what I’m known for.

    ex: I hurt my knee trying to flush a recessed toilet with my foot (I was taking karate at the time, so my knee came up before my foot did). The knee still hurts sometimes.

    I gave myself a concussion on the playground as a kid by sliding across the width of ice on my feet, only to realize by the time I reached the parking lot that I can’t ice skate. (Pow…)

    I fell down on some ice outside a job I had at a pizza joint after work, landing flat on my back, but managing not to spill a drop of the soda I was carrying or upturning my pizza box. (The cabbie was laughing so hard when I got in because: “All I could see was this floating paper cup in my headlights!”) No injury to anything then, except my pride. And my butt. (Still couldn’t ice skate.)

    Thankfully, I tend to get into what appears to be spectacular incidents without hurting myself (badly)– somewhere along the way I’ve managed to learn to roll with it!

    :)

    posted by ACute Angle on 1-4-2008 at 4:03 pm

14. 1.) You know… I can’t recall the strangest. Or even a funny one at the moment.

    2.) When I was at summer camp, a long long time ago… There was this kid who had this nasty scar on his leg. I asked him, “How’d that happen?” He said “My father ran over me with a lawnmower”.

    posted by Stuart on 1-4-2008 at 4:15 pm

15. It was not so much the injury that is weird but the treatment. In college I was working on something with an EXACTo knife. Keep in mind these are surgically sharp. Somehow it slipped and sliced clean off the inside of my index finger. There was blood, lots of blood. I made to the campus health clinic; there they decided to put the piece of finger in a little plastic pee cup filled with saline solution and then wrap my damaged finger in gauze and put a small condom on top to keep the pressure on the open wound.

    Off to the emergency room! After waiting forever, I finally get a consult with 3 doctors. Why 3 I will never know. They check my finger out, take my little cup holding the severed slice and decide it can not be sewed back on. BUT they can take a skin graft from my…wait for it…buttocks.
    I say no thank you and later have it cauterized at another doctor’s office. Had I accept this ground breaking therapy I would have been forever known as ButtFinger. I never got my piece of finger back. I kind of miss it.

    posted by Kristi on 1-4-2008 at 4:23 pm

16. 1. One time a few years ago I was on a city bus going out to a suburban mall (or somewhere like that). I was sitting next to my friend chatting, when I became aware of something that sounded like sniffing. I was really creeped out and turned around to see a very raggedy looking old man smelling my hair (well, he had been). He looked like he wasn’t right in the head and he just smiled and said, “My my you have such a pretty head of hair. How did you get such a pretty head of hair?”
    I smiled awkwardly and turned around and then next thing I know, he reached out and started touching my hair and he said, “Do you brush it every day? I bet you do. I wish I had a brush.”
    He then looked me up and down and yelled out, “Dang do you eat? Someone needs to feed you!” This kind of behavior continued for a couple more minutes before my friend and I jumped up and found other seats. It was absolutely terrifying. And the oddest thing is that the bus route went through the hospital nearby…and he got off at the psych ward. It took me a few months before I could ride the bus again in that city.

    2. I once fell off of the back of a waverunner going at full speed. On the way off, I whacked my thigh on the side. My entire thigh swelled and was black and blue for a month. It was bruised so badly inside that I limped around for a couple of weeks.

    posted by Pam on 1-4-2008 at 4:24 pm

17. I suppose I already mentioned an odd injury, but an old story came to me as I read all these…

    I was in a sub joint waiting in line to buy an Orangina (may I mention if the world ambrosia hadn’t been invented prior to Orangina, there would be no need to create it)and as I got into line it became apparent the person in front of me had no intent to purchase anything.

    A homeless gentleman dressed up pretty much exactly like the mental image of “hobo” was waiting in line, quietly muttering to himself and sort of stutter stepping in place a little. I tried to keep a little distance, but not enough to be awkward and distress the poor fellow more. Unfortunately my ad hoc measurements were faulty and apparently I fell in the range of “agitate further”.

    The sans domiciled turned on me and stated in a slurred dialect “I’ll…. hook ya!…. I will…. I’LL HOOK YA!”. Now I had no idea what he was talking about, so I sort of gave him the old smile and nod… ok crazy guy… just trying to get some Orangina here. However this set him off further… and his now fevered movements gave me the chance to notice his left hand was indeed…. a shiny metal hook.

    The manager most likely saved me a couple of shots at the hospital (sure the hook was shiny.. but still…..) by placating the man with some alms (aka what appeared to be a hastily built cheese sammy) and I walked out the proud owner of some liquid delciousness.

    So yea….. if anyone threatens to “hook ya!” , you may want take that a tad more seriously than I did.

    posted by Dan on 1-4-2008 at 4:37 pm

18. I was working at a scout camp one summer and was sent back to the campsite to light lanterns and on the way back I stopped to use a latrine. On the way out, I stepped in a hole right outside the door and tore the tendons in my ankle. At least I didn’t fall in!

    posted by Laura on 1-4-2008 at 4:38 pm

19. 1. I was sitting in a theatre, watching one of the Star Trek flicks with a group of friends. At some point, they show Rand with her then-red hair. This guy in the seat behind me sees that, and he reaches forward and gently tugs my long auburn hair and says, “Pretty.” I was too freaked to respond.

    2. I’ve had several concussions, too, but the funniest injury was badly breaking my left pinky finger. I was at the local bowling alley, carrying a 10-pound bowling ball in my left hand, as I watched my darling sister lob an eight-pounder down the lane while slipping and falling (she wasn’t hurt) over the foul line. I was laughing so damned hard, I didn’t see the waist-high cinder block wall between the concourse and the gallery, walked into the wall, the ball smashed my pinky. I was still laughing as I yanked it back into place, then we all watched and laughed as it turned amazing shades of blue and purple. I went home afters and immobilized it, then taped it to my left ring finger for added stability. It swelled all the way up almost into my wrist — and I had to take a typing test the next day. (I got the job.)

    We still laugh about it, but I can always tell when the weather is about to change. LOL!

    posted by CardinalRobbins on 1-4-2008 at 4:40 pm

20. 1) I had a friend at a bar this past new years who experienced something rather odd. We were standing at a bar getting ready to get drinks for the count down when some random guy out of nowhere comes and taps my friend on the back and asks him if he likes to make out with guys. Creepy!!

    –Not that there is anything wrong with that! (seinfeld)

    2) My brother split his cheek open running through our yard. He was looking behind him while running and when he turned around to look forward, still running full speed, a t-post slashed his cheek, perfect height.

    In elementary school I was running on the playground to get lined up to go back inside after recess. I was always pretty short, still am. While I was running to get in line to go back inside the next grade up was running outside to begin recess. Well, wouldnt you know it, the biggest kid in the whole elementary decides to run in the same path as I do, only in the opposite direction. He, being quite taller, managed to sink his top front tooth, the big one, right into the top of my head. I didnt get any stitches but there was plenty of blood to freak everyone out. They had to pick pieces of tooth out of the gash. I like to think I got the sympathy vote from the chics

    posted by Anon on 1-4-2008 at 4:46 pm

21. I’m rather famous for stupid accidents. Like the time I broke my foot dancing. During a Renaissance Halloween party. In gypsy garb.
    My friends who brought me to the emergency room (who were wearing, in turn, full Scottish regalia and tunic with tights) set me down, and then walked up to the triage nurse to report my arrival. They came back to sit by me, and my friend Les was smiling and shaking his head.
    “Ok, what happened?” I asked.
    “The triage nurse took one look at me and said, ‘It was so quiet here earlier. Then we had a stabbing, two gunshot wounds — and now the Scottish clans are coming!’”

    We won’t get into the time I stabbed myself in the leg with a boxcutter knife or the time the power drill fell into my foot, spade-bit first.

    posted by lleachie on 1-4-2008 at 5:02 pm

22. I am somewhat notorious for injuries involving legs and feet. I have long speculated that, like the babies who occasionally go home with the wrong parents (switched at birth, I think it’s called), I went home with some other infant’s legs. Been nothing but trouble all my life - I could fill volumes with my injuries; the worst being a spiral radial fracture of the left femur in a motorcycle vs car incident. (Car won the disagreement…) Orthopods put it back together in surgery with a titanium plate, lags and screws. Doc told me I’d have two positive things out of the deal - 1) a really nifty scar to impress the girls (it is - reaches from my kneecap almost to my hip), and 2) I’d be able to tell the weather better than the guy on Channel 13. I can.

    Dumbest injury involved a concussion. Had gone to the local supermarket to pick up the usuals. There was a canopy in front of the market held up by 3″ round steel posts. There was also this remarkably assembled black lady wearing nearly nothing undulating across the parking lot. I was watching her (who wouldn’t?) and ran into one of the posts. Woke up with fireman asking me if I knew the date (I didn’t, even before I clocked myself) and wondering how many fingers he was holding up (two). Wanted to know if I needed to go to the ER and I declined because I knew if I did my wife would find out what happened and finish the job of killing me.

    posted by Doc on 1-4-2008 at 5:31 pm

23. I should point out that the incident with the post, the concussion, and the remarkably constructed woman happened in 1973. The car vs bike with me in the middle was in 1985.

    I don’t ride motorcycles anymore and am always careful to keep at least 1/2 an eye on where I’m walking.

    posted by Doc on 1-4-2008 at 5:36 pm

24. I was shopping late in the afternoon, as I was wandering around a small boutique, I made a comment about how much I enjoyed the music they were playing. That’s all it took for her to begin to pour out to me how the particular song reminded her of a time in her life she’d just as soon forget. How her husband had mentally and physically abused her and her children, how the children hated her for not protecting them, on and on it went in great detail while I could only stand there like a deer caught in the headlights.

    posted by islelass on 1-4-2008 at 5:41 pm

25. Can’t remember any strangers saying weird things to me, but I do have a couple of injuries.

    When I was about 5 my dad was picking me up for the weekend from my moms house. He parked on the far side of the drive way which had a lovely lilac bush next to it. When I opened the door I turned slightly to get in the car and ended up with a twig through my eye. Mind you, not my eye LID but my acutaly EYE. I spent some time in the emergency room, but it was over just enough to miss any parts that would have blinded me.

    While at summer camp I was running to dinner when I slipped and smacked my head on a stone drinking fountain giving myself a black eye. No one ever beleived me about that one!

    posted by Leslie on 1-4-2008 at 5:44 pm

26. After attending a Bulls game, we took the bus back from the old Stadium.

    An older black guy in the back of the bus said (to nobody in particular): “If you give me a dollar, I’ll show you how to please a woman”

    Well, the bus was extremely crowded, but somehow we managed to give this guy a LOT of room. When he didn’t get any takers, finally he said “Just give me a quarter”. That apparently was the price point for this one guy, so he gave him a quarter. The guy leaned back, put it on his forehead and then snaked it into his mouth with his tongue!

    The whole bus went nuts! We couldn’t believe it. An awesome display!

    The bus driver, for some reason, didn’t like it (even though he didn’t see anything, we were in the back of the bus - maybe this guy did this on a regular basis). The bus driver called the cops and much to the displeasure of everyone who saw, the cops took the guy off the bus. There was a LOT of hooting and verbal abuse directed at the cops for this - the guy was AMAZING! He must have had an eight inch long tongue!

    posted by Moon on 1-4-2008 at 5:50 pm

27. 1. When a complete stranger asks me to commit a crime, it always seems very strange to me, if not to them. And I assume that sometimes people say yes or they wouldn’t do it.

    A. I moved across the country in 1985 and a man in Woolworth’s invited me to sell him my traveler’s checks for 10 cents on the dollar and then report them stolen.

    B. A man who wanted to buy my husband’s car invited me, the notary, to sign off on the title without the buyer’s name filled in (because he was an unlicensed dealer who wanted to resell it without the annoying paperwork).

    2. My aunt broke her hip while blowing bubbles in the driveway with her grandson.

    I injured my good leg while in physical therapy for my bad leg. It was a soft tissue injury that took five months to heal, and I had to walk with a cane and use my formerly bad leg as my good leg.

    posted by kittymama on 1-4-2008 at 5:54 pm

28. I was 7 years, curious and interested in how things worked. Being a girl, I didn’t get a bow and arrow like my brother who was a year older. So, I did the next best thing. I got behind the box he was shooting at and told him to shoot. I wanted to see what the arrow looked like when it came toward the box, through the slit. I waited and waited and he kept whinning that he was told never to shoot the arrow at anyone. So, I got tired of waiting and looked over the top of the box - he missed the box - but hit my eye. Luckily it was a blunt flat arrow (actually another bow without the string - we didn’t have much money). It slid over the top of my eye scratching it and kind of hung there, held up by the eye and the bone over the eye. Talk about blood gushing all over the place. My brother’s first words were “please don’t tell mommy”. Even at 7 I knew that was not a very bright idea. He got a beating for shooting an arrow at me - poor guy - but he knew I would have beaten him worse. I wore a patch for awhile - got just a couple of stiches. No lasting damage - I can see fine. Only one doctor mentioned it when I had my eyes checked year later. Obviously, since I didn’t think things through this was not my last injury….. having fun was more interesting than being careful

    posted by Margaret on 1-4-2008 at 6:29 pm

29. I do have one mildly interesting injury.
    In second grade, I was getting lunch. However, the peas on the tray fell and burned my arm. I still have a slight scar and can now say I was beaten by a bunch of peas.

    posted by Casey on 1-4-2008 at 6:38 pm

30. When I was in college my friends and I frequented a sports bar by our house. As a group of girls, in a sports bar, we often received attention…wanted and unwanted.
    On one occasion, one of my friends had just broken up with her boyfriend…and it was an ugly break-up. So we were having a girls night of drinking and supporting!
    A very inebriated man walks towards our table and sits down. Being that my friend was not “guy friendly” that night, we told him that we were just having a girls night and would like to be left alone. He told us that girls did not come to a sports bar unless they wanted to get hit on. He refused to leave our table and asked his friends to come over and join us. At this moment my friend, who is “emotionally spent”, turns on this guy. She says “listen up, we have asked you nicely to leave, now get up go to the other end of the bar and stop talking to us” Although uncomfortable at this point, I am there to support my friend.
    So here comes the weirdest thing ever said to me in a bar. He turns to me and says “does this bitch know who I am”, looking at my friend “do you have any idea of who I am”. He stands up and announces as loud as he can “I AM BATMAN’S BROTHER”. He then stomps off telling anyone who will listen that my friend is a raging whore. His friend stays behind for a second to apologize to my friend. Before the friend walks off I stop him and ask what the whole Batman thing was about. He says “oh he is Michael Keaton’s brother”.

    posted by loo on 1-4-2008 at 7:27 pm

31. After having recently landed in Small Logging Town, Way the Heck Northern Idaho, from Sydney, Australia, I was grabbing a coffee in the only coffee shop in town. The only other customer in the store was waiting his latte(?). Being in northern Idaho, I tried to avoid direct eye contact after giving my order to the barista, but to no avail…. The guy turns to me, smiles, and says “So…are you into knives?”
    I managed to stammer out “Not really, I prefer multi-tools…for….work.”
    He then whips out a catalog of knives from his back pocket and starts running me through a few of his favorite designs. Being northern Idaho, and in a very small community, I did not want to piss him off, so I politely sat through the ensuing conversation which included other gems such as “I used to be in to automatic weapons, but I got bored with them. Re-packing all those magazines takes too long.” He finally left the store. I exchanged a look with the barista, who commented “Yeah. He’s a little lonely….”

    Definitely the creepiest conversation I have ever had.

    Weirdest Injury: Unpacking my bag after a cross county flight, I squatted down too quickly for my stiff muscles to handle, and partially tore my piriformis. In English, I sprained my ass. I am not sure what was worse, the pain or the knowledge that my friends would never let this go.

    posted by Lostoz on 1-4-2008 at 7:57 pm

32. As a former 8th grade teacher, I’ve heard some things from teenagers that I expect many others have not. Not the most bizarre, but the worst thing I ever heard from a student was that her dad was running a child porn site and that she and her sister were the top models. I reported it, but the FBI got involved and it took a long time for this guy to be arrested. Nothing like the system for keeping kids in danger.

    Stupidest Injury:
    Here’s a time when the dumb blonde surfaced. I was about four and was being babysitted by a teenage neighbor (who I thought was ultra cool) and she had the idea of playing “circus.” I would be a flying acrobat, which appealed to me because of a fascination with flying.
    The babysitter layed on her back and brought her knees to her chest, then I sat on her feet. She propelled me through the air as if I’d been shot out of a cannon. It was great until I hit the brick wall and broke my arm.

    posted by smart blonde on 1-4-2008 at 8:09 pm

33. 1. My mom told us once about a man outside a deli who asked her if she needed a sheep, and told her to call him should she change her mind. She passed him again later and he accused her of telling the manager on him, then informed her that “that manager’s name is Shannon.” She later offered him half a sandwich she couldn’t finish. He asked her if it was Italian (would that be a good thing or a bad thing?), and after learning it was #3 on the deli menu, he assured her it was Italian and took it.
    It didn’t happen to me, but it’s still pretty funny.

    2. When I was about five or six, after a church group charity something-or-other, we stopped at a McDonald’s for lunch. After finishing lunch, I went to the playplace. After going down the slide a few times, I decided to try climbing up it. I hit my head against the top (they’re tunnel slides). I sat down with my hand against my head and figured I’d just sit out until it quit throbbing. I took my hand down, saw the blood, then began screaming. Luckily, we had two nurses and a first aid kit with us. I didn’t need stitches, but I’ve got a great scar on my eyebrow now. That’s one of four scars I have, and three are from chicken pox, which is hardly as exciting.

    The other day, I fell all over the place several times, twisted an ankle, and momentarily fuzzed out after jumping up with two very asleep feet. All because Dad thinks “Please Knock” Means “Knock, shout Eileen, then push the door open.” I don’t like when people come into my room without permission, especially when it’s a mess…

    posted by Eileen on 1-4-2008 at 8:48 pm

34. Once while stationed at Ft. Hood in Texas a Captain from another unit took me for a ride in one of the Army tanks. The hatch on top was open but instead of climbing down into the tank I was sitting on top with my feet dangling in the hole. We were cruising along when suddenly the tank crossed a dip and it went down with me following a few seconds later and I cracked my elbow on the hard metal. When he took me to the base hospital emergency room I lied and said that I’d fallen off a supply truck and busted my elbow. If I’d told them how it really happened the Captain would have been in trouble for letting me sit on top of the tank while it was moving.My elbow had a hairline fracture but it was an experience I’ll never forget.

    posted by Melinda on 1-4-2008 at 8:55 pm

35. After Air Force basic training, I spent some time at Keesler AFB in Biloxi, MS for tech training. One night I went to a local bar outside the base with some buddies, and the bouncer at the door — he made John Coffey (from The Green Mile) look small — took a look at my ID and said, in the deepest bass voice you can imagine, “Hey! You an’ me we got the same name! But I don’t think we’re related. Your great great great grandaddy maybe owned my great great great grandaddy… But I don’t wanna talk about that!”

    My family came from the northeast, so I don’t think that was the case, but all I could do was look up at him (and I’m 6′2″) and nod. He caught up with me later on; I bought him a beer, and we had a nice chat.

    posted by Dave on 1-4-2008 at 11:20 pm

36. once, while doing laundry at another apartment’s laundry mat (hey, it was cheaper?), i was quietly pondering life, graduating college, impending breakups, etc, in my journal, when some middle aged woman decides to tell me how she’s been estranged from her mother for the past 30 years and they’ve just gotten back in touch the day before and gosh, they’re about to meet again that day. wow…. thanks for all that.
    once at a bar (lots of my stories start like this), some guy walks up to my friends and i (in a really bad bright green windbreaker, no less) and proceeds to ask my friend if she wants to dance…then tells us he got shot by a friend. In the chest. Points at the scar. Tells us the entire story. Did we ask? No. Oh, and he pointed at my friend Rusty (who is a good-sized fella) and matter-of-factly says ‘He’s a good sized one’. Thanks, Captain Obvious.

    Oh, and word of the wise to all the young ladies out there: If you’re ever flying alone, do not sit at the airport bar by yourself. Every man in there will want to tell you his life story, why he’s flying, how all he owns is that suitcase, about his divorce, how he likes to date younger ladies, etc…. DO NOT MAKE EYE CONTACT!

    posted by Emily on 1-4-2008 at 11:39 pm

37. Once my husband was wearing a KISS t-shirt when were eating lunch at Morrison’s Cafeteria and some pyscho pointed to his shirt and told him he was going to hell.

    posted by kani on 1-4-2008 at 11:39 pm

38. A man once proposed marriage to me outside of a Walgreens. It might have been romantic had I met him previous to the incident.

    posted by Jill on 1-4-2008 at 11:43 pm

39. 1. I was at work at the public library and an old woman who spoke very little English asked me a question about an activity we were advertising. I answered her question, and she proceeded to thank me and tell me I was a pretty lady. Then she asked me if I was married. I said, “No,” and she told me, “You get married pretty lady!” She then told me her life story, which I didn’t understand very much because of her limited English. She continued for about 5 to 10 minutes, all the while encouraging me with, “You get married pretty lady!” Very strange.

    I won’t even go into all the crazies that come into the pharmacy where I now work.

    2. When I was about 3 1/2 I was jumping on my bed with my younger brother. Somehow while coming down I missed the bed and my face ended up hitting the bedpost. I ended up with a permanent scar on my right cheek. Luckily for me it looks like a dimple. I don’t think I ever jumped on my bed again, and to this day I don’t like trampolines.

    posted by Janel on 1-5-2008 at 12:22 am

40. It’s 3am at a 24-hour restaurant, and I’m with a group of friends. We’ve been tabletop gaming for hours, and we took our game to the restaurant to refuel while in the middle of a tavern scene. A large, balding man in a leather coat adjacent to our packed table suddenly turns around, and says, “did you know there’s a gene for alcoholism!?”

    All eight of us shut up like a switch had been flicked.

    When I was six or so, I took the wooden coat hanger pole out of my closet (all the clothes wound up dumped on the floor, of course), and went out into the yard and swung it around while I pretended to be Donatello from the Ninja Turtles. I smashed it through my lip so badly that my lip almost fell off. Needless to say, I had to go get stitches. Add that to the time my lip got caught in a swing chain (those little plastic protectors do nothing!) and the time I fell off my trike while drinking from a bottle.

    I still like the time when I was in grade four and my mom interrupted my reading to get me to go play with some kids across the street, and one wound up taking me aside and punching me in the eye for no reason. That sure built my social skills. It was swollen and purple for days.

    posted by Marri on 1-5-2008 at 1:19 am

41. My daughter was in Dublin with her Girl Scout trooop and was trying to find the Guinness Brewery - to take a tour (normal Girl Scout stuff…). A short old man walked up and told them to take the #9 bus for 6 stops (they didn’t ask him for directions). The troop got on the number 9 bus, started to get off at what they thought was the 6th stop, and the same old man appeared and blocked them from getting off the bus. He told them they needed to go one more stop. My daughter is totally positive he was a leprechaun.

    posted by Luther on 1-5-2008 at 1:20 am

42. 1) While my husband and I were dating, we went to a very crowded Taco Bell for lunch (I know how romantic). We ended up getting a small two seater table. You know the type, one side is a single chair and the other connects to other tables in a long bench. Anyway, we sat down next to a very “rotund” man, sitting alone with about a dozen tacos lying on the table in front of him. His size being what it was, there was very little room between him and me since the tables are so close together. As my husband and I were carrying on a conversation, the man bellows “I’m trying to EAT!!!” and stares us down with a piece of lettuce hanging from his mouth and a little bit of the crazies in his eyes. Needless to say we picked up our tray and moved away immediately, even though the table we sat down at adn’t been cleaned yet.

    2)I’m lucky that I’ve never been seriously hurt in my life (knock on wood). The worst injury I’ve had to date was inflicted by my oldest sister while she was babysitting me. I was told to go to my room for something crazy because my sister liked the power, and I naturally refused. Well she being bigger than me was able to pick me up and throw me into the room. I do mean throw, I had some serious air time. Well I landed on my face and got a wicked carpet burn from chin to forehead. The worst part? She convinced me to lie about it to my mom!

    posted by Tricia on 1-5-2008 at 2:40 am

43. 1) Some guy walked up to me at a house party, plunked himself down next to me on the couch, and said, “So, what are you?” I blinked and responded that I was an earthling. He said, “No, I mean you’re obviously not white.” COulda fooled me, I thought…

    2) My weirdest injury involved getting four teeth knocked out in a jazz dance class. It was Halloween, and my teacher decided to run us through the Thriller routine. You remember the part where everybody does a 360 and then throws out their clenched fists? Apparently I drifted a little during the 360, and the girl next to me punched my teeth out. It was weeks before she could look at me again. I looked great for the Halloween party that night though.

    posted by Denise on 1-5-2008 at 3:34 am

44. 1. Halloween, about three years ago. My friends and I decided to go downtown and see what it was all about, since that’s the scene. After about an hour, we decided we were bored with that and slipped away from the crowds, going to nice little bar out of the way that we frequented on occasion.

    I was dressed as a zombie - the whole nine yards. Rotting flesh, exposed bone, etc. One of my friends does movie makeup here in Austin, so she hooked me up with the ensemble.

    A guy was sitting at the bar, a complete stereotypical bar fly with a glass of whiskey and one of those old tweed jackets with the patches on the elbows. He smiled at me, looking me up and down with his red-bleary eyes, the scruff of hair on his chin just catching the light over the bar. Raising his glass in my direction, he proclaimed,

    “Even that ghoulish makeup can’t hide your true beauty.”

    Oy. I wasn’t sure if I should be flattered or scared.

    I’ll have to think about the injury for a bit. I’ve had so many…

    posted by Stephanie on 1-5-2008 at 6:09 am

45. I don’t frequent bars, but almost every week when I go grocery shopping I have strangers, usually little old ladies, come up to me and start random conversations about odd and personal (sad) things, like what medications they are on, why they can buy only catfood and no people food, etc. One lady saw me reading the label on a can of soup and started a conversation about how the Chinese government is taking over the world. I politely listened but after 15 minutes of her ranting I made every imaginable excuse to move on to the next aisle without her.

    Weird injury: Didn’t happen to me, but to one of my campers when I was a camp counselor. We were at a campfire cookout and one of the girls accidentally got a carrot stick in her eye. Took her to the hospital and she was okay, but it could have had a very tragic outcome. Insurance companies must love this stuff.

    posted by Cyndi on 1-5-2008 at 8:06 am

46. ok wierd stuff said, or overheard i should say. one of the bums who hung out on our block at work would talk to the parking meters. it took a co-workers boyfriend overhearing him to decipher what he was saying. aparrently it was the beginning equation for a breeder reactor. kinda very freaky.

    weird injury:
    suffering through it rght now. al i can figure is that i sneezed wrong over thanksgiving. since then, my hip and low back began to hurt. i think i pinched my sciatic nerve. i’m going to a spine and pain specialist soon to get steroids directly injeced into the area. yeah, i’m volunteering for a giant needle full of really thick goop to be injected into my spine. i’m in a LOT of pain.

    posted by mri on 1-5-2008 at 8:46 am

47. Once while working a woman asked me if we had found any sunglasses. We had an entire box of sunglasses in the back so I asked her to describe them. She then said “i didn’t lose any, I just want some” and I said “Well, its a lost and found so you have to lose one to get them” and she said “EFFING ELTON JOHN THE FAG” and walked out . apparently Sunglasses = Elton John’s homosexuality?

    posted by Sarakenobi on 1-5-2008 at 11:11 am

48. I was at a bar and a Billy Squier song came on the jukebox (It was THAT kind of bar). The two guys sitting next to me started trying to figure out who it was and I let them argue about it for a bit before I butted in with the answer.

    Guy #1 then struck up a convo with me about music and it came up that U2 is my favorite band. The whole time we were talking, I was thinking that this guy looked like Bono and as my luck would have it, he wasn’t actually Bono but he was in a U2 tribute band *as* Bono. It was possibly the strangest experience I’ve ever had in a bar, and if I ever get to meet the real Bono, I’m sure I’ll freak right out and die but not before telling him this story.

    posted by Rachel on 1-5-2008 at 11:18 am

49. Okay, not in a bar but pretty weird. I was talking to an older guy on the telephone (explaining what “the Company” needed to process his insurance claim). He got very angry and told me “if you’re mother had wheels, she’d be a streetcar”. Huh??? Never could figure out what he meant.

    Injuries? Many years ago my family lived in a house where the heating system consisted of cast-iron grates set in the floor. The 3-foot by 3-foot grate in the dining room floor was directly above the furnace. We had layered door-screening under over the opening to prevent small toys falling in. My mother decided to clean the screening. Just she & I were in the house. It took a lot of strengh to lift the grate on to one edge. She said she’d balance the grate (it was now vertical) while I cleared the screening. Yep, you guessed it. I fell into the furance pipe. Got one leg stuck and sprained my hip and shoulder. Now, I’m stuck in a furance pipe, can’t get out, no-one in the house except my wildly-laughing mother who can’t let go of the grate to help me and, anyway, she’s letting the grate wobble because she’s laughing so hard. Fortunately for me, my brothers arrived home about then. And, most fortunately, it was summertime.

    posted by Catherine on 1-5-2008 at 1:53 pm

50. This happened to me but not on the receiving side of the injury, I was the EMT who responded to the call. It comes under the heading of:

    Stupidest Injury:

    posted by Owen on 1-5-2008 at 2:59 pm

51. Oops, wrong key!

    Christmas day: Nighttime, got a call for a man with a possible broken shoulder. When we got there the teenager was sitting inside at his dining room table holding his right arm. Part of the process to help identify the type and extent of the injury is to ask: “How did this happen?” His reply was that the family received a new snowmobile for Christmas. (Fell off striking shoulder on ground….but) he continued….we were pulling each other behind it on a rope and (oh no!) I ran right into the horse shoe pit stake full speed. And I said aloud, “That was stupid, well thought out.”

    posted by Owen on 1-5-2008 at 3:07 pm

52. I’m generally a freak magnet, but as I don’t ride the bus anymore, it’s all a blur.

    Freaky injury? Well, mine is a case of deja-ooooooo. I broke my foot tripping on a bump in the road and went to Emerg. Almost one year to the day, I broke the same damn foot falling off my motorcycle. This time I heard it snap, and got fiancee to drive me to Emerg, where the triage didn’t believe me. X-ray time, and guess who gently puts an arm around my shoulder and says: “Marion, I’m afraid you’ve broken your foot again.”? The same Emerg oncall doctor as the year before!

    posted by Marion on 1-5-2008 at 11:53 pm

53. 1. The strangest thing said was from a guy who was hitting on me,
    ” Wow you look really hot… blah blah blah” Ending the conversation he said “Did you know I always thought your sister was hot?”

    2. I was out with my friends for a going away drink-off. When “John,” after way too many Long-Islands, was dancing with me fell in the middle of a really small dance floor. Everyone was laughing, but noticed that a part of the bass drum was smashed under his body. He woke up the next day with scratches and a nice bruise of a drum ring on his back.

    posted by Miss Nae on 1-6-2008 at 4:30 am

54. The strangest, random comment ever made to me was when I was travelling in Paris. Well, it was not so much a comment as it was shameless flirtation. I was thirteen, my siblings all younger, and my parents had stopped us all to sit down and eat at this little cafe. The waiter (who obviously knew no English, but that was fine) spoke with my mother. However, he kept glancing over at me and laughing. Keep in mind, this fellow was about forty. I was a little stupefied, so I just took to examining my menu. My dad reached over and tapped me on the shoulder. He whispered, “The waiter has something to tell you.” I looked up, and the waiter–wait for it–reached across the table and tweaked my nose. He laughed hilariously, and skipped off to go get our orders. I was somewhere between flattered and horrified.

    posted by Allison on 1-6-2008 at 12:06 pm

55. I’ve had many notable injuries in my lifetime. All induced by my siblings. Were such a loving family. Twice I’ve had my head split open by flying objects that (according to them) were not intened for me. But the most notable, was the one that caused the most lasting damage. When I was 12 My brother, for some god-forsaken reason, decided I deseved a slap on the back of the head. Now being a true retalitarian, (I just made up that word!!,)I immediately turned on the spot to deal him a blow from which he would never recover. When, I was stopped by a painfull stab to my eye. See, I had forgotten that he happend to be standing next to a T.V. that was sitting on the floor, and when I turned so abruptly one of the rabbit ears from the anttena lodged itself behind my eyelid. I cannot describe to you how painful this is. What made it worse, was that I could not pull it out, because, when it hit my eyeball the lid closed around the asprin-shaped end and anyone who has something like that stuck in they’re eye will tell that opening your eyes is hard. My mother came to my rescue and ,eventually, I was removed from the T.V. I wear glasses ,and, I am legally blind to this day. My brother was eventually ambushed and beaten for his part in this fiasco and now I feel a whole lot better. Get well soon Richard. I told you I’d never forget.

    posted by Gilbert on 1-6-2008 at 1:38 pm

56. We had a guy on our rowing team in HS who said some crazy stuff:

    Coach Alex come up in his boat while we are stopped and asks if we have any questions, James raises his hand and says “do we scare the fish when we row?”…

    James’s favorite joke was: “whats the difference between a dog?”….after several seconds and finally realizing that he is actually done talking we get the punchlline: “one ear stands up and the other one does”

    WTF

    My sister in law is the subject of my crazy injury. We were at a managers meeting for a fireworks company and we are watching the fireworks get shot off for us. Alcohol is involved. 45 minutes into the show (and its slow, shoot one off, tell us about it, shoot the next one…) is the grande finale where they light everything off at once.
    Suddenly a green fireball flies by my head, and luckily I dodge it. Fearing that it has entered the van I chase after it with the intent of saving the beer. Once the beer is secure I notice my S-i-L holding her neck in a choking charade position. Yes it hit her in the neck, the best part is my brother and I, along with the rest of the crew, went back to his house to drink beer and play pool while my mother took Deb to the ER. My bro is never allowed to live that down, but at least the scar is fading…

    posted by Patrick on 1-6-2008 at 1:52 pm

57. Once when I was in college, as I was walking into an off-campus bar, the bouncer asked me (unprovoked): if I slept with a guy, would I make him pancakes in the morning? This devolved into a long discussion regarding the quality of the interaction, etc. with the general consensus being no. I think he was hurt by the reality check, but Pancakes (as I called him) and I were buddies for the rest of my time at college.

    posted by Jess on 1-7-2008 at 9:01 am

58. When introduced to people, I used to shake their hand and say with a complete straight face, “I’m wearing new underwear.” I then walked away. I don’t do that any more because I don’t wear underwear now.

    posted by Dave on 1-7-2008 at 10:33 am

59. Strangest bar incident…when I was freshly 21, I was at a small bar where my friend was the bartender. It was fairly quiet, until this middle-aged guy starts hitting on me (for some reason, I always attract the skeezy old man). Anyway, after I turned him down, he tried to set me up with his 17-year-old son.

    posted by Jaime on 1-7-2008 at 2:12 pm

60. I just thought of another one, but it was said to a co-worker.

    I worked for a state senator a while back. We had a long list of “crazies”, people whose numbers you knew not to pick up when they came across the ID. Or, you told the new guy to answer, which is what happened in this case.

    Far too much to write here, but the gist is that when the Earth is knocked off of its axis and we’re thrown sideways, we better be as far north in Canada as possible. No idea why the Earth is knocked off the axis, but now you’ve all been warned.

    posted by Jaime on 1-7-2008 at 2:17 pm

61. Standing in a bar on St. Patricks day about ten years ago enjoying myself with a few friends when out of the blue this huge guy proceeds to shove me in the back and start shouting “I bet your mother is real proud!” over and over. I had no idea what he was talking about so I merely replied “Yes, yes she is” Apparently this pissed him off even more so he conitinued to rant on about my mother being proud. As he walked away his skeevy little friend kept saying to me, “You don’t want to mess with him”. It still confuses me to this day what set this guy off.

    Injuries: Quite a few in the last few years. I suppose the weirdest is breaking my foot by jumping off the couch to cheer during a Chiefs game. I wasn’t standing on the couch, just sitting like normal and I jumped up and landed funny I guess. The pain was instant and caused me to then fall down hard on my knee which cracked my patella. When I went to the ER the next day (yes, I waited a day) the ER doctor kept asking how much I had to drink the previous day. The answer: A lot.

    posted by Ralph on 1-7-2008 at 3:54 pm

62. 1. My husband works in a grocery store. One day a fellow dressed in red sweats and baseball cap came up to him and said, “I am a prophet sent by God. I do not claim to be Jesus, just a messenger from God. In 25 years, you will be outcast from society and will curse my name because I told you this.” My husband looked at him, said thank you, and told him to have a nice day.

    I attract a lot of the 60-70 year old, dirty old man types. Working in a bank, I had a customer walk up and comment that he liked my necklace. It was a charm that looked like a 1961 Impala and was on a thing gold chain. Yeah, I was wearing a v-neck shirt, and the car was hanging from its rear bumper. He tells me, “I just picture myself driving that little car right in to the canyon!” I never could quite look that fellow in the eye after that. . .

    2. My husband asked me to take him to the emergency room a few months ago. He said he had been walking through work and, using his thumb and middle finger, flicked his finger at a paper sign that had a fly on it. He was then brought to his knees by the pain that followed. Somehow, with a flick of the finger, he had torn the tendons in his hand loose. He still cannot make a fist without losing control of his middle finger.

    I’ve had a few fun injuries. The most fun was when my dad was building a screened-in porch on the back of our house. I was a daddy’s girl (about 7 years old) and was sitting under the porch where he was working(it was built off the second story). A 2×8 came loose and my dad yelled, “Get out of the way!” Well, I didn’t somersault out of the way, but turned to look and said, “Huh?” I caught a bracket attached to a 2×8 with my head, about an inch above my temple. I remember walking around outside before they took me to the hospital, touching the wound, saying, “There’s a hole in my head!”

    posted by Pearl on 1-8-2008 at 1:55 pm

63. Okay, so I have a couple more about creepy older guys that have said rather inappropriate things::

    When I worked at my local neighborhood Blockbuster Video, we had a couple of guys come in that my manager and I suspected of shoplifting. I very blatantly followed the guys around, I never liked to play “subtle security”, and one of them eventually asked me if we carried a certain movie. He just so happened to be standing directly in front of the title in question. I said, “It’s right here” and knealt down to the bottom shelf to pick it up. As I stood up, he put his arm around my waist and leaned in for a kiss. I leaned away with a polite, “Um, no!” He asked if he scared me and then, get this, TRIES AGAIN! I said,”Dude, I am MARRIED!” He says to tell my husband that I almost got kissed by a professional kickboxer, and then pulls up his shirt to show me his scars. From then on my 6′4″ 260lb manager would act as my bodyguard whenever this guy came in. When I told my husband, he really didn’t care that he was a kickboxer . . .

    Then, working in the bank, we had a rather elderly man that, when he walked, took about 40 steps a second but never moved, like a cartoon baby dear on ice. He would come in almost every day and ask us to make copies of some stuff he had written. I would say sure and make his copies. He told me that everything that he wrote down would come true. I asked him to jot me down a raise, and he just looked at me real confused like. Then he told me that his son was in prison for murder, but not to worry, because he was getting out soon. Yay!

    posted by Pearl on 1-8-2008 at 2:17 pm

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