Not Quite the Darwin Awards

No, I didn't almost kill myself, but I did do something stupid. I'm currently nursing a sprained wrist which, thankfully, is not my writing hand so is just more annoying than anything. No, I didn't fall or hit it on something. The injury is the result of something much more sinister: trying to open a bottle. I know. You can quit laughing now. Many of us are embarrassed by our stupidity from time to time, especially when it results in bodily harm. Unfortunately, I've had a great many of these incidents.

Take, for example, the way I damaged my other wrist. The summer before highschool I decided to learn how to ride a 4-wheeler. I got good at it over the course of a day, but was explicitly told not to ride when my mom and her friend went to the store. Of course, I didn't listen. The tract of land we were on had a nice sized wood, which our path ran through. I had navigated the path probably a hundred times that day. The problem was not the woods; it was the fact that the sun was quickly setting, making my vision that much worse. Riding through the woods on that path, in 5th gear, I missed a turn and ran head on into a tree. This wouldn't have been so bad, but I had another kid on the back who weighed probably twice what I did, and both our weights landed directly on top of my wrist. I was lucky I didn't break it, but it did result in me having to wear a brace for the next 8 weeks and finally requiring surgery 6 years later. I now have a nice little scar to show my boys anytime they think about doing something stupid, because, let's be honest, scars are the only thing boys respond to sometimes.

I have many such scars. There's the one on my right index finger where I dropped a glass cake plate and sliced my finger open.

Or the time that my oldest broke a mason jar on the back porch, and when I didn't realize I had a large piece of glass jutting out of the bottom of my shoe, I sliced my ankle open. I probably should have gone for stitches, but I was on my way to the lake. (That particular trip I nearly killed my family, but fortunately didn't end in bodily harm. I learned not to drive 50 during a pouring rain storm trying to follow someone, especially when you have a lot of red lights. We teetered between hitting the cars on the right or landing in the drainage ditch to the left, but I slid through the red light without hitting anyone, stopping at the next light just under the bridge. Trust me, that's a whole post in itself.)

I think the best one, though, was my freshman year in high school. While hanging out at my house, my friends and I realized it had started snowing, which was really a novelty to us. We went outside and played for a few minutes, and I then ran back inside to the kitchen. Keep in mind I was wearing combat boots when I ran through our tiled foyer and across the carpeted living room, which you would think would dry my boots off pretty well. When I got to the kitchen I slipped, went up in the air, and hit my middle finger on the cabinet. It then proceeded to turn purple. My mom insisted on taking me to the emergency room, only to have jambed it pretty well. I spent the next 6 weeks with my finger in a splint, walking around showing everyone my injury. (hey, what do expect from a teenager?!)

So, what are some of the dumbest ways you've injured yourself? I know I'm not alone on this.