I gotta say, I wasn’t the brightest bulb on the tree when I was a youngling. How about you?
Today’s assignment is to regale us with what, IYHO, was the grandest of dumb that you ever did as a kid.
The first (and definitely not the last on my list of dumb and dumbers…) happened in the drugstore situated next to my dad’s service station. I was 10 and my brother was 11. The school we attended was just across the street, and we often walked over after school to wheedle money out of Dad so we could go to the drugstore and get candy or soda.
That day, brainiac that I was, I tried to hide what I was buying from my brother…by sticking it in my pocket. Why? Who knows. The next thing I knew, I felt a large hand on my collar as I was hauled up to the counter. The drugstore owner called my Dad over at the station.
I’m sure you can imagine the rest of the story. Definitely not pretty.
So, TKZers, what’s the dumbest thing you remember doing when you were shorter and younger? And have you ever used it in your story-telling?
Go ahead, don’t be shy. We won’t laugh too hard at you…
Those of you who are from my generation will remember the Kick the Habit, Join the Unhooked Generation TV marketing campaign to get people to quit smoking. When I was about nine years old, I ran around our backyard jumping up and clicking my heels (or trying) like the people in the commercials. We had a clothesline (remember when people dried their clothes outside?!). I smacked my forehead on the cross post, which was wood with a metal bar across it. Sliced open a wound along my hairline. My parents had 5 kids, minimum wage salary, and no insurance, so my mom tried to doctor it. But when blood kept running down my forehead, they changed plans and took me to the emergency room. I don’t remember how many stitches, but they had to buzz a chunk of my bangs. They used bright orange mercurochrome as the antiseptic so all the world could see this silly thing I’d done!
Good morning, Kelly…
Oh man oh man…bright orange, huh? I feel your pain, my friend! I also remember hurting myself all.the.time. I was quite a klutz (still am) and my Mom could’ve earned her nursing degree just taking care of me, + my three sibs, because they both worked just to feed us.
Thanks for sharing your oops story. I was beginning to think I was the only one . . . 🙂
Kelly, they still have Kick Butts day here in Mississippi…and I can see you trying to kick your heels…
Hi Patricia!
That’s a good one. My oldest daughter just moved to Florence. I wonder if she’s heard of that.
🙂
We are having a snow day here in Mississippi and when we do, I always remember my dumb thing on a snow day (there were other dumb things for other days).
My sister and I rode the school bus and that day when HUGE snowflakes started falling, school closed and the bus took us home. I had the bright idea of getting off the bus early and taking a shortcut through the neighborhood. With my sister who was in first grade. Well, halfway to our house there was a ditch that we had to cross…needless to say, once we were in it, we couldn’t get out. So we walked down the ditch until it was shallow enough to climb out.
By this time, my parents knew the school bus had run and we weren’t on it, so they came looking for us, thinking all manner of terrible thoughts. I was grounded for weeks, and I’d been wanting a piece of track for my Lionel train that I got for Christmas…that got held up too. And walking in the cold snow wasn’t nearly as much fun as I thought it would be…
Ahhh, what a story, Patricia!
I don’t know who to feel more sorry for–you, your sister, or your parents. I suppose it’s one of those stories out of the family archives that gets resurrected from time to time, and then you have to relive it. We’ve all got those, I’m sure!
Have a great weekend, and thanks for baring your soul for us this morning! 🙂
We were not well supervised as children. One hot summer day, my big brother and I were playing with a coffee can filled with gasoline (don’t know why) in the yard next to the Webers’ house.
Jimmy: “You know you can put a match out in a can of gasoline.”
Johnny: “Nuh-uh.”
Jimmy: “Yuh-huh. Here.” He handed me a book of matches. “Just light the match and stick it in the liquid. Mister Wizard did it.”
I lit a match. Then I lit all the matches because why not? I tossed the burning book of matches into the can of gasoline and proved that my brother was a) wrong, and b) perhaps trying to kill me.
As the greasy plume of black smoke billowed into the sky, I panicked and kicked the can.
Of burning gasoline.
Down the side of the Weber’s house.
I’ve said it many times: I never got a whuppin’ I didn’t deserve.
Epilogue: Fire damage was contained to the flower garden.
Ding ding ding!
John, your dumb and dumber tale takes the prize for this morning . . . so far. I can’t even picture how much you suffered (brother too, I hope) for your shenanigan.
Was wondering: Does Boxers have a prank like this lurking in his childhood that got him started blowing stuff up?
🤡
There are several dozen I could share. But one sticks out. Times were tough back in the 50s and everyone I knew in my small hometown had a large vegetable garden and raised chickens.
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We had a storage shed next to our garden and it had a concrete slab poured over rubble. Field rats set up their dens in the voids under the shed and they decimated our garden. Hunger was a serious problem for the family. Numerous way of getting rid of the rats were tried and failed.
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One day when my parents were away, I had a brilliant idea. Why not gas them? In my defense, I was 10 years old. Miners in the lead and zinc mines used long lasting carbide lanterns (before the days of battery powered lanterns.) Calcium carbide used to make acetylene gas in the lanterns was readily available at the local hardware store. A nickel’s worth would buy a coffee can full of carbide.
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What could be simpler? Dig a hole next to the shed exposing the rubble under the shed’s slab, put a bucket in the hole, add water, then dump the carbide in the water. As the acetylene gas gushed out, my 12-yr-old brother and I put wood planks over the hole and covered them with packed dirt. Done deal!
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A half hour later we pulled back one plank and peered in. All the fizzing was over. 10-yr-old me was ready to declare success but older brother said, “Let’s make sure.”
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The “Noooo!” was just coming out of my mouth as he struck a match on his jeans and tossed it into the pit.
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Cue a scene from the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid where they were robbing a train and blowing up a safe in a boxcar, “Are you sure you used enough dynamite?” Our shed rose up from the ground a couple feet and we were blown backwards about 10, rolling several more feet. After we recovered from being stunned, we tried to talk but no sound came out. Or so we thought. We were both temporarily deafened by the blast.
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When our parents came home to an irate neighborhood, our hearing had recovered enough to take the scolding we had coming. My mom’s canning jars did not withstand being lifted a couple feet in the air and landing on the concrete floor. But I was forgiven later when it was discovered the rat problem was indeed solved; there would be food on the table.
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My ears are still ringing.
Lars…my hat’s off to you. Blown off by the explosive winds generated in your garden shed!
My word, what a story. It’s really a wonder some of us survived our numbskull shenanigans.
Have a great, non- explosive week!
🤯🤯
Two decades later, this and several other incidents almost derailed my younger brother’s marriage. Our reputation had one of the girls from our neighborhood warning his bride not to go through with the wedding because “all those boys were bad to the bone, always blowing things up and stuff.”
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Luckily she didn’t listen and married him anyway.
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I drove 1,300 miles to attend a 60th high school reunion back in Oklahoma and stayed with them a few days. Still married almost a half century later and we still laugh about her being warned those awful boys.
🤡🤡🤡
Beautiful!