Stupid Crap I’ve Done
by Brad Foster, 2023
A listicle, because I know how much Smillew loves listicles. And since it was his birthday recently (Happy B-Day, Smillew!), I can think of no better gift!
I’m sure there’s more stupid crap I’ve done, but this is what comes to mind so far:
- Circa 1976–77: When I was about five or six years old, my friend (whose name I don’t recall. Come on, gimme a break, that was well over 40 years ago!) and I explored a construction site in Virginia where I lived from 1972–1977. We sneaked (snuck?) through a gap in the chain-link fence, which I’m sure had a “No Trespassing” sign. We gleefully bounded down to the vast plain of mud and stagnant brown ponds. I had the bright idea to jump into one of those “swimming holes”. Within a few minutes, I felt an intense pain in my left knee. I was sure it was a shark.
“There’s a shark in here!! I got bit by a shark!”, I hollered.
My friend ran off, and I was left alone.
“Thanks, you dick!” I might have thought at the time, if I had such a vocabulary.
Unbeknownst to me, my friend made his way to my house. He hammered on the door and when my mother answered, he shouted: “Brad’s dead…he’s DEAD!”
I don’t know what transpired after “Dr. McCoy” made his dire analysis, but I was rushed to a military hospital and ended up with a four inch scar in my knee.
I don’t know how I survived that ordeal, because I remember bleeding profusely from that wound! Fools and children, am I right?!?
- The early 1980s: Before school, made a sling-shot with a steak-knife…I don’t know where I got this idea, but I thought combining a sling-shot and a steak knife was a really great idea! I grabbed one of the yellow-handled, viciously serrated steak knives from the kitchen, and ran up to my room. I found a thick rubber band, and set the butt of the knife into the cusp of the elastic bastard. I released it, and the steak knife did not fly as I expected but plowed into my left hand. I stared at the gash which quickly burbled blood. I think I screamed in pain, but no-one was home. Somehow, I patched myself up and hiked to school. Most likely, I showed off my newly acquired scar, to which most of my classmates exclaimed: “That was really stupid!”
- Still the 1980s: At some point in my misspent youth, a girl in our neighborhood decided…
