Yeah, I thought that would get your attention. It sure got mine.
Last week when I told the story about my sister accidentally lining her lips with black eyeliner in the middle of a grocery store, a reader commented with something along the lines of "I see your lip liner story and raise you a Brushing my teeth with Vagisil".
And yes, I'm pretty sure there's only one kind of Vagisil.
We've all done it. Something stupid/embarrassing and (many years or beers later), hilarious. In fact one of the most read posts on my website is all about a a girl, a first date and a fart.
As soon as I read NinaMargoJune's comment about the Vagisil I immediately thought of the time I decided to try to multitask by brushing my teeth while I was sitting on the toilet. I sat, I peed, I brushed and by force of habit when the time came that I needed to spit my toothpaste out, I did that too. All over the bathroom floor.
I'm pretty conditioned to think there's a sink under my face when I'm brushing my teeth.
And then last summer, in another episode of trying to save time I decided if I just jigged my leaf blower a certain way I'd be able to eliminate one of the leaf blowing steps. My leaf blower is also a leaf sucker that has a bag attached that all the shredded leaves go into. Every 10 minutes or so I have to pull off the big, heavy bag, and empty it into a paper yard bag. It's a bit of a pain. I'm very, very smart, so I figured I could just eliminate that attached bag altogether and just keep a yard bag under the leaf blower so all the shredded leaves would fall right into that. Here's a picture so you have a better idea of what I'm talking about ...
See how I got rid of the bag that attaches to the leaf blower and threw it aside so I could implement my better idea of holding the blower directly over a paper yard bag? See how happy I am? How smoothly it all went? That was in my imagination. How I pictured it would go. This is how it actually went ...
There I was standing out on the sidewalk on a Saturday afternoon, when WHOOMP. I forgot that the very, very, rapidly, fast moving air that sucks the leaves up into the leaf sucker, blows them out with the same force. Air came flying out of the bottom of the leaf blower, hit the leaves that were already in the paper yard bag and sent them flying into the air all around me like an atomic bomb. And it happened in an instant.
I had leaves in my bra. In my ears. In my mouth.
You want to know what my first thought was the SECOND this happened? OMG I hope everyone saw that. It was too funny not to be shared. It was like something out of a cartoon. So I looked around, up and down the street and not a single person saw. This wasn't like when you half trip while walking down the street alone and hope no one saw. THIS was something people needed to see!
Nobody saw. A moment of accidental comedic genius wasted.
It was awful.
It could have been embarrassing this moment, but it was just so ridiculous, so perfect, SO hilarious ... it wasn't.
That time I was on a cruise and upon meeting the ship's Captain at dinner and blurted out "How do you do?" like I was a debutante. THAT was embarrassing. Or the time in highschool when a boy I had a crush on said hi and I said "Greetings" back. GREETINGS? Evidently I am bound and determined to make a really weird first impression at all times.
So. Now it's your turn. I'm sure you all have much better examples of stupidity than I do. Because as I established near the beginning of this post I am smart, smart, smart.
(One second I was the coolest girl on the street, the next I looked like I was about to slowly rise out of the bushes in the jungles of Vietnam.)
Have a good weekend!
p.s. If you read my 10 Seed Starting Tips post on Wednesday and the link to my half price ($15) seed starting video was broken, I've fixed it so here you go ... I personally email out the course information packet so if you don't get it immediately it's only because I was asleep when your order came in. It's coming. I promise.
Julia
A few years back I was filling my top-loading wood stove with an armful of logs and threw my car keys/key fob (my only set) into the stove without realizing. The boys and I spent an hour scouring the house for them without success. My former husband came by to pick up the boys, and apparently knowing how I can be at times, decided to look in the stove. He found part of the car keys with melted fob buried in the ashes at the bottom. Ugh. I had the car towed to the dealership and new keys made for $250. I am sure my former husband thinks of this with glee pretty often:(
SusanR
Trust me, your former husband has done even worse, you just weren't lucky enough to be around when he did it. :)
Jenny W
When my MIL was first married, way back in the day, her husband got a case of the hemorrhoids.
"Bend over the bed, Dear, and let me pour some turpentine on them."
Needless to say, turpentine, never was, and never will be a cure for hemorrhoids!
Dennis
That time I was driving across Pennsylvania at 2 AM in this loooong 45 MPH no passing construction zone and decided to pass the only other car on the road that was doing exactly 45. As I pulled along side, I glanced over and the driver reached over to the passenger seat and picked up and put on his head his Pennsylvania State Trooper campaign hat! I continued to pass and then just pulled over without him ever having to put on his unmarked car flashing lights or siren. Epically stupid and embarrassing.
Auntiepatch
It's 12:45 am here in San Diego CA. I'm choking and laughing at the same time, trying not to wake up my husband (and pee my pants)! Thank goodness I ran out of tea hours ago!
Holly
I worked for a municipality for almost 30 years. I worked my way up the ladder and was an assistant to a top manager. He was at a conference in Amsterdam and called to say he was having trouble accessing his voice mail on his office landline and was expecting an important message. He had recently changed his password and couldn't remember it. I contacted IT and it was not an easy fix. Finally, at 10 p.m, we got it resolved and I called his office extension and left him all the info on how to access his messages. I gave myself a little pat on the back and left the lonely office building for the 1/2 hour commute home. Upon arrival the next a.m., I had 3 voice messages from him. I called his cell phone and told him I had left all the info on his office voice mail....and then it dawned on me...the voice mail that he couldn't access in the first place! I was mortified and he was not happy with me. Giant brain fart!
SusanR
OMG, I can just imagine how mortifying that would have been. But it's funny, now!
Gayle
Yeah. Our IT depth sent out an email advising that anyone having difficulty with their email should email IT regarding the problem. I called to let them know that would be a problem, but the secretary there replied it was so they would not get so many phone calls like the one from me. (Rude,eh?) I actually had to explain it to her
Dana
While staying up late to finish a craft project, I noticed that the hot glue gun in my right hand was about to drip on the table, so I caught the drip with my left hand. Turns out hot glue is HOT, so I reflexively pulled the glue off with my other hand. Now my right fingers were burning, so I used my teeth to get the glue off my fingers, forgetting that I was still holding the glue gun. It was almost a week before the burn on my nose faded.
Years later, I was up late finishing a dress I was making and sewed over the edge of my finger. I have just made the connection, and am writing myself a note to stop crafting at night.
Paula
lol
Kelly
This is my favourite. I can so see this happening to me.
Shauna
About twenty years ago I was at The Fillmore, an historic jazz club San Francisco. I was really enjoying the music, plus I was young and cute, so I was getting asked to dance a lot. One of my partners was an dapper older gentleman. When we started dancing, I noticed that lots of people were staring at us. I got very self-conscious and uncomfortable and as a result felt the need to make small talk with my partner. I leaned into his ear and asked if he had heard that BB King was there that night. He gave me a strange look, and after the song ended he didn't ask me to dance again. Turns out HE was BB King. All these years later I still flush with embarrassment when friends tell that story.
Shana Beirne
Oh. My. God. I would have peed.
Danee
New on a job as a promoter in a shop. I had eaten 3 meals in 2 days at a particular fast food joint, about an hour into work after lunch I felt an enormous rumbling in my tummy. I shouted "I need to use the bathroom!" and ran for it. What happened in there was awful, took forever, multiple flushes were needed and air freshener but there was no air freshener. The fan didn't work either, I left the door to the bathroom ajar hoping the large stock room that it was in would allow the stench to disperse.
About an hour later one of the sales clerks goes into the bathroom and comes back out and speaks in whispers to another sales clerk whilst giving some serious side eye to a 3rd clerk! I'd gotten away with it! Deanna was well known for stinking it up in there, I started to giggle, that's when Alicia must have remembered that Deanna hadn't been in the bathroom, but that I had! Alicia says "It was you! We thought it was Deanna!" and Deanna is going "What did I do? Why are you guys laughing at me?"
That was 4 years ago and they still tell me as I go to lunch, "No McD......... for lunch today."
Jenifer
OMG ...this is one of those experiences that is funniest when it happens to someone else! :)
NinaMargoJune
NinaMargoJune here enjoying my 15 minutes of fame - er ignominy. Love the leaf blower epic, now that I know that mine sucks I'll be more careful... Not many more embarrassing moments to add other than shouting the exhusband's name rather than the current husband's name in an ecstatic moment and the time I superglued my fingers together. My mantra is now: Let's celebrate life's bright pageant!
Moose
I'm making a pizza and as it slides off the wooden peel onto the pizza stone in the oven, a lot of the toppings slip off, land on the hot stone and start to burn. I can tell this will be an evening of fighting the smoke detector unless I do something clever, so I grab the shopvac. This was brilliant, because I could just reach over the pizza with the long nozzle and delicately pick up the burning peppers and smoldering pile of cornmeal. (now, it's true that my wife told me in no uncertain terms that this was a dumb idea, but I digress...). Actually, it mostly began pretty well, with lots of smoky veggies shooting up the pipe. Well enough that I got cocky enough to try to get the last of the cornmeal while simultaneously smirking. Like you, I failed to appreciate the shear power of the air-moving machine I was wielding. Turns out that pizza dough getting slurped into a shopvac makes an unmistakable sound that you know instantly; kind of a wet, inverted splat. The remaining pizza on the stone was twisted into a mangled heap. I don't recall if it took longer to clean the vacuum or for my wife to stop laughing.
Karen
Hahahahahaha!! Ohhhh I have pizza stories too that I forgot about, lol. ~ karen!
Teresa J
OMG HILARARIOUS!!!
Kathleen
Eons ago (in the 80's) and with plenty of wine in my system, walked out of the pub, it was raining, and slipped on the wet wooden stairs... Sat down so hard that my HUGE clip on earrings (it was the fashion back then), dropped off and were ricocheting down the staircase. With the force of landing on my bum, by jaw closed fairly violently, and I thought that the earrings bouncing down the stairs were my shattered teeth. I INSISTED my sister grovel around in the rain and look for "my teeth".
Which reminds me, wonder what happened to those earrings?
christine
You win.
Teresa
O.M.G. I haven't laughed so much this early in the morning since I can't remember when.
All I've got is walking past a cute guy when I was in high school, I wanted to say Hi but it came out HiLow = damn, that was soooo embarassing.
kari
Oh my gosh. Make the tears stop. I am at my daughter's riding lesson and the peeps here are wondering what the heck is wrong with me. My heaving body on this tiny spectator bench is not. cool. My daughter is going to kill me.
Chris
Collapsing with laughter over here! Ever placed an order at the Timmy`s into the garbage can before the speaker? And, going way back, that time I nervously fidgeted with my belt (the elastic kind that had two metal thingys that hooked together) while asking my little, old boss a question. The belt unhooked, flew across and landed on his desk. True story, and going in my book one day.
Chris
I still see him, blinking at me over his specs. and not saying a word, lol.
Holly
lol! I wore pierced earrings and due to my family having extremely wimpy ear lobes and wearing heavy earrings, I had a giant hole that had stretched out. I was talking to a coworker and laughed and the entire earring, with the back still attached to the post, flew out and landed on the ground in front of him. He picked it up and just looked at me totally bewildered.
Chris
LOL!
Jennie Lee
I'm glad you wear eye protection when operating your leaf vac without the bag, Karen. At least you followed part of the safety instructions, which kept things hilarious instead of tragic. I once sucked up a rock with my leaf vac, and it went THROUGH the BAG! Made a hole right through it! That rock is probably still in orbit.
sara
At around midnight a few years ago, I was the only car waiting at a stop light. A cop pulled up next to me, I looked over at him, made eye contact, hit the gas, and drove right through that red light. To this day, I have no idea why. It wasn't on purpose, I wasn't trying to be cool or break the law, I'm no daredevil. I just was so nervous I guess I forgot how to function. It was so odd and dumb, I'm embarrassed every time I think about it.
Holly
omg...lol!! Hope he was understanding. You do know you were the main topic (You're not going to believe this...) back at the precinct later on, don't you? : ) It sounds like something I would do!
sara
I think he could tell I was just as surprised as he was that it happened. He basically just laughed at me and then I drove the rest of the way home, humiliated.
Teresa J
OMG!!!! You guys are cracking me up!!! And I should be winding down for bed!!!!
Ann
Like you, I was multi-tasking while on the toilet. I proceeded to rub my sore knee with a product called BioFreeze, which goes on cold and quickly changes to heat....for a long time. Noticed I had started my period, inserted a tampon, and have a story that will entertain for eons.
Elaine
Ouch!! That sounds awful!
Olivers Mom
My comrade, I once applied good old Ben Gay to my knees before ballet class while peeing beccause you don't want to go through all that with a leotard on and I always skipped the panties for no lines....so I cleverly finished up and pulled my tights staight up....too much already said...
mbaker
Been there! Not with the ballet, but the Bengay and a pair of jeans. The worst part was that I initially thought everything was fine but then over time the fabric shifted. :(
Jenifer
OMG!!!! Someone help me up off of the floor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm rolling!!!!!!!!!!!!
Linda
Ben Gay stories are epic. My husband mistook Ben Gay for hemorrhoid cream. Youch!!!
Jenny
I did the opposite and thought I was rubbing Ben Gay cream on my neck before bed. I was annoyed at how little warmth I felt but figured maybe it was expiring or something. In the morning I finally put in my contacts and realized that I'd rubbed toothpaste all over my neck and shoulders.
Eva
I got the sponges that are used monthly. The package instructions said to add some floss for a removal string. Time comes, I attach the floss and insert. Well, some parts of the body don't care for minty freshness.
Amanda
I once used too little toilet paper...on the one day that I had just finished chopping jalapenos & habaneros, so I feel your pain. :/
Kat - the other 1
I feel you. I once tried a homemade tea tree oil douche (tea tree both freezes & burns if not diluted properly), I actually used MUCH less tea tree oil than called for... I think... But...
OH MG!!!! And it's not as if you can rinse it or anything (after boiling you have to let the water cool 24hours or something, so it's not like I had any "fresh" water on hand). Never tried a homemade douche again! Only plain vinegar water store bought ones (the odd time I feel the need.) I think my older brother was the only other person home that day, he never said anything about my howling. Lol.
Centi
This is hilarious!
Reminds me of the time I wanted to read the ingredients list on a jar of artificial honey (it's really awful but it's cheap, so my parents used to buy it) while the lid was open. I turned the jar a bit and then all the sticky stuff poured out... which I didn't notice.
I did this while sitting at an old wooden table with lots of cracks in it.
That was great, too.
Chrissy @ Adventures in DIY
When I met Chris Isaak, I said to him "I'm a Chris, too" because I was so nervous and couldn't think of anything cooler to say to him (seriously?). My friend that was with me NEVER let me live that down. However, years later, I watched a Sopranos episode in which the Christopher character met another Christopher and said the SAME EXACT THING! I didn't feel so bad after I saw that! lol
Dagmar
Oh my, I love Chris Isaak. I think I would probably turn into a blubbering idiot. 'That' would make for my story.
Chrissy @ Adventures in DIY
I was in my early 20s and so completely mortified afterwards. lol He's very nice and so gorgeous in person - it was hard not to get nervous around him!
Brandy Ballard
Got you beat. I drive a little truck....my mother and I went Christmas shopping so the bed was FILLED....we then decided to go to the drive-thru car wash.
Karen
LOLOL!!! ~ karen
Pam
Doh!! You get double points for two people simultaneously being stupid!
Mark
Karen, you were in camo as a scarecrow. :)
Janelle
1. Pointed a hose at the base of a fruit tree and pulled the lever - had it facing backwards, sprayed myself directly in the face at close range. 2. Used to get the kids a milkshake from Burger King if they were less than totally wretched in the grocery store which was next door. Drove into the drive-thru and went to order at the speaker thingy but it was gone and then I noticed construction all around me and the fact that the Burger King was being changed into a credit union and the take out window was now a yet-to-be-installed drive-thru cash machine...but, I couldn't just book it out of there because they had the drive-thru exit blocked off with a saw horse, so I had to reverse out of the drive-thru in my truck with roofers staring down in disbelief and thee little children whining about milkshakes. Now, whenever any of my friends do something stupid, I say "ever try to order a milkshake at a bank"?
Karen
omg. This comment section is going to be epic, lol! THOSE are GREAT! ~ karen!
Mark
Wish I could "like" this funny story... :)
Melissa C
Yup. I like that story too!
Ann Brookens
REALLY! I want a "Like" button!