Remember when you were a kid

And the laws of physics were whatever you thought they were, and you were pretty sure this is what would happen if you jumped off the roof with an umbrella?

8 Likes

You are talking to a kid who did jump off a roof with an umbrella. According to my Mother, I was:

A. Bloody lucky I didn’t break my leg.
B. In serious trouble for ruining her good umbrella (it turned inside out).
C. And if you think you are in trouble now, just you wait until your Father gets home.

16 Likes

Also: That was probably in Australia, so we can add: Lucky to not have been bitten by some dangerous animal.

9 Likes

It’s all fun and games until the Newcastle Big Boy appears and it has a health bar.

4 Likes

I think every boy, of my generation at least, contemplated jumping off a roof with just an umbrella to slow their decent. A friend of mine when I was about 8 or 9 climbed up on the barn on their farm and jumped off with just an umbrella to slow his fall. His misfortune, he broke his leg, kept me from doing it.

Wheels

5 Likes

I jumped down the stairs when i was young. From about halfway. No issue whatsoever. Heroic

Fine…lets do it from the top

Can anyone see the issue i encountered mid-flight…not the dog

8 Likes

New Zealand actually… The most dangerous animal would have been a hedgehog.

3 Likes

I have a scar that my hair line covers. The dent in the drywall was left as a reminder.

4 Likes

I once sewed a fisher-price colored kindergarten backpack into a parachute using a handkerchief and thread. Was intercepted on the way out the upstairs window by my mother, who stopped me and referred me to my father for a physics lesson.

8 Likes

I never tried the DIY parachute, but I did idiotic jumps with my bicycle, disregarding the fact that it was not a BMX bike (or motocross bike, that’s probably where I got the ideas from). It had no suspension or anything, and wasn’t at all made for jumping.

Thankfully I never broke a bone doing those, but my mom eventually got wind of my stunts, and she was not happy. That my brother called those “Colt Seavers stunts” (the protagonist of “The Fall Guy”, a show we liked to watch) didn’t help. Mom considered banning the show in our home. But she left it at a physics lesson, and I was clever enough to heed it.

4 Likes

I used to fall off my motorcross bike all the time. My dad was like a superhero on a bike and I’ve only ever been “mid”
Broke a bone in my hand, massive lump on the back and so swollen i could barely get my glove off. He wouldn’t have it so “back on, stop whining” was in full effect.

Took them a week to take me hospital as they were absolutely convinced id done it to get out of school. Which sounds horrendous, but is probably fair to be honest

4 Likes

One Bonfire night, I had the great idea of cutting open several rocket type fireworks
and putting it all into one… what could go wrong …

In my mind i could see this hybrid abomination soaring into the sky and boom, now what actually happened was a ground based explosion… what you don’t realise about rockets is that explosion in the sky looks really big, when it detonates in your back garden its f+++++++ huge and took out most of the panes of glass in my dads greenhouse

and that was the start of me wanting to work in Lab :grinning:

8 Likes

That reminds me of an old school mate who one day collapsed in school because his mother just thought he was lazy. (He was, but not that day).
I still remember the face of my English teacher when he asked him why he didn’t stay at home, and he just mumbled “my mom didn’t believe me when I said I was sick”.

6 Likes

LOL, these stories are great… I don’t have much to add as I was an introvert so I rarely did anything strange. Always came home on time, my mum always knew were I was- maybe the fault was my Commodore 64, it was way much more fun that what otherwise my life would be back then.

BUT

When I was three years old, visiting Algeria with my mum because my father worked there - directing a building site for a village, I got my fantastic eyebrow scar.

(I don’t remember anything of course, her words are though seared in my mind. :grin:)

One fine morning she tried to comb my hair but I didn’t want to have any of it, so obviously I start running away from her.

To see if she was catching up I turn around (while running) and I don’t remember that the big table of solid wood, with an exquisitely rectangular shape, graced by very sharp corner.
With immaculate precision I smack right into one of said corners slicing my left eyebrow, missing my eye by an hair, (pun intended) and promptly bleeding profusely.

Being the early 1981, there were no mobile phones and even when my terrified mother managed to collect herself enough to call my dad’s office, he was doing his job directing the workers, so it took quite some time to finally get an hold on him and get him back home.

The nearest hospital was… far. Over an hour away, but the story goes that he made the distance in 30 minutes.

The funny thing is that he brought to the hospital several workers already, for stuff ranging from minor to medium accidents, so he knew the Russian doctor was a butcher that would give stitches that would be looking bad on fighting bulls, so he got the Algerian male nurse that instead had a gentler touch and a careful eye, and to this day, unless I brush the eyebrow hairs against the grain, you can’t notice the scar. :grin:

Oh and I vomited on the guy sitting next to my mum while on the plane. Both ways- different guy though.

7 Likes

I remember riding my bike to school one day, I was 14 or so, and hearing a moped gain on me rapidly. I moved right to make way for his noisy arse. He had decided to pass me wrong way so we collided. I went down hard, he rode on.

I came to lying on the wet pavement. Grabbed my bike, shrugged off the helpful worriers and made it to school. Got a note from the concierge for being late. Went to class. Teacher asked me if I was allright. Why? Well you’re deathly pale and bleeding schurem, please go back to the concierge.

I ended up staying in bed for three days with a concussion. F mopeds.

But a better story is my boys’ first family christmas dinner. He was one year old, in that fat cute larva stage of life. Smiling and eating bawling and sh1tting is all he did.

Grandma had made a dish called hete bliksem, a porridge and apple sauce dish that went down well with the little guy. Desert was a big heavy pudding (griesmeel) and cooked pears.

Feeding the baby was such fun, his nephews and niece kept on shoveling food in the eager little gullet. After dinner granddad sat on the couch, filled to the brim, with on his belly a sleepy, at least as full big fat baby boy.

The boy burped once. He buped twice. He burped up all of the dinner. Waves upon waves of christmas dinner. The baby must have been pressurized. The amount of puke was amazing. My dad was absolutely soaked in it.

9 Likes

Later, when the baby grew up, he was called Mr. Creosote…

4 Likes

Being a grandpa not sure I should be laughing as hard as I am. :roll_eyes: :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

3 Likes