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The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

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ByteSlinger

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Post Sat Jun 19, 2010 3:58 am

The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

Okay, for the most part, we're all pretty intelligent people here in the EGB. But every once in a while, one of us - or one of our loved ones - will do something so incredibly stupid that it may defy explanation. I am starting this thread because I just got off the phone with my sister (she works nights and gets home at this ungodly hour) who told me she got cut on a bagel today. I told her she must have been holding the bagel in her hand when she ran the knife through it, and that was careless.

She told me: "No, I didn't get cut on the knife. The bagel cut me."

Now, I'm staring at the phone, trying to figure out how a ROUND piece of smooth bread could cut someone. All I could ask was "Did you say you cut yourself on the bagel?"

A sheepish voice replies, "Yes. Yes I did."

I'm dumbfounded - but I have to hear how this happened. "Care to explain to me how a dull, rounded bagel cut you? Did they substitute glass shards for poppy seed all of a sudden?"

"No, it happened like this: I cut the bagel in half, no problem. I even put butter on it, and placed it in the toaster oven to melt the butter and crisp it up a little bit. When I took it out, it smelled so good - the butter was all melted, and the bagel was nice and crispy on the edges. But one of the edges had been cut thin, and when it crisped up, it became hard and sharp. I never once suspected that the edge of a cooked bagel could become sharp as a knife. When I picked it up to eat it, I turned it around in my hand first to get to the extra-buttery part - and in the process of rotating it, the sharp edge caught the skin between my thumb and forefinger, and cut me like a paper cut!"

"You're making this up, right?"

"No - check your phone." - she took a picture of the cut on her hand and sent it to me. It really happened. You just can't make this shit up!

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So, with this as our first Darwin failure, anyone else have something to add? We could use a chuckle or two!
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Ismael92

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Post Sun Jun 20, 2010 10:32 am

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

Great thread, I wish someone else posted more anecdotes. I would post some of my own, but I don't have any...

Actually, something quite stupid happened to me when I was younger (about 7 or 8 years old). A guy pushed me and I fell down to the ground, and somehow I managed to get my leg cut with a branch. A tree branch. The branch was on the ground, and it wasn't a minor cut either. I couldn't walk back home (someone had to carry me), and I couldn't walk for about a week. I still have a big scar on my left leg.

It wasn't my fault, but come on. I got my leg cut with a branch?! As soon as I fell down and saw my leg cut open (which was gross as hell), and I saw the branch that was on the ground, pretty much covered in blood, I think I felt more embarrassed than in pain.

I think that's the reason why I've always been kind of hemophobic D:
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SlntCobra1

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Post Sun Jun 20, 2010 4:52 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

Damn! Did it get all the way down to the bone?

I have one that took place between me and a friend of mine back in the spring of 2006 in shop. I was busy sanding my wood stool top and he comes over with an orbital sander and turns it on but the paper nicked my right index and middle fingers. I have 3 faint scars. 1 on my index and 2 on my middle finger. I tell ya, that stung like hell!
:evil: :evil:
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ByteSlinger

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Post Sun Jun 20, 2010 8:27 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

I've had my share of stupidity as well. Working my way through college, one job I had was at a Deli. I was cutting roast beef and it was down to the end, and the meat holder/guard wasn't getting any grip. So, despite the logic behind the guard, I swung it up and held the meat in place with my right thumb and forefinger.

As I was cutting, the customer asked me a question, and I turned my head to answer her - and in the next stroke, proceeded to slice a 1/8" slab off of the side of my thumb. I didn't feel a thing, as the blade was so sharp - but I bled out quickly, and I watched the customer's face turn white as she pointed to the wall. I turned back to see a red plume of blood shoot off the blade and up the wall. My blood. At that moment, another customer looked at it an said, "wow, that roast beef is REALLY rare. I'll take a pound of that when you have a moment".

It took weeks for my thumb to heal, as the skin was cut parallel to the bone and couldn't be stitched. And I haven't worked a deli since.

And that's why I never became a surgeon or a professional knife thrower. :D
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SlntCobra1

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Post Sun Jun 20, 2010 8:51 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

Wow, that was incredibly stupid! YOU NEVER TURN YOUR ATTENTION AWAY FROM A ROTATING BLADE! That is just asking for trouble.

Another incident that happened in shop when I was a sophomore in the fall of 2005, I was about to get the top of my card box to the shaper when someone else was already using it, they had the grain of the wood going in the same direction as the rotation of the shaping head they were using, it grabbed the wood, and flung it into the lockers. The lockers were in the shop serving as the base for the work benches.

Boy did the teacher get pissed that day!
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RogerBK

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Post Tue Jun 22, 2010 5:26 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

God, it happened to my dad...

It was 9PM, (8PM in the USA according to the NG Timezone) and my father was cooking the dinner, he was watching TV while the rice was cooking. My mother called him to see the rice, but there happened a horrible thing last night...

My ex-house (now I live in a apartment) had three stairs steps in the very right part of the living room, but there was a big step with the size of the 3 steps of the little stair in the side of the normal stair. (Note: the big step, isn't supposed to be used, since it's very dangerous if someone jumps it).

Well, when my mother called my dad, he was going there, but instead of using the normal stair, he jumped the big step, when he jumped, his leg didn't pass over the step, and he falled down. When I saw he falling, I runned to see if he was allright, but his leg was totally bleeding, and the bruise went down to the bone. I called my mom to help me, and we took him to the hospital.

Thank God nothing happened to him, just a scar. Ugh. :shock: :shock:
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lol, it was hard to put the image in the signature... :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
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Ismael92

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Post Tue Jun 22, 2010 7:33 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

Ismael92 wrote:I think that's the reason why I've always been kind of hemophobic D:


Damn, I can't even read this thread without saying "eeeewwwww" out loud each time someone mentions blood :/

SlntCobra1 wrote:Damn! Did it get all the way down to the bone?


Fortunately not, but I'd say it was quite close :(

ByteSlinger wrote:I turned back to see a red plume of blood shoot off the blade and up the wall. My blood. At that moment, another customer looked at it an said, "wow, that roast beef is REALLY rare. I'll take a pound of that when you have a moment".


That must have been disgusting, yet really funny, lol
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Sheizenhammer

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Post Tue Jun 29, 2010 9:25 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

10 years ago, I ran headlong into a barbed-wire fence wearing only a T-shirt and some shorts.

I was on a camping holiday in a field, it was pitch dark and I just plain misjudged where the exit to the field was (it was one of those annoying fences where, in a dim light, just looks like a bunch of evenly-spaced poles with no real gate to speak of).
Odd thing is, I just found it funny at first. Especially since I'd picked the gap between posts that was right next to the real exit. The people standing around nearby thought it was pretty funny too... until they saw all the blood everywhere. Took all damn night plastering up every one of the cuts (the nearest doctor was hours away, and none of them were so bad they needed stitches at any rate, so we just sorted it out there).

I still have one of the scars. The other 15 or so all faded over time, but this one (the deepest and longest one) is still here, and by now is almost certain to be permanent.

Still, it's only like an inch long, and it's kinda cool, so meh. All part of growing up I suppose.
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SlntCobra1

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Post Wed Jun 30, 2010 12:43 am

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

Oh, I've got another one. This happened when I was 9 I think? This was before the house fire 12/12/02. I was coring and peeling an apple for my mom's apple pie for Thanksgiving. So, instead of leaving the core AWAY FROM THE BLADE so I could pull it off safely, I pulled it back to the starting position and yanked the core off with my left hand and cut my left ring finger on the peeler blade. I can just now start to see the scar on my finger. REAL FRIGGIN' SMART!
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ByteSlinger

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Post Fri Sep 03, 2010 1:10 am

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

There are times like these that I lose all hope for the next generation:

I was returning home late one night, and stopped into a "major grocery store" to pick up something to eat for dinner, as well as the basic supplies of milk, bread, Diet Coke and Keebler cookies. I didn't need much - it all fit nicely in a small hand basket - and I figured that I could be out of here fairly quickly.

Well, it turns out that there were only two people on checkout that night. The first lane - a "full service" lane - had three people backed up in it, while a pimply-faced scrawny teen with nose piercings was losing a battle with the register. It seemed that the register decided that things were too quiet, so it proceeded to eat it's own register tape, happily tearing it to shreds and winding it over all moving parts within a three foot radius.

The clueless lad was first calling over the paging system for some help, but no one came to his rescue. He was poking at it with a screwdriver, and even trying to stick scissors in it (of course, still plugged in and operational)

I looked around for another open lane, only to discover that the second cashier was supervising the self-checkout lanes. As I took a step towards the self checkout, the other three people (a teen girl, an older boy, and a middle-aged guy) suddenly see what I see, and we all stampede to the self checkout.

Only two registers were open, and there were four of us, so out of the goodness of my heart I let the two young kids go first - one on each lane.
The boy had 3 large bags of potato chips, half a dozen TV dinners, a bag of peanut M&M's and a six-pack of Mountain Dew Code Red - or as I see it, another late-night stoner going out for a quick snack.

In the other lane the girl had a more sensible selection, comprising of three loaves of Italian bread, various plastic bags of fresh fruit and veggies, and some soy milk. Why she needed to buy this at 1:30am was still a mystery to me, but hey, you do what you have to do.

While the older guy and I wait patiently for these kids to ring up their own orders, we see that BOTH of them are having troubles with various items not being picked up by the barcode scanner. It was almost laughable - she swiped the first loaf of bread, and it worked fine. The second loaf had a creased barcode, and for some reason, wasn't working at all. She passed it over the scanner over and over again, and each time it failed, making her more and more puzzled.

The stoner had the same problem with the bag of chips. First one worked, second one failed.

It became a game - how long would it take for either brain surgeon to realize that they could just pick up the first bag, and scan it multiple times to account for the remainder in the order?

After a few minutes of unabashed parallel stupidity, I realized that this was going down as a tie - neither one was EVER going to get it right. I was hoping that a manager would show up, and as I looked around, never saw one - but I did see a poster of "manager of the year" - it was some no-neck troglodyte named "Randy" who really needed to get his shirts tailored better.

Well, at this time of the morning, between hunger and exhaustion and a complete lack of compassion for the mentally challenged, my evil little mind figured out a way to get things moving faster. I walked over to the young girl, leaned over and said "You do know that it's a state law that says if a scanner fails to read your item after five tries, you get it for free, right?" And I said it loud enough for the stoner to hear me as well.

"Really?", she said

"Would I lie to you?", I answered, without answering her.

"I don't think so. I can't get this bread to scan", she offered

"Then I guess you get it for free", I said, and with that, she tossed that loaf into her bag, and continued scanning.

The stoner turned to me and said "These chips won't scan, either. Does that mean I get them for free as well?"

"Hey, the law is the law!", I replied.

Well, it seemed that store clerk #2, a somewhat emo-looking boy who looked like he was one step away from trying to dance with a freight train overhead me, then came walking quickly up, all serious and angry. "I heard what you told these customers - and I've never heard about that state law before!"

It was time for me to either go big or go home - and I wasn't ready for bed just yet. "Excuse me, but how long have you worked here?", I demanded.

"Four months", he answered, trying to be tough. I laughed in his face, "Noob! I've been doing retail for over 20 years! Who do you think trained Randy? He may have been employee of the month, but everything he learned, he learned from me. I knew about that scanning rule for years - why were you never taught it? Was Randy your boss?"

"No", he answered, "but I wish he was - I heard he was a real good guy."

"Yeah, he was", I said, "so, now do you believe me? Or do you want these customers to come back and complain that they had problems checking out - and you wouldn't obey the state sales laws? Depending on the sales, you could be slapped with a fine, or spend a little time in the county lockup. Your choice", I said, very convincingly.

He looked around, then at the young customers and said "you heard the rules - if it's not scanning, you get it for free!"

Sure enough, each kid had picked up a bit of "free" food because of the temperamental scanners - and the second cashier was so proud of himself that he did the same thing that "Randy would have done".

No one questioned me, and everyone believed what I said as true. I left there, paying for everything and making a mental note that I should never go back there again.

The funniest part is one I can only speculate on - the next day was Monday - how many customers would be getting "free items" on the self checkout today - before the REAL supervisor put a stop to things....

Mwuhuhuhuhehehehehe...

So many kids - so little brains!
:lol: :lol: :lol:
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EagleRock

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Post Fri Sep 03, 2010 1:13 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

ByteSlinger wrote:So many kids - so little brains! :lol: :lol: :lol:


My brain aches after that. It's tired after moaning from inside my skull.

I weep for the future. But I will say this, with people like you assisting the nation's youth, you're speeding up the reversal of the Flynn Effect. :?
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ByteSlinger

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Post Fri Sep 03, 2010 2:29 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

EagleRock wrote:
ByteSlinger wrote:So many kids - so little brains! :lol: :lol: :lol:


My brain aches after that. It's tired after moaning from inside my skull.

I weep for the future. But I will say this, with people like you assisting the nation's youth, you're speeding up the reversal of the Flynn Effect. :?



Based on what I read on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect), it looks like it was in reverse 20 years ago, so by now, it's already running on it's own momentum.

But remember - there is a difference between intelligence - and gullibility. Also, fear is a great motivator as well. The clerks chose to believe me because I sounded convincing - none of them tried to validate or verify my claims. Also, they were afraid of potential legal backlash, so they folded like a cheap suit , took the bait, and did as I asked.

I have many, many minions - too bad most of them are morons! But that echoes society as we know it - so many sheep, no one questioning authority, and everyone living in their own little electronic cocoon, far away from reality...
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SlntCobra1

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Post Fri Sep 03, 2010 3:46 pm

Re: The EGB Darwin Awards Thread

Good lord, this is why I am afraid of the future. As if this weren't bad enough, we have to fuck with the minds of complete idiots. OY! :roll: :roll:

95% of teens would cry if the Jonas brothers were about to jump off of a 10 story building. I'm one of the 5% who would bring popcorn and invite friends.
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