Did something dumb today.

[Peter Drouin]

Well ant that cool.

[Ljohnsaw]

I didn't do it and, fortunately, I was out of range.  I do metal scrapping.  My Niece and her husband bought a Midas franchise last year.  Just bought another one that is a disaster.  Lots of scrap metal to recycle.  Yesterday I loaded up three 5 gallon buckets of nuts and bolts.  There were four of those tanks on wheels with a very long spout funnel for doing oil changes on the rack.  To drain the oil out of them, you hook up a air hose and put the drain hose in the bulk waste oil tank.  Worked great on two.  One I had to help lift to manually dump.  Of course, the plastic funnel on the bulk tank broke and doused me with some nasty oil. :

But the "fun" part.  They have a pit rack for doing large vehicle oil changes.  Down in the pit is another collection tank thing and it was moved up the the mid-landing when the lower pit flooded with water.  This one needed draining.  It was slightly different.  With the others, you remove the funnel and close off a big ball valve and pressurize.  This one had a ball valve on the funnel stem just below the funnel.  The mechanic closed that off and attached the air line.  You could hear it filling with air and also hear the oil running into the bulk tank.  The oil eventually stopped (plugged up by sludge?).  The air was still going into the tank.  So the mechanic disconnected the air line but it didn't bleed out any pressure.  Without apparently thinking it through, he then touched the release lever to raise the funnel.  Except with the pressure in the tank, it launched a good 20 feet straight up, just missing my nephew, crashed into the ceiling with a huge bang then crashed back to the floor.  The three of us stood there for a second and said What The Fact just happened!

[Don P]

 :D, lucky he didn't do the split rim decap!

When we cranked up the glue machines the shop started buying glue in drums. We had the pipe drum cradle so I could remove the bungs and pour out a few gallons at a time. After lunch one day I got impatient and stuck a blower in the little top bung with my hand sealing it.

You know, it doesn't take much pressure at all to blow the lid off a drum of glue  :D.

[KenMac]

I had so much trouble hooking up to my dump trailer that I bought an after market wireless back up camera in hopes it would help. It works great and is movable and now also allows me to see my gooseneck ball as well. The camera attaches magnetically and is battery powered. The small monitor plugs into the power port or cigarette lighter. I'd buy another one in a heartbeat if it failed.

[firefighter ontheside]

So, yesterday we went and bought a used commercial gas stove for the firehouse.  This is a $6000 stove for $1000.  It was in a house and we had to get it out of the house and out to the truck.  The only way it was going to get out the door was to take the oven door off.  I figured out that there were some little levers on each hinge that had to be flipped to allow the door to lift off.  The guy with me lifted his side off and me my side.  I had my hand down by the hinge and when I lifted the door off the rest of the hinge flipped over like a guillotine and cut off a piece of skin from the tip of my thumb about the size of a dime.  DanG that was dumb.  The lady we bought it from first got me a paper towel to stop the blood and then she went and got me bandaids.  

[Southside]

Did she put a call into the rescue squad too? 

[firefighter ontheside]

I think she was trying to do her best to offer help, but not do too much.  Plus, we were in a city where I knew some firefighters and I didn't want to have to have one of them show up for me.  I would never live that down.

[rusticretreater]

 1 1/2 thumbs up!

[Ljohnsaw]

Well, that will mess up your fingerprints!

[firefighter ontheside]

Yeah.  My fingerprints are always messed up.  I had problems when getting fingerprinted for concealed carry.  One finger is messed up from an incident with a biscuit cutter/joiner.  We have a lock on a cabinet in the house with liquor in it.  I can never get in it, because the finger print reader can never read my finger prints.

[Old Greenhorn]

So did you have have a department truck or something for the pick up? Didn't you have a jump bag in the rig?
 I know how embarrassing that can be and I might be laying there with an open compound fracture saying "No, I'm fine, just give me a minute, I can walk this off" rather than call the rescue squad, and if it was my own district, even more so. :D

 I did get some minor injuries a time or two and have the person who called us offer help and one time we had ben running non-stop for 2 days and I was exhausted. I was working on a patient in the ambulance and she looked up at me and said  "Man, you look like crap! You should lay down or something." There's your sign. ;D 

 That's a bad spot, I hope it heals up quick! 

[K-Guy]

We have a lock on a cabinet in the house with liquor in it.  I can never get in it, because the finger print reader can never read my finger prints.

Sounds like your wife found a way to put you on the wagon!! smiley_jester

[Nebraska]

I had a little thumb trauma a couple days ago too.  Ran my thumb into a scalpel blade my technician was holding as we were extracting a calf  from a cow during a c-section.  : it was my bad, she felt terrible, no major damage just a boo-boo, but at that point in time there was no stopping to inspect it.

[Resonator]

This one happened to me a while back, but I figured I'd post it as a cautionary tale to any guys out there that do their own grocery shopping...

Made my usual run to the store I've been going to for years, and noticed they had all new shopping carts. Didn't think too much of it, and went about my usual shopping. Went to check out and all the regular checkouts were closed, only had the self - checkouts open. Not a fan of these, but checked out all my purchases and paid the machine. Things like pop bottles and water I didn't put in bags, just put them back in the cart, and bagged up the rest. Went to go out through the 2 sets of automatic doors, went through the first set, and SCREECH! The wheels of the cart all locked up solid, and nearly threw me over the handlebar. I looked down at the wheels and couldn't figure out what had happened. Just then a manager came out and informed me I had set off the new security system.
What I learned is there is a scanner that detects if there are items NOT in bags in the cart. This then sets the alarm off, sending a signal to the wheels, locking up brakes in the wheels. There have been several thefts at other stores in big cities where people load up the carts, and then just make a dash out door stealing everything in the cart. The new system is meant to prevent that. I showed them my receipt, they freed my cart, and was able to leave. Live and learn. :

[Rhodemont]

Lost my Logrite 60" blue peavey.  Looked all over for it for a couple days.  Figured I dropped it in the road off the tractor coming back from getting a log.  I was planning to drive up to Mass to get a new one after sawing a few logs yesterday.  Had to change the band so went to the shed to get a new one...There it was, right where I put it.  If I had not had to change the band I would have two of them now. I am getting concerned that Mariann is correct, I am a complete "did something dumb ".

[firefighter ontheside]

We were in one of the guys trucks and not a FD truck.  My FD pickup truck is more of a command vehicle and has no real pickup truck type utility.  He may have had some stuff in his truck, but the bandaid from the homeowner was all I needed.  Actually this thing is healing really well.  I figured the flap of skin was going to die, but it seems to be actually healing as if it had been stitched down.

Interesting about the shopping cart.  I just noticed the local walmart has all new shopping carts, but I don't think they have anything like that on them.

[Southside]

Had to grab a roll of Romex the other day. Reached under the rack, found the 12/2 and picked it up. At that time the entire stack fell over and "Whoop, whoop, whoop" started going off. Turns out they cable the stacks together now with anti theft devices. So the guy comes over, re sets the thing to DEFCON 5, and hands me a roll. Wasn't sure how that system stops someone from walking out the door with the wire but whatever.

[Don P]

Yup, the wire aisle at our Lowes has its own video now. I wear a hat from another construction company and a sweatshirt from a third when i go in there.

[aigheadish]

Not sure what counts as did something dumb... 

My son (I may have told this story) got pulled over by the cops on our first attempt to teach him how to drive. He was in my car and we were probably a mile away from home. He didn't have his temps or anything and he was confused about where to stop at the stop sign on a country road. The cop came up asked what was going on, I told her, and she sent us on her way. 

At 430 this afternoon my son took and passed his drivers test to get his real, official and license. All good. He drive my daughter and I to dinner to celebrate. On the way home it was dark and he didn't see our road until he was too close to make the turn. There was a car following us so I didn't want him to slam on the brakes to make the turn. We kept going to the next road, again country roads (actually the road that he was pulling onto at the stop sign of the previous story) to take a right onto it and the car following us continued to follow us, my daughter was looking out the window and said "that's a cop". I started chuckling a bit, he was driving a bit slow and confusedly. We go down the way to turn onto the road that he'd previously got pulled over on and the cop followed us again. I laughed harder. He isn't quite sure where the passenger side of the car is, so a couple hundred yards down the way he'd ran through some tree branches that were just sticking out into the road and I kinda yelled at him to pay attention to where that side of the car was, but I also laughed harder. As we turned onto our street the cop lit him up. He pulled off to the side, all hands visible, and all 3 of us are laughing now. He hadn't done anything illegal and the circumstances were hilarious. I'm looking in the mirror and up pulls the 2nd sherrifs car and I laugh harder. Cop comes up, maybe the same lady, I'm not sure, and says "I pulled you over because you ran off the road back there." We are all kind of giggling and my son explains what happened, that he was having trouble seeing that side of the car and that he'd got his license not 3 hours ago. She asks where we live and I say about 7 houses down the way. Other cop is standing at my window and he's kinda giggling too. She goes back to her car and checks or whatever and come back says "OK, be careful and dad? Good luck" We're all cracking up at this point. And she sends us on our way.

So, within the first 10 minutes of his first run, gets pulled over, and within 3 hours of getting his real license gets pulled over.

So good. 

[SawyerTed]

 :D :D

Thankfully you had cops with common sense and a sense of humor.  

[aigheadish]

Yeah, the local sherrifs hang out on this street a lot with a neighbor and they all seem OK. 

One of the cops and the neighbor were "arguing" over some fencing we were getting rid of a while back and the neighbor drives up on his tractor with a beer between his legs as the cop rolls up from the opposite direction. The neighbor kind of sets the beer on the ground and they start comparing uses of the fencing, giving each other a hard time. The cop wanted it for his hot tub area and the neighbor for his chickens. 

[GAB]

:D :D

Thankfully you had cops with common sense and a sense of humor.  

Two traits that have dwindled considerably in the last few decades.
GAB

[beenthere]

For me, I won't diss our cops on the beat these days. For the job they do, and the situations they face "these" days, and the rules they have to follow, I'm not sure who in their right mind would pursue such a profession. I'm not in the "defund the police" camp for sure. They risk their lives in so many places and at so many times, gutsy hero's in my mind.

Not sure if I was a cop walking up to a car where everyone is laughing, what I'd be thinking is going on or how I'd assess the situation.  ??? ???

We all have our individual impressions of cops, be it from the movies, media, the many YouTube videos of cop chases, or our personal experience on the occasion we get pulled over.
My initial encounter with cops and the cherry red light on the top of the cop car was 16 years old and getting a ticket for not stopping at a stop sign. I said I did, the cop said that the wheels did not stop rolling. That was my first lesson that stop means "stop". Not continue rolling.

[jasonb]

That would have been my last trip to that store.

[firefighter ontheside]

I've done it before, but I didn't want today to be the next time.  I'm building a table and I glued up the top with 3 red oak boards.  I determined what would be the top and what would be the bottom.  The bottom had some bad spots in it, but no problem it's on the bottom.  Well, then I promptly built it the wrong way.  No going back from that.  I had to spend a bunch of time filling voids and doing more sanding.  It will look OK, but not as good as it would have.