Silly things you did in your early years

What did you do that had your parents drawing breath, or that make you think, why on earth did I ever do that?
Here's one of mine, 50' up a TV tower, no harness, no training. Note the bend in the tower from loose guy wires.
The antenna is a further 15' or so, above me, and was designed to pick up capital city TV, when we had no local transmitter.
About 40 years ago. I think I was up there for a while, from fear of the belting that awaited me, when I decended.

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

That reminded me of a climb up a big water tower I made as a freshman at UNC-Chapel Hill. My roommate and I had noticed an extension ladder leading to the permanent ladders and catwalks on a water tower on campus. In the wee hours one night we decided to investigate, and found we could get under the fence surrounding the tower. While my roommate stopped on the catwalk around the tank I had to continue up the curved ladder to the top. I wanted to see that red blinking light up there (being a flashaholic). I could also see the lights of downtown Durham. I recall my arms were shaking as I climbed back down. Oddly, we actually had not been drinking.

Geoff

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

The advantage of having been young and stupid well before the explosion of the internet and social networks is that I do NOT have folks all over the world knowing exactly how stupid I really was.

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

It's not the silly things that I did when I was young that impress me. It's how lucky I was. I still do silly things. I just don't have as much luck. But I'm lucky I have good health insurance.

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

I grew up watching Evel Knievel do his thing. And had neighbors whose dad raced dragsters. The combination led to my mom stating "as much money as we've spent in this orthopedists office it looks like they'd have better furniture". Ah, the 70's.
Leaping off 2 story school buildings, jumping a bicycle into the back of a moving pickup truck, riding down gravel roads in the mountains brakeless, jumping out of trees into water inches from a rock ledge... that was just what we did back then....

But the silliness began in my 30's when I was coach of a bmx stunt rider team. Actually the silliness began in my 20's... but at 36 a 360 spin one way while spinning the handlebars one morning resulted in a pretty serious rib injury... yet I cut and trimmed my mother in laws yard that afternoon. When I woke up alive the next morning I decided a visit to the doctor was out.

Later I re-injured those ribs along with an elbow I destroyed on roller blades in my 20's. See, first time on blades I crashed into a bush trying to stop. Shook that off and 10 minutes later was leaping down stairs... not content with that 360 twist while leaping down stairs.... and while perlisouly out of control and about to crack open the back of my head I threw back my arm, which prevented the head injury but destroyed my elbow joint....


Now to the skateboard... I took up slalom racing agaiin at 40. By 45 was flying down hills.
At 46 a crash to my left side re-injured my elbow and ribs.... but I was wearing a helmet so there was that.

I retired completely from extreme sports at 47 and started working on Japanese sports cars to take flying down unpopulated country roads. At 51 I became a flashlight junky. Now that.... is the silliest thing I ever did.

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

Did a solo scuba dive to 156' by dragging my equipment alone in a homemade barge, designed to fit in the back of a Dodge Aspen wagon. That wasn't the silly (dumb) part.

On the way back to shore the wind and waves kicked up, to the point where I could hardly tell if I was making progress or not. Two guys zipping around on a Zodiac pulled alongside and asked if I needed help. I said no, but as soon as they left, knew that was a mistake. It took an hour to see that I was in fact making slow progress, and another two hours to hit the beach. It didn't kill me--it made me stronger.

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

I've climbed some towers when I was younger. Not for fun (I have acrophobia) but for work. Highest I've climbed is around 160 feet. One time there was an angry crow waiting at the top.

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

OK 1st thing 1st I was a pre teenager. My dad was in a hospital with a bleeding ulcer, It seemed like a good time to try driving our car out of the garage, I started the car and pressed on the long pedal and a tree right beside the garage just jumped out and took out the right fender with headlight assembly. I still feel really dumb and that was a 55 Chevy still pretty new till then.

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

It did seem silly at the time, because it was such a small thing. I saw pictures of it on t.v. But never believed there really was an hourglass tattoo on its belly. So of course seeing the black widow spider in its web across a well, outside of my uncle's motel, just fascinated me. Because I would look for it everyday and it didn't move, I figured it was dead so one day I grabbed it to show my mother. It wasn't dead. Good thing she was a nurse.

Fast forward 2 years to a (still) curious 10 year old at his aunts restaurant. There was this huge spider in the corner way up in the ceiling. Seeing this thing day after day when I would go for lunch, especially after the black widow was bugging me. I asked my cousin what kind of spider it was and he said he didn't know but they kill them for the meat (kinda looked like a hairless tarantula).

Curiosity got the best of me & since it wasn't moving for days (are you seeing a pattern yet?), I grabbed a broom and poked at it whereby it immediately launched itself out of its web and, miraculously enough, down the back of my shirt where it bit me. I ran thru the restaurant screaming & stripping at the same time jumped off the dock out the back and into Montego Bay. Because the dock was 6 feet above the water, and my clothes were gone, my uncle had to get his boat and come around and get me. The same uncle that rushed me to the hospital after the black widow...

Re: SILLY THINGS YOU DID IN YOUR EARLY YEARS

roger-roger said:

On the way back to shore the wind and waves kicked up. Two guys zipping around on a Zodiac pulled alongside and asked if I needed help. I said no.

Click to expand...

Yup... that was silly.