WTF things you used to do and wonder how you're still alive....

[Bedheadretention]

I've just been reading the thread about people not being able to do simple jobs around the home e.g, changing a bulb/plug, and it got me thinking about when I was around 7-8 years old, not only being fully competent and able to rewire an electrical plug, but also jamming into the electric sockets wires from the video player in my bedroom that didn't have a plug (blue wire into left bottom wall socket hole, brown wire into right bottom wall socket hole) and the tv plug kind of wedging them in over the top after seeing my DF doing the same thing with other small electricals.

WTF did I do this? I thought at the time it was probably ok as DF did the same when a plug was missing, but part of me knew deep down it was wrong! TBF DF did go full on gobshite tell me off when he noticed, and unplugged them, muttering he would 'get me a plug', but then forgot, so I never received said plug, so just jammed the wires in again. I would go barmy if my dc did this, and am cringing now at nearly frying myself and thinking I could have caused a house fire too, (to be fair, this was early 80s, so slack on health and safety).

Please tell me I'm not the only knob to have done something so stupid, I've only just thought of this for the first time in decades and feel so daft. How did I not see what I could have done?

OMG at these! Thank you to every one of your responses.....I realise now reading through them I did chuff all in comparison to you mad lot
Still, wondering how the hell you all we managed to survive and get through to now though?

Just realised, I've made it onto Discussions of the day!
Chuffed !
Takes a bow

Bedheadretention don’t feel bad, my son who was 6yrs old at the time decided that the bulb on his table lamp was getting too hot for his liking, so ever the font of common sense he got his water mug, poured the water over the hot bulb and was witness to a massive explosion, where shards of razor sharp glass exploded into the air and took some skin off his chin.

Upon hearing the loud explosion I ran upstairs three at a time, as you do, to see a very sheepish looking child sitting on his bed, surrounded by glass, with a bleeding chin.

😮😮😮

Mine is tame, travelling with strangers in their cars, being a passenger in a car and holding the door closed or door held closed with string. I used to ride my pony in a headcollar bareback and no hat around fields. Sometime a friend sat up behind me, poor pony. Oh and I learnt how to drive a small tractor and trailor. Nearly took the pier off one time.

Used to throw ourselves off galloping ponies onto broken bales of straw. Jumped off straw stacks into broken bales. Skydiving, horse riding, motorway driving far too fast when speed cameras didn't exist. I once broke the speed limit by 100mph, not a typo. Tombstoning before it was called tombstoning. And the visiting the houses of randoms from the cb world instead of school mentioned by a pp is something I'd forgotten about/never really though of as risky until now!

Hitch hiking from the age of 13, DD is 13 now and I would go nuts if she did this. Mind you, I do have more of a clue about where she is than my mum ever did me!

I used to climb trees impossibly high, I hate going up a stepladder now.
We used to use an old car bonnet as a sledge on the hill on my uncle's farm.
Swimming in the local reservoir in summer.
The friend I walked to school with used to buy a raw sausage from the butchers and would suck the sausage meat from the skin. It looked tasty so I spent the next two weeks eating one myself, until I casually mentioned it over dinner and my dad was nearly sick and told me to stop 😷

Well aged 14 on holiday in Ibiza I decided to swim through the gap between the big pool in to the kiddie pool on the floor of said pools, except aged 14 I had hips and got stuck. Took some wiggling to free myself. Still feel sick to the core with that one. I nearly drowned.

Took all sorts of drugs.

Used to get pissed wandering the streets and get lifts left right and centre.

I was a tear away and funnily enough I smile at most of the memories yet I would not do it again

Taking lifts off strangers while v drunk and out clubbing aged early 20’s. They would drop me elsewhere in town (Central London) so I could make my way home easier!
Complete madness when I think of it. Didn’t do it often, but regularly enough.

I used to poke wires into sockets because there weren't enough plugs to go round and I'd seen Dad do it. Then I tried it with a 12v carriage light and no auxiliary plug - just the ends of the 12v wires. I ended up sliding down the wall three feet up and six feet the other side of the room with my arms and legs out like a seat drop on a trampoline. Didn't try that again. Good thing that all new appliances come with plugs now.

I don't do trampolining anymore either. Far too high up and such a short time to fall.

Used to run across train lines with the local kids, especially exciting when you could see the train coming. Would jump out of high windows, see who could go the highest.
As I got older would accept lifts home with randoms, was with friends though, but still
Walking home alone, completely drunk, at night, when I was a student.
Smoking anything, whatever was passed to me. Taking pills, not knowing what they were.
I'm extremely careful now, although not because of experience, thankfully, just greater awareness

We use to slide down the gravel piles at the quarry, on plastic bags. Insane that we could get in, no security etc

Next door neighbor and I used to stand on the tiled roof outside our bedroom windows. My dad caught us and were shouted at.

AS a student I regularly used to forget my top floor flat keys. So I used to walk along the gutter to the bathroom window then wriggle through. I was very slender and only just fitted through the window.

Smoke 20 a day-unless I was going out, then it would be 30

Take a wide variety of recreational drugs

Drink an absolutely ridiculous amount. On my 21st I did 21 shots...in 1 hour, as we got to the pub late on and I had to fit them in

So many other things but they're outing.

The friend I walked to school with used to buy a raw sausage from the butchers and would suck the sausage meat from the skin.
🤢🤢🤢🤢wish I hadn’t read that!

I used to eat raw sausage too and worms. Am vegetarian now.

50 years ago - disappear for the day on my bike to play by the local river, parents had no idea where I was. Go and play at the abandoned tin mines near my great aunts house when we visited her. 35 years ago - drunk drive. Considered a bit naughty and silly at the time. And drive much too fast, over 100, but only on motorways of course.

Was a total rebel and feel lucky to still be around
Masses of drugs and alcohol
Too many ONS, mostly unprotected
Regularly hitchhiked around the country
Took endless risks which make me shudder when I look back, it’s been a very colourful life!
Happy with quiet times these days

Hitched from Mexico to Chile with all sorts of crazy encounters but didn't die!

I like this thread. It makes me feel like I was not so abnormally stupid in my youth. Where are you all now though because if I mention this stuff now like taking drugs and all night parties it's not stuff my mates did!

Take whatever drugs were going round without asking what they were.
Hitchhike to Glastonbury with no tent or sleeping bag etc. If you hiked up round the perimeter to the stone circle you could climb over the fence. I used to sleep in random tents until the red cross ladies said I could use their base and gave me a tinfoil blanket. Or I'd sleep in the hari Krishna tent where music played all night and you might get a bean bag. At 17 I looked about 12 too.
We used to play jackass in a skater park with shopping trolleys.

Sniffed glue numerous times and lost consciousness with dodgy people around me. Sniffed glue next to rivers, canals, busy roads. Had unprotected sex with boys I hardly knew. Went in cars with anyone, including a boyfriend who was driving a stolen car which quickly got wrapped around a tree while I wasn't wearing a seatbelt. I still have a dent in my leg from that.

I'd say I had lucky escapes but I believe the solvent abuse contributed to my developing MS and I got pregnant at 16.

This has been a stroll down memory lane for me... pretty much everything. . Adolescent brains are porridge, aren't they?

I have done most of this crazy stuff - one that hasn't been mentioned which I seemed to think was fun; drunken swimming in sea, so lucky there were people there to get me out each time. What all this shows is that it is quite normal for young people to engage in risky behaviour, they perceive risk differently; it is useful to remember this if your DC's behaviour seems risky to you and you are struggling to comprehend it. Also, given all the risky going home with / getting lifts from random guys, doesn't that suggest that actually, the majority of blokes are not out there waiting to pounce on and abuse any vulnerable young women. On the contrary, men have often been kind and respectful to me in these situations.

Your lot have made me feel much better about STUPID risks I took when younger again for me hitch hiking, playing on building sites, unprotected ONSs. emmy yes I'll absolutely have to regularly give my head a wobble when DD hits the teenage years. The worry is though that it's our DD/DS who will encounter that 1/100 bad apple so I'll still be a strict old cow I'm sure!