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(UL)Roping A Deer
(Hmmm)Tiger, not lion, kills 1, injurs 2
(DA)Slippery When Wet
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(Hmm)White Spirit IS Flammable
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(?)Let Me Get a Better Look!
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(HM)Home Made IED
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MANS BEST FRIEND???
Rafts, Rivers, Cement and Bridges
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Picnic Lunch
Holy Flaming DOH!
gangsta guns & fireworks don't mix
The high cost of gas
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Auger to Heaven
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Miami of Ohio University...
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Fire up the BBQ !
(several)
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The Faster Method
Kinky Sex, Shocking Death
highway worker nearly earns award
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1 shoot closes slaying case
Grafitti Vandals Drown
When Couch Potatoes Take Root.
two for one
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Do Tell
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Man Shot Himself In Genitals During
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Men shoot themselves in tattoo atte
Making Deadly Gas at Home
German man goes out with X-mas Tree
vodka+viagra death
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Semi-Conductor
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Metal fence gets revenge
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Go Get the Lawnmower
Next Time Buy a Ticket!
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Couldn't wait to get down and party
Truck-a-Luck
dangerous dog food
They Ain't no Bo and Luke Duke!
The Blue - Handed Pikeman
Un-happy slapper
Driver found unbuckled in crash, bu
Man Shot Himself In Genitals During
He now hates that 'Tom Tom' GPS!!!
A Crocodile Poacher gets scrambled.
Bare hand versus table saw
Drunken Phone Repair
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Belly dancing through traffic
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Super Glue Eye Drops
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New year buffaloe ride
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Slow Learner
Hangings should never be mocked up
Strong finger for firing a pistol
unsuccessful robber shoots self in
The Death of Deadtown
Don't want to fall out of this bed!
Abused car strikes back
Goat Overcomes Man
New years Nose Ring In Brain
Dog Love
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Listen to your parents!
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Darwin Awards
2008 Slush Pile

This item was recently submitted by a reader.
Should I include it in the archive?
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Slow Learner

2008 Reader Submission
Pending Acceptance

Now I am an intelligent man, well at least academically. However I seem to be lacking that part of my brain that contains common sense. For all you future Darwin award winners who haven’t guessed, I am still alive (though only because of luck) so this is merely only a person account of an honourable mention (or more).

When I was quite young (around 10, so most likely to young to be eligible for an honourable mention) I learned that sticking a fork in an electrical socket is painful. I mention this because being thrown across the room, blacking out for a few minutes and them proceeding to throw up should have taught me the lesson of electrical safety. However just as many other pervious nominees, I failed to learn my lesson. There has also been far to many times when I muttered the immortal words “Is this electric fence on” on fences ranging from powered by 12v battery’s (hurts a little) to powered by 240v (feels like being hit by a fist the size a truck on both sides of your body). As a side note, if you know about electric fences these are unlikely to be deadly, due to the length of the pulse and the change in volts and amps. Still touching an electric fence is still not the smartest thing to do.

So after all this, most people would have well and truly learned their lesson. Well all I can say to that is “I’m not most people” a fact that the human race should be thankful for. Years later while making numerous cold milk shakes on an especially hot day the blender got covered (by that I mean practically swimming) in spilled drink. As most of you would expect when an electrical device get very wet, you shouldn’t touch it as you could get a nasty, possibly deadly shock. Well I turned the blender on and (as you have probably already guessed) I got a very painful electric shock. Now this is was not the brightest thing in the first palace but probably not that uncommon. However my next thought was “oh f**k the blender and surrounding liquid is electrified, that’s dangerous. I better turn it of.” so instead of turning it of by the wall after drying my hands (as any rational person should do), I decided to turn it of flicking the same switch that just shocked me with still wet (quite sore) hand and you guessed it got shocked again.

That’s however is not the end of the story with in a week I did the exact same thing turning the wet blender on getting shocked then turning it of getting shocked again. I guess I’m just lucky that that each of those shocks caused my hand to be uncontrollably flung away from the source of the electrically very quickly. I believe after that I decided that cordial was the better drink for hot days. So maybe I have finally learned my lesson.

I'm not exacly sure of the date but it was the summer of 1999-2000 in Australia.

Submitted on 01/07/2008

Submitted by: Matthew
Reference: Personal account, Jan 12, 1999

Copyright © 2008 DarwinAwards.com

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Bruce said:
Definitely Keep: Personal Account
Sounds to me like you need a new blender. Thanks for a great story, Matthew!


Chip said:
Definitely Keep: Personal Account
Thanks for the story, Matthew. Sounds to me like the blender has a short in it. Incidentally, when I was 10 I used a pair of tweezers (not a fork) with electrical wire wrapped around each leg and taped to the side and end contact of a light bulb. I then inserted the tweezers in a wall socket. After I picked myself up off the floor from across the room, I had to get rid of the melted tweezers quickly and then make an excuse why the fuse was suddenly blown in the fuse box.


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