Kids will be kids

[ChromeDome]

Around age 10 my dad got me one of those little compound bow beginner kits. Of course, the first month I went around our land sticking arrows in anything that could get stuck by an arrow.

Did you know that a 1955 40-horse Farmall tractor tire will take six rounds before it goes down? Tough son of a gun.

That got boring, so being the 10-year-old Dukes of Hazard fan that I  was, I quickly advanced to taking strips of cut up T-shirt doused in chainsaw gas tied around the end and was sending flaming arrows all over the place.

One summer afternoon, I was shooting flaming arrows into a large rotten oak stump in our backyard. I looked over under the carport and see a shiny brand new can of starting fluid (Ether). The light bulb went off in my head.

I grabbed the can and set it on the stump. I thought that it would probably just spray out in a disappointing manner. Let's face it, to a 10-year-old mouth-breather like myself, Ether, really doesn't "sound" flammable.

So, I went back into the house and got a 1-pound can of pyrodex (black powder for muzzle loader rifles).

At this point, I set the can of ether on the stump and opened up the can of black powder. My intentions were to sprinkle a little bit around the Ether can but it all sorta dumped out on me. No biggie, a 1-pound pyrodex and 16-oz can of Ether should make a loud pop, kinda like a firecracker you know?

You know what? Forget that. I'm going back in the house for the other can. Yes, I got a second can of pyrodex and dumped it too.

Now we're cookin'.

I stepped back about 15 feet and lit the 2-stroke arrow. I drew the nock to my cheek and took aim. As I released I heard a clunk as the arrow launched from my bow. In a slow motion time frame, I turned to see my dad getting out of the truck...OH SHOOT! He just got home from work.

So help me God it took 10 minutes for that arrow to go from my bow to the can. My dad was walking towards me in slow motion with a can't believe what I'm seeing look in his eyes. I turned back towards my target just in time to see the arrow pierce the starting fluid can right at the bottom. Right through the main pile of pyrodex and into the can.


When the shock wave hit it knocked me off my feet. I don't know if it was the actual compression wave that threw me back or just reflex jerk back from 235 decibels of sound. I caught a half-millisecond glimpse of the violence during the initial explosion and I will tell you there was dust, grass, and bugs all hovering one foot above the ground as far as I could see. It was like a little low to the ground layer of dust fog full of grasshoppers, spiders, and a worm or two.

The daylight turned purple. Let me repeat this... THE DAYLIGHT TURNED PURPLE.

There was a big sweetgum tree out by the gate going into the pasture. Notice I said "was". That tree got up and ran off.

So here I am, on the ground, blown completely out of my shoes, my thundercats T-shirt shredded, my dad is on the other side of the carport having what I can only assume is a Vietnam flashback: ECHO BRAVO CHARLIE YOU'RE BRINGIN' EM IN TOO CLOSE!! CEASE FIRE. DAMN IT CEASE FIRE!!!!!

His hat has blown off and is 30 feet behind him in the driveway. All windows on the north side of the house are blown out and there is a slow rolling mushroom cloud about 2000 feet over our backyard. There is a Honda 185 3-wheeler parked on the other side of the yard, the fenders are drooped down, and are now touching the tires.

I wish I knew what I said to my dad at this moment. I don't know - I know I said something. I couldn't hear. I couldn't hear inside my own head. I don't think he heard me either... not that it would really matter. I don't remember much from this point on.

I said something, felt a sharp pain, and then woke up later. I felt a sharp pain, blacked out, woke later....repeat this process for an hour or so and you get the idea. I remember at one point my mom had to give me CPR and dad screaming "Bring him back to life so I can kill him again."

Thanks Mom.

One thing is for sure... I never had to mow around that stump again, mom had been griping about that thing for years and dad never did anything about it. I stepped up to the plate and handled business.

Dad sold his muzzle loader a week or so later. I still have some sort of bone growth abnormality, either from the blast or the beating, or both.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, get your kids into archery. It's good discipline and will teach them skills they can use later on in life.

[Grumpy]

Dang it, don't do ,that. Spit half a cup of coffee on my key board. I can remember a few ass whoppings
for some stuff I pulled growing up. But that was funny 

[Kaiser]

 

[Stanley Steamer]

I guess I wasn't so bad as a child compared to you......I only shot a Cousin in the @ss and shot the windows out of my Granny's old house with the BB gun I got for Christmas one year.....that got me a good whipping......

[hubcapsc]

There's a story I used to think was interesting involving me, some other kids, a
gasoline-explosion-created GIANT smoke ring that could probably be seen for miles, and a property
owner driving through the woods in his 1970-something Impala to investigate. But it didn't involve my
father, and I didn't blow up personally.

Basically, ChromeDome, your story is at least as funny as Dave Berry's story about
his colonoscopy... both made me laugh out loud...

http://www.miamiherald.com/2009/02/11/v-print/427603/dave-barry-a-journey-into-my-colon.html

-Mike

[Jess from VA]

Flushing the car keys got me a BIG whippin. "Why would you do that???"  " I dunno...."

Years later, playing in an apple orchard, we stuck 2" black cats in rotten apples and played hand grenade.  

Pure devilment.    

Two things to NEVER get a child....... a whistle and a drum set. 

[John Schmidt]

Just ask my aunt. I had two cousins, brothers, a year older and younger than me...I was right in the middle. What we didn't do when I spent the summers on their farm. One summer we thought it a neat idea to dam up the creek behind the house. Beavers would have been jealous of our job, however Uncle Ralph wasn't. He was plowing and saw a couple hog sheds float by in the creek...along with a few of his hogs, swimming with the current. Butt whooping #1 that summer. Some of you old timers recall wind chargers that were in use looonnnng before the current windmill farms. They were used to charge a whole slew of big glass cased batteries which provided DC voltage for the farm back when eletricity wasn't run out into the country. My uncle finally got electricity on the farm and removed the big fan from the top of the wind charger....they looked like a small windmill. One summer day, my cousins and I lugged this huge rock up to the top of the old wind charger frame and set it on the working platform on top....about 70' up. My dear aunt was doing the wash and after she hung a basket of clothes and went back inside, we pushed the rock off the platform....it crashed and banged all the way down. Marv, the youngest still had the highest pitched voice so he was screaming as the rock went down. Did I mention we had been told to not play up there. My aunt came screaming out of the house, running right through the screen door, thinking one of us had fallen off the top. We were sitting up there laughing like crazy, all she did was take off her apron and get in the pickup, then headed for the field where my uncle was. Whooping #2 was in the works.

The third one was almost worth it. We sneaked up to a neighboring farm through the field to where lovely Hazel lived....a slightly older "woman of the world." On the farm, nobody pulled their shades, including Hazel. She knew we were out there...and so did their dogs. Moral of that story...don't try a hasty exit through the barnyard....very slippery. And incriminating.

[buffalobill]

You oughta write kids books

[bentwrench]

Forget needing a new keyboard from my drink,I nearly passed a nutrigrain bar through my nose when that tree "got up and walked off"
bw

[FryeVRCCDS0067]

I've got 4 bows in the closet, 18lbs of smokeless powder, 5lbs of black powder and substitutes, at least one can of either and several gallons of chainsaw gas. You really shouldn't be telling me these stories cause I've never really grown up. Dang that was funny.

When I was a kid I used to put carbide into everything that was holding water. Crawdad holes were awesome. Then wait till it started foaming/boiling and throw in a match. Man, what fun.

Or I'd spend hours tearing apart several rolls of caps, wrap the powder containing parts into a big ball of aluminum foil and smack it with a hammer!! Oh Yeah!

Man what a great story, thanks for sharing it.

[alph]

When I was a about 12 I was into model rockets.  I also was cheap, or resourceful.  I got a hold of a box of matches.  There was about 50 books of matches in that box.  So, I clipped the tips off of the matches making a pile of match heads about two inches high, and four inches around.  Now, being a good racketeer I had to test my fuel.  I placed a lit match to one of the heads and in a second I had a rolling mushroom cloud, in the living room.  I was home alone, for the moment.  I was so amazed at this cloud growing, and growing!!  I realized that there was a lot of smoke in the house, so I opened the windows to let in some air.  Just then I saw my mother walking down the driveway coming home from work.  it was really funny, there was about four feet of smoke hanging from the ceiling of the house.  Mom walks in, all I could see were her legs.  She starts yelling at me in Italian. Goes back up to our restaurant gets my father and that was pretty much the end of my NASA career. 

[Flask]

I do not post very often. But I had to post on this story.
Maybe I could picture myself or one of my brothers playing this story out to the T.
I have not laughed that hard in a long time. 

Thanks for bringing back memories of the good old days ----- It keeps us young at heart !!!!

[John Schmidt]

One of the best tricks ever played on my PITA younger sister was on Halloween. She always made a big deal out of everything and making a jack-o-lantern for my girls was no exception. My girls were all grade school age at the time and she did the carving with great flourish and the girls were all wide-eyed. Another cousin of mine was staying with my parents while attending Jr. College, and we had a few firecrackers left over. When my sis went looking for a match to light the candle(a big deal in a house of non-smokers), Jimmy and I cut a slot in the top of the lid she had cut out and stuck a firecracker in it. We positioned it so the fuse was right over the candle's wick. She comes back with my girsl in tow, lights the candle and with great pomp and circumstance marches through the house toward the front door, with plans of placing it on the front steps. She never made it, or should I say....the jack-o-lantern never made it. The firecracker went off right at the door, and she was standing there with her hands still out in front, holding only a piece of the bottom of the pumkin. The rest was spread all over the walls, door, dripping off her nose, and she was just looking at it in disbelief. Meanwhile my girls were all excited, yelling "do it again auntie." Dad had to hold his newspaper up to cover the fact he was losing it laughing so hard. Mom however....different story. She was NOT happy and Jimmy and I had to clean the living room walls over the next couple days. It was worth it though, plus my sister couldn't hear what were saying to her for the next 2-3 days.

[old2soon]

Fair dadgum warning-ya ain't sposed to put that thar funny stuff out in public whar an old fart like me with C O P D high blood pressure and other age induced ailments is likely to read it. I will not tell you what came out of my nose and mouth while i was laughing so hard-but your gettin a cleaning bill. Damnation that was funny. Kinda messed up my Dr dentons also. RIDE SAFE.

[GreenLantern57]

My wife is sitting here looking at me like I am crazy.  Have not laughed soo hard because of .... not sure the statue of limitations has gone by on that one, but lets just say it was funny as hell.  Well we all laughed at it later.

[hotglue #43]

That's great!!!!! reminds me of my youth!!!!!  I know for a fact.... it takes 11 weeks ta grow yer eyebrows back... thanks to blackpowder.... Don't ask me about the "UFO's" I used ta make..... that burned up the hay field.... got my butt tore up for that.....again!!!!! Have ya ever read Pat McMannis???Great short stories...  his stories remind me of my follies when I was much younger ... and more foolish..LOL..... and yep... I jumped off the barn with a sheet as a parachute.......

[Kendall]

Fantastic story Thanks...

[John Schmidt]

Re. jumping off the barn....I did almost the same thing as a preschooler. I figured if Superman can fly with a cape, it must be true. So, I got out a big red bandanna(had to be red) and tied it around my neck. Then climbed about 20' up our windmill and jumped. That was the first broken ankle...not to be the last. Knocked the wind out of me as well. That was about 70 yrs. ago and my ankle still tells me when rain is on the way.

Back then and in the years to follow, we had to make our own entertainment, often to our parents dismay. But I also remember being scared out of my wits as a young lad listening to the war news with H.V. Kaltenborn. What a reporter...as I recall I believe he reported on the radio without a script, just used notes he had taken earlier.

[alph]

Those are all great memories.  Thanks for sharing ‘em.

Makes me sad when I see my kids growing up in today’s society.  So many parents afraid that their little precious angels will get damaged if they were to climb a tree, so they cut down the perfect oak, that was waiting for that not so perfect tree fort. 

Oss, don’t be offended, but, DAMN THOSE ATTORNEYS!! 

[R J]

Damn it oss, you brought back way too many things I did as a kid growing up on the farm.

Some of the things I did that got me some good ass whompins and when I say good, dad would have been in jail in these times.   Mom painted my back, butt and legs in iodine many many times, I still have some of the scars.

1st ass whompin:    Creosoted a corn cob and stuck it up a farm cats butt.   All I can say is get the 4377 out of it’s way.   Them claws are sharp.

2nd ass whompin:   Had seen dad clomp the old bull in the forehead when he wouldn’t go where dad wanted him.   Well any animal of a size to carry me, I either rode em or tried damn hard.   I rode the old bull a lot and one day he wouldn’t go through the gate.   I always took a small baseball bat with me to the pasture to knock on bee hives and such.   Got stung a few times and blew some of them up with firecrackers also.    Vell da old bull got the baseball bat on the head as hard as a 8 year old could swing it.   After jerkin cows tites for a few years I had pretty good strength in da arms..   He dropped like a rocket and I was partially penned under him.   The bull was dead, and I never went to school, set down or laid on my back for about 6 weeks.    Flunked 2nd grade for that little stunt.

3rd ass whompin:    Had a neighbor like someone else who paraded around naked and she always had a crowd watching.  That would be us neighboring farm boys, aged about 7 to 14.     She was entertaining the farm hand one day and someone threw a firecracker in the window, it rolled up under the bed and went off.   Farm hand jumped about 20’ in the air and his legs were moving full speed ahead as he came out the window buck assed naked.    He thought her husband had took a shot at his bare butt with double ‘O’ buckshot.  Of course, I got blamed for the firecracker.   I ain’t  talkin and that is my story an I’m stickin to it.

4th ass whompin:    Grandma had a fire cracker business for a month before and after the 4th of July each year.    Well. I and my cousin got into her left over big fire crackers.   They were the equivalent of M80’s now.  They were legal to sell then.  Cost like a $.01 apiece.   We found an old car muffler in the back of the station uptown and hauled it to the farm.    Stood it on end and pounded the end in the ground.  We’d light a firecracker and drop it in the other end was straight up in the air.   There would be a pop and a flash out the end.   We put a bucket on top later and blew it off.   Got a couple of feet in the air.    Well if one will do that then 2 will do better.   That was fun, now let’s try 3, then 4, and then 5.  Bucket was getting pretty high, bottom was pushed up so it wouldn’t set flat now more.  One last try, we dropped 6 of those firecrackers in there all taped together.    Bucket went airborne to never be seen again and the firkin muffler blew apart also.   I still carry a scar in my leg from it.    Back then there was no insurance and very little $$$$ so they pulled  the chunk of metal out, my leg was  washed out and a bottle of iodine poured in and then wrapped in and old worn out shirt of dad’s.

I kind of tapered that sheet off after that.   Everyone said later I’d be damn lucky to live to see 21.    Well, I fooled them, I will be a rough around the edges 79 in a few months.

Problem is, if my kids would have done that, I’d of killed em.    

Yup. kids don't know how to have fun anymore.   Can't walk 5 blocks to school either.   Can't roam the neighborhood, or have to be home before the street lights come on.

Got to have them damn cell phones, iPods and etc.

[Redline +]

Reminds me of the first acetylene bomb I made. I had seen it done before...but I thought a bigger bag would be better. OMG!

Redline 

[ChromeDome]

As much as I would like to take credit for being Robin Hood in the making I can't. My parents discovered by the time I was 3 or 4 to keep anything sharp, flammable or explosive away from me.

[Skinhead]

Well, my boys are now 30 and 27.  I told them from day one, don't event try to BS me about stuff they did or were planning to do as I'm sure I'd been there and done that. 

Most of my family still lives in Pittsburgh, and we had been taking summer vacations at a little camp in the PA mountains between Ridgeway and St. Marys since I was six. So each summer me and my boys would make the trip from MI to Pa and meet up with the whole family for a week in the Pa mountains.  The perfect place for young boys to hike, swim, ride motorcycles, set off fireworks, shoot, catch critters, etc. 

Well when the boys were about 10, they met up there with their cousin, who is between them in age, and set out with some firecrackers for a day of fun playing by the crick (creek to you non-burghers).  Josh decided he had to take a dump and did so under the bridge.  Jason thought it would be funny to stick a firecracker in the steaming pile of excrement, but they forgot to let Eric (who was playing a few feet away) in on it.  When they got back to camp, my sister could barely discipline the kids see was laughing so hard.  She sent them back down to the crick with a bar of soap and told them not to come back until Eric and his clothes were clean.

[fudgie]

I got a scar on my bicept from my brothers bow. He either shot it directly at me or up in the air the see when it lands. Either way I got a 1" scar.