The Darwin Awards Countdown to Extinction (3 page)

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Authors: Wendy Northcutt

BOOK: The Darwin Awards Countdown to Extinction
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“The world is not a petting zoo.”
“If the police had sent in divers looking for the body, serial Darwin Awards could have been issued. Happily, justice was blind but not stupid.”
At-Risk Survivor: Ninja Deer Hunter
Unconfirmed Personal Account
Featuring hunting, food, and a deer
 
 
1996, TEXAS | My father’s friend, Joe, was out in one of the many hunting leases in southeast Texas, looking for a delicious hunk of venison on the hoof. When he failed to return to home base, his worried wife went to check on him. She found him in an unconscious state with blood and puncture wounds all about his body! Joe suffered no lasting damage, despite his incredibly risky misadventure:
That morning he had been in a climbing stand up in a tree above an open creek bottom—his favorite spot—when he heard a deer blow at his back. He didn’t risk turning to look, for fear of spooking the animal, so he quietly waited . . . until a large buck sauntered just under the tree he was in! Apparently he did not have time to carefully determine his best course of action. Rather than lean down and shoot the animal in the head, an easy kill, he opted to attack with a large hunting knife.
Positioning himself in a catlike crouch, he pounced on the deer, intending to close the deal on what could have been an awesome deer-slaying story. But when he landed, the trajectory of the knife was slightly askew. He swung the blade under the buck’s throat and into his own opposing thigh.
Since he landed on the animal’s neck, it had no trouble determining its
own
best course of action. It threw its large rack back into the man’s face. Following the head butt the hunter lost consciousness, and what followed is clear speculation based on the blood trail and shreds of clothing. He appeared to have been dragged about forty yards across the forest floor before his flannel jacket—being the main reason for staying on the buck after the eight-second buzzer—tore loose and released him from the beast.
He did not have time to carefully determine his best course of action.
In time, he healed completely, and that stand is still Joe’s favorite hunting spot!
 
Reference: Grady Woods
Deer occasionally gain an advantage over their primary predators. “I had this idea that I was going to catch a deer, put it in a stall, sweet feed it on corn for a few weeks, then butcher it. Yum! Corn-fed venison. The first step in this adventure was acquiring a live deer. . . .” Things go from bad to worse in “Roping a Deer,” from
Darwin Awards Next Evolution: Chlorinating the Gene Pool
(Plume, 2009).
At-Risk Survivor: The Mane Attraction
Unconfirmed
Featuring food, a lion, the military, and insurance
 
 
2009, POLAND | One day a young man living in Wroclaw received a large envelope in the mail. One look and he knew exactly what it was: the draft. In Poland, when a man turns eighteen he is summoned to the medical commission to determine whether he is healthy enough to serve his country.
There are ways to avoid being conscripted. For instance, being enrolled in higher education or providing sole financial support for a child or suffering a serious physical handicap. Our boy was completely healthy, had no kids, and was not smart enough to continue his education. In short, he was destined to serve his country. And he was determined to avoid it.
The Polish medical commission has four categories:
A.
In good health, and able to serve in the army.
D.
Able to serve only during wartime.
E.
Completely unable to serve, even during war.
B.
Temporarily unable to pass the medical exam; e.g., recovering from an accident but expected to return to full health. “B” candidates must attend another medical commission in twelve months.
Our hero wanted Category B, and another twelve months to find some way of cheating the army. But how? While playing with his cat, he was accidentally scratched, and
bang
! The idea was formed. A few serious scratches and stitches would qualify him for a deferment.
The big cat decided that such insolence must be punished.
Our man decided that a small cat was not enough, which leads us to the Wroclaw zoo. The incidental spectators watched in amazement as he strode toward the lion cage, reached inside, and started yelling at a large male beast. The King of Cats looked in amusement upon the small being stubbornly trying to provoke him, but when the little hominid pulled its handsome mane, the big cat decided that such insolence must be punished.
Our man’s plan worked better than he expected. He received not a B, but an E. You see, the irate lion did not simply scratch the idiot. It used its powerful jaws to bite the man’s arm off.
This story was aired on Polish TV when the amputee sued his insurance company for failure to pay for the missing arm. The company successfully asserted that it does not cover the loss of a limb due to the bite of an intentionally provoked lion.
 
Reference: Polish TV
Reader Comment
 
“A piece of advice:
Never
avoid the draft by provoking a lion.”
At-Risk Survivor: Not Even Half-Baked
Unconfirmed Personal Account
Featuring food, a woman, and electricity
 
 
Fewer and more fastidious, female Darwin Award contenders prefer more wholesome methods for their special acts.
After an extended night shift, our heroine, a working mother, was exhausted but decided to stay up a few extra hours until the kids came home from school. Being a thoughtful mom and a junk-food junkie, the tired woman decided that this was the time to bake a cake.
Her ancient yellow electric mixer had a detachable cord that plugged into the back of the appliance. Things were going well—butter, sugar, flour, cocoa—until the loose cord popped out of the old mixer and landed in the dough.
Plop
.
Ever the safety-conscious professional, she carefully turned off and set aside the completely inert mixer, and lifted the cord out of the batter. But what did she do with cake batter dripping off the end of the cord? She did what anyone would do—she stuck the live electrical cord in her mouth and found herself on the floor, suddenly very wide awake. Did I mention that the old cord was un-grounded?
Having lived to tell the tale
and
having reproduced she is twice disqualified from winning the Darwin Award, but there is an ironic twist. Who would relate such an idiotic thing? Who would be dumb enough to electrify herself mouth first, and honest enough to use it as a safety lesson afterward? Only an Occupational First Aid instructor, introducing the learning module on electric shock!
What happened to the cake is anyone’s guess.
 
Reference: A student of the First Aid Instructor
WENDY’S DEADLY DINNER PARTY
To celebrate the publication of a new Darwin Awards book, the author hosted a dinner party featuring Suspicious Mushroom Soup, E. Coli Spinach Salad, Faux Fugu, and assorted deadly delectable and toxic treats. Her centerpriece was carefully picked branch of poison oak, carried home from a walk wrapped in layers of fabric, and carefully transferred to a high-walled glass display vessel. Three days latter . . . your guessed it: She developed a pernicious poison oak rash. The moral of the story is, there is
no such thing as picking poison oak safely.
“He who teaches himself has a fool for a master.”
—Benjamin Franklin
At-Risk Survivor: The Great Fruitcake Incident
Confirmed Personal Account
Featuring a father, food, holidays, an explosion, and alcohol
 
 
A holiday-themed personal account, with one more reason to be leery of too much Christmas cheer.
 
2005 | I love cooking. Every year I bake a few fruitcakes for family and neighbors. I mix in various alcohols, so people actually
eat
my fruitcakes. Now, I’ve been known to experiment with various types of alcohol. In 2005, I was suffering from a shortage of Jack Daniel’s whiskey, so I searched the kitchen and settled on a bottle of tequila. After mixing a measure of the Mexican liquor into the batter, I poured it and slid the pan home.
I was suffering from a shortage of Jack Daniel’s whiskey.
Alcohol burns, so when you bake a fruitcake you use a low temperature. Set the oven no higher than 250 degrees so your cakes don’t catch on fire—never a good thing, and besides, it’s hard to explain why the top of the cake is charred.
As I slid the pan in, my father came into the room. He also loved cooking, and he was darn good at it. Poking around, he started making suggestions. I remember seeing him look at my oven, look back at me, and laugh. “You’ll never get it done like
that
.” He reached over and turned the heat up to 350°F.

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