Asklemmy

I was on the roof of a 4 story building and was trying to show off to others. The building next to the one I was on was 3 stories and there was an alley between the buildings. The alley was wide enough for cars to get through and a line of trees next to the driving part, about 20 feet total from building to building. I wasn't going to try jumping the entire alley, my plan was to jump to a tree, grab one of the branches and 'ride' it to the roof of the other building. I executed the manuever almost perfectly. It went exactly as I had imagined but with one exception: I was also smoking a cigarette. The lit part of the cigarette was knocked off the end and the burning coals managed to slip around my glasses and got stuck directly in the middle of my eyeball. It burned my cornea, thankfully not too seriously. I was blind in that eye for about a month while it healed.

I honestly don't know how I am not blind in that eye. It's my good eye too. I've had 2 other situations that led to being blinded in the same eye, that was the second incident. Both of the other two incidents are also dumb.

The first was from me forgetting to take out my contacts, during the brief time I wore them. They were one pair a week contacts, which I wore for a month and a half. The eye got infected and prevented me from wearing contacts again due to corneal scarring. It also prevented me from seeing much of anything at my first concert. I was 14 and the headliner was Blink 182. I was told that they had ladies take their shirts off on the stage, something 14 year old me would have been very interested in seeing. I saw nothing though, one eye was covered with a medical patch, the other was contactless, I had no glasses at the time and my vision in the eye that worked is 20/180.

The last and most recent dumb injury was not really my fault, at least I don't think it was but that's debatable. I was working in an aluminum extrusion factory. They made parts for the frames of windows and doors. After the parts are extruded and cut, some of the edges are razor sharp. A coworker of mine had to take a tool and deburr these sharp edges, so that workers handling the material don't cut themselves by accident (or on purpose I suppose). The process leads to piles of razor sharp slivers of aluminum all over the place. I was chatting with a coworker after my shift was done, waiting for her to finish cleaning up her work area. I had removed my work glasses and was wearing my normal glasses. Big OSHA no-no. My normal glasses did not have the requisite side shields. The coworker used compressed air to clean up the area by blasting the pieces off the extrusions and onto the floor to be swept up. She playfully blasted some in my direction while we were talking. A sliver of aluminum was blasted into my eye and got lodged there. I had to have minor surgery and was blinded in that eye for 2 months. Since I was clocked out at the time, I was not covered by workmans comp. I probably could have gotten it covered but at that time I regularly smoked weed, so I would have failed the mandatory workmans comp drug screen and lost my job. I chose to keep my job and paid for the removal, approximately $9,000 in 2005 money.

Thanks for reading! Since this was pretty long, you get a bonus for reading: A dumb joke! In 2015 I had a job interview. I had seen a joke online and everything needed for the joke played out. The interviewers asked me where I saw myself in 5 years. I responded that I did not know because I did not have 2020 vision. I did not get the job. Still worth it.