Potential comic accidents

[Night Train]

Don't know it this fits comic either.

I was driving a Land Rover through some road works with cones on each side of me. The traffic was crawling and there were cars joining on a slip road on the left. I was determined to only let one out at a time so as the car next to me creapt forward I held back to let him out in front of me.
Anyway, I though I would stay close to the back of him so the next car would come in behind me. As he drew in front and across me I kept fairly close and then felt a crunch and the Land Riover lurched a little.

I couldn't see what I had run over so assumed it was a pile of cones or something. The car ahead didn't have a problem and there was no one beside me joining either.
Then as the car in front pulled away I thought 'He's got a trailer, it only got a left side mud guard!

It seems I had run over his trailer and ripped the mud guard off on the right side. He didn't stop at the end of the cones and so I didn't worry about it.

 

[barq]

Not cycling related but...

"Barrel o' Fun"

 

[ComedyPilot]

Well, seeing as you asked, I was riding through Oberstdorf today in the sunshine and spied a good-looking waitress outside a cafe. As my attention was on her I didn't see the couple I almost collided with!! The bloke did say I should pay attention to the road and not young girls! Doh.

 

[andy_wrx]

There was the canalboat episode a couple of weeks ago.

There's a swingbridge over the Macc canal, next one up from Bosley Locks, near Gawsworth.
It has a big silver cabinet to control the bridge, operated by a key which the bargie-types get from British Waterways.

When I got there, this really scruffy bloke was fiddling around with the swingbridge controls, had the barriers down but couldn't get the bridge open, was doing lots of swearing and jabbing at all the buttons.
There were already two cars trying to get across in my direction and three on the other side.

I could have carried the bike over the footbridge, but I thought I'd try to help.
I'd never seen one of these bridge controls before, but there were buttons marked Up and Down, and Open and Close, and Emergency Stop.
It's a swingbridge, so I guessed Open and Close would do the bridge and Up and Down must be the barriers.

The bloke was jabbing at them all randomly, including Emergency Stop, and (surprisingly ?!?!?) nothing was happening. He was also trying to get his key out, although the machine seemed it wouldn't let him whilst the bridge was in-use.
More cars were arriving, the bloke was getting more stressed and swearing more, even though all the drivers were, for now at any rate, waiting patiently.

I persuaded him to try holding-down the Open button and after a pause the bridge swung open - result !

He then shouted to a woman on the other bank, saying she'd have to drive the boat through. I'd assumed she was just a spectator watching him hopping about and swearing, but seems she was with him on the boat.

"I can't", she said, "it's too narrow".
"You'll f*cking have to, I'm on this f*cking side, you'll have to f*cking do it"
- charming.

There's a woman driving the first car on my side and she and I exchange glances, both dying to laugh.

Eventually the woman goes off down the bank and then there's engine noise, then a barge appeared at a crazy angle across the canal.
"Steer this way ! F*cking this way ! This f*cking way !"

She clearly steered the other way, the bow hit the other bank and clattered along it, the stern hit the bank on my side and clattered along it, the swung-open bridge scraped noisily down the painted side of the boat and ripped-off the open saloon doors...

Lots and lots of 'f*cking' swearing from the bloke, all sorts of threats !

He goes over and fishes the doors out of the canal.
While he's doing this, I close the bridge by holding-down the Close button and then open the gates using the Up button. The bridge is now open and the cars start to cross.

He comes back and now the machine will let him remove the key.
"She's ripped me f*cking doors off !", he says, "I'll f*cking kill 'er".

As I ride across the canal, I look along it and perhaps 100 yds along is the barge, out in mid canal, with the woman on the bank...


Oh dear. This whole drama seemed to take ages and I was wishing I'd just minded my own business and gone over the footbridge.

But the thing that astonished me is that despite it taking 10-plus minutes, none of the motorists said anything. No-one got out of their cars to interfere or complain. A couple of people did turn around and drive off another way, but most just turned their engines off and waited
- perhaps they were all just enjoying the spectacle of this guy jumping about and swearing.

Ripping the doors off was the best bit !

 

[Batzman]

I was riding down a hill in NZ with a friend of mine, and a sheep picked the *wrong* moment to cross the road. ...I nearly fell off my bike laughing...

 

[alecstilleyedye]

There was the canalboat episode a couple of weeks ago.

There's a swingbridge over the Macc canal, next one up from Bosley Locks, near Gawsworth.
It has a big silver cabinet to control the bridge, operated by a key which the bargie-types get from British Waterways.

so that's why it's called the fool's nook then

 

[magnatom]

and intermittent squawking too...and a flurry of straw

Don't forget, you would also want a couple, partially undressed, to flee from the barn gathering their close as they make haste....

 

[Arch]

As I ride across the canal, I look along it and perhaps 100 yds along is the barge, out in mid canal, with the woman on the bank...

I think this bit was the crowning glory myself!

I was on a narrowboat holiday once, and we'd done some washing (just undies) and hung them on a line up at the prow, and a pair of my pants blew off and ended up in the canal. Which was funny, but we could have done without the laughter of the oiks on a fibreglass gin palace which was overtaking at the time...

 

[Speicher]

This wasn't funny at the time, but it was afterwards.

Some years ago, I woke up one morning, with a swollen left hand (mine ) and difficulty moving my fingers, which were an alarming shade of purpley sort of greeny.

Oh dear, thought I, I had better get to the Doctor. He took one look and sent me off to A and E. They looked at it, looked concerned and said to return the following day. I remember asking them if they would need to amputate the fingers, and they replied "they did not know".

Anyway, it was a splinter that had gone under the nail approx ten days earlier, causing my hand to go septic. They removed one nail and some nerves in the finger, and put the most gigantic bandage that they could possibly find (to cushion it against knocks) and said to have my arm in a sling. Fortunately it was my left hand.

Two days later, I went back to work. Everybody's first question was "What have you done to your arm?" or "How did you brake your arm?".
So when I said "I got a splinter in my finger" they all fell about laughing, and would not believe me.

 

[andy_wrx]

so that's why it's called the fool's nook then

Yes, that's the name of the pub opposite !

Clearly this guy was he !

 

[andy_wrx]

a fibreglass gin palace

The sort which cruise up and down the Ouse,
with radar rotating (why ? it's a river fer gawd's sake not the middle of the Atlantic)
with some guy ('the Captain' of course !) steering, wearing a peaked cap with an anchor or wheel on it,
and two or three over-made-up women neighing into their champagne glasses on deck ?

We used to call them 'Belgranos'...
(although I guess this was more topical in the early 80's when I was in York)


Or just the sort of glass-fibre cabin cruiser you get on canals
- the 'proper' steel narrowboat bargie-types call these things 'Tupperwares' and take great delight in bumping into them rather heavily when mooring...

 

[Arch]

The sort which cruise up and down the Ouse,
with radar rotating (why ? it's a river fer gawd's sake not the middle of the Atlantic)
with some guy ('the Captain' of course !) steering, wearing a peaked cap with an anchor or wheel on it,
and two or three over-made-up women neighing into their champagne glasses on deck ?

We used to call them 'Belgranos'...
(although I guess this was more topical in the early 80's when I was in York)


Or just the sort of glass-fibre cabin cruiser you get on canals
- the 'proper' steel narrowboat bargie-types call these things 'Tupperwares' and take great delight in bumping into them rather heavily when mooring...

The flashy Ouse sort, as I remember. Mind you, they all look alike to me.

I've cultivated a special look I give those boats, once which says "oh, I'm looking at you as you go by, but not because I admire you, but because I happen to like looking at boats generally, actually, I think you look ridiculous." I'm not sure how much they appreciate the subtlety of this. It the same sort of look I give boy racers in loud cars...

 

[Night Train]

Anyway, it was a splinter that had gone under the nail approx ten days earlier, causing my hand to go septic.

Ouch, sounds a really nasty outcome for a splinter.

I get quite a few splinters when I am working with reclaimed timber. I keep a clean scalpel to cut them out immediately and then dress the wound. The ones under the finger nail can be really painful to get out but a blade and sharp tweezers usually do it.

 

[Kirstie]

My other half crashed into a cow on his mountain bike once. I suppose it could be seen as funny but I don't think the cow was very impressed! It got up and ran off. One of his mates also beheaded a squirrel with his mtb. He was going down hill and it just ran out of a hedge into his wheels. Blood went everywhere and it was completely gross!

I've had the odd ultra-slow-over-the-bars crash whilst mtbing, and the classic catching a pedal on a tree stump which stops the bike dead so you carry on like superman...

 

[TheDoctor]

A friend came out of the pub, leapt onto his bike, missed it and fell on the ground on the other side. The bike then fell on him. And I almost wet myself laughing...
The same bloke nearly got run over cycling back from a beer festival. By an ambulance.

Actually, I begin to see the common thread...

And one that happened to me. I thought I could just about jump from the bank back to the barge. I was wrong.
Handy hint - Irish canals are deep. And very, very cold.