Blowgun

So usually I tell this story as my little "your dumbest moment" when we're getting to know people in wards and class and stuff. I hope you like it! Lemme just give you some background first.

When I was about ten years old, an amazing invention had been made available to the public. It was the glorious blowgun! My brothers had gone to the Navy outlet store or whatever about a week earlier and bought their amazing new toys. Of course, being the naive, copy-catting brother that I was, I wanted one too. After all, my brothers were the envy of all their friends, I wanted to be too! So the race for the blowgun began! When you're a kid, and you see something you want, you will find a way to get it no matter the cost. I ran into the house and begged my mom to let me buy the blowgun. Of course, the answer was no. I had to work for my toy! So I started saving up my pocket money and soon I had enough money to go and get it!

I remember the drive to the outlet store. I couldn't wait to get my hands on that shiny long tube of black plastic. Of course to me, it was far more than plastic, it was my first step towards world-domination!! Mwahahahaha! When we finally stopped, I jumped out of the car and ran towards the blowgun section. Had I known that there were so many neat-o accessories, I would've brought more money! But it didn't matter! I got the basic set which included the gun and about ten darts.

Now let me just explain to you how the darts in blowguns work. They're small and skinny like flu-shot needle. And, they come with a nifty little thing on the back of the dart so when you load it in the gun, it doesn't pop out of the mouthpiece. Now, that's pretty brilliant now that I look back on it! The people who made those darts were pretty smart. I did poke myself again quite a few times trying to put those plastic ends on the darts but finally, I got everything together and I was ready to go have fun. Now, you know those warning labels that we all think are very funny 'cause they seem SO obvious...? Well, those are made for me.

Before I went outside, I created my own amazing dart board, consisting of a piece of paper and markers. Oh you should have seen the majesty of it! It basically basked in its own glory! So anyway, I was having a lot of fun in the backyard doing target practice. I was doing pretty well for being so far away so I decided to get a little closer to just see what it'd be like to practice closer... He he he. So anyway, I blew on one of the darts and it didn't go out all the way. So instead of just tilting it up so the dart would go back to the mouthpiece and be stopped, I sucked it in. And it was stopped by the mouthpiece so stop freaking out!

The problem came in later. I began to have a lot of fun with blowing the dart halfway out and then sucking it back in, only to have it stopped by the mouthpiece. Then, my brain decided it was time to change it up a little bit. I guess I was just a ten-year-old with a death wish. So I turned the blowgun around, so that the point where the really sharp dart came flying out at speeds over a million miles an hour, was facing my mouth. More like, IN my mouth... Then I decided to play a game where I would see how high I could get that metal shaft up the blowgun, without it getting in my mouth. But then my body decided it was time to gasp for no reason. Maybe a butterfly flew in front of me and scared me or something, I don't remember! But before I knew it, there was a long metal dart sticking out of the roof of my mouth.

At this point, time seemed to stop. I just kinda stood there in shock looking down at the hot-pink plastic end of the dart that was in my mouth. It was a strange sensation. But then I realized that the strange sensation coming from my mouth was a LOT of pain! That's when I began screaming and running around in circles. Ok, point one, I scream like a girl. You can imagine how funny that looked. Point two, if you've ever seen me freak out, you'll know it's hilarious. Point three, put point one and two together, and you get a hilarious mental image so just stick with me on this.

So then I ran into the house screaming "mom!" at the top of my lungs...or...at least the best sounding version of mom I could create with a big piece of metal sticking out of my mouth. I found her in the kitchen and I expected a motherly response where she would be concerned, help me to the bathroom, help me clean up, and then give me an ice cream or something to sooth the pain. But oh no, you know what I got? My mom looked at me, shook her head while LAUGHING of all things, and pointed me towards the bathroom. What kind of response is that?! Well, I went to the bathroom, managed to get the dart out of the roof of my mouth, it was pretty stuck in there, and then I put away my blowgun and never touched it again...

So I guess the main point of the story is the next time you laugh at those ridiculous warning labels, just remember. It was created because someone used it improperly...

"Blowgun: Warning, do not aim at face or mouth. Never inhale."