Place your Darwin nominees and winners here

[TBG 150]

"Life Is Short. Live It To The Fullest. It Has An Expiration Date"

   

In case you have been waiting breathlessly for this year's Darwin

Awards----awards are given each year to bestow upon the remains

or estate of (in most cases) that individual, who through single-minded

self-sacrifice, has done the most to remove undesirable elements

from the human gene pool. Just think... until these events occurred,

these same people were walking the streets just like normal people.

 

SIXTH PLACE:

Goes to a San Anselmo, California man who died when he hit a lift

tower at the Mammoth mountain ski area while riding down the slope

on a foam pad. 22-year old David Hubal was pronounced dead at

Central Mammoth Hospital. The accident occurred about 3 a.m., the Mono

County Sheriff's department said.

Hubal and his friends apparently had hiked up a ski run called Stump Alley

and removed some yellow foam protectors from lift towers, said Lt. Mike

Donnelly of the Mammoth Lakes Police Department. The pads are used to

protect skiers who might hit towers. The group apparently used the pads to

slide down the ski slope and Hubal crashed into a tower. It has since been

investigated and determined the tower he hit was the one with its pad removed.

FIFTH PLACE:

Goes to Robert Puelo, 32, was apparently being disorderly in a St. Louis market.

When the clerk threatened to call the police, Puelo grabbed a hot dog, shoved it

into his mouth and walked out without paying. Police found him unconscious

in front of the store. Paramedics removed the six-inch wiener from his throat

where it had choked him to death.

 

FOURTH PLACE:

Goes to poacher Marino Malerba of Spain, who shot a stag standing above him

on an overhanging rock and was killed instantly when it fell on him.

   

THIRD PLACE:

"Man loses face at party" A man at a West Virginia party (probably related to the

winner last year, a man in Arkansas who used the .22 bullet to replace the

fuse in his pickup truck) popped a blasting cap into his mouth and bit down,

triggering an explosion that blew off his lips, teeth, and tongue. Jerry Stromyer, 24,

of Kincaid, bit the blasting cap as a prank during the party late Tuesday night,

said Cpl. M.D. Payne. "Another man had a blasting cap in an aquarium hooked

to a battery and was trying to explode it. It wouldn't go off and this guy said,

"I'll show you how to set it off!" He put it into his mouth, bit down and it blew all his

teeth out and his lips and tongue off, Payne said. Stromyer was listed in guarded

condition Wednesday with extensive facial injuries, according to a spokesperson

at Charleston Area Medical Division "I just can't imagine anyone doing something

like that," Payne said. (Note: Maybe that's why they call these the Darwin Awards)

   

SECOND PLACE:

Doctors at Portland University Hospital said an Oregon man shot through the skull

by a hunting arrow is lucky to be alive and will be released soon from the hospital.

Tony Roberts, 25, lost his right eye last weekend during an initiation into a men's

rafting club, Mountain Men Anonymous (probably known now as Stupid Mountain Men

Anonymous) in Grants Pass, Oregon. A friend tried to shoot a beer can off his head,

but the arrow entered Robert's right eye. Doctors said that had the arrow gone

1 millimeter to the left, a major blood vessel would have been cut and Roberts

would have died instantly. Neurosurgeon, Doctor Johnny Delashaw, at the University

Hospital in Portland said the arrow went through 8 to 10 inches of brain with the tip

protruding at the rear of his skull, yet somehow managed to miss all major blood

vessels. Delashaw also said that had Roberts tried to pull the arrow out on

his own he surely would have killed himself. Roberts admitted afterwards

that he and his friend had been drinking that afternoon. Said Roberts, "I feel so dumb

about this."

   

THIS YEAR'S WINNER:

John Pernicky and his friend, Sal Hawkins, of the great state of Washington, decided to

attend a local Metallica concert at the George Washington amphitheater. Having no tickets

(but having had 18 beers between them), they thought it would be easy to "hop" over the

nine foot fence and sneak into the show. They pulled their pickup truck over to the fence and the plan was for Mr. Pernicky, who was 100 pounds heavier than Mr. Hawkins, to hop the fence and then assist his friend over. Unfortunately for (the late) Mr. Pernicky, there was a 30-foot drop on the other side of the fence.

Having heaved himself over, he found himself crashing through a tree. His fall was abruptly halted (and broken, along with his arm) by a large branch that snagged him by his shorts. Dangling from the tree with a broken arm, he looked down and saw some bushes below him. Possibly figuring the bushes would break his fall, he removed his pocket knife and proceeded to cut away his shorts to free himself from the tree.

Finally free, Mr. Pernicky crashed into holly bushes. The sharp leaves scratched his

ENTIRE body and now, without the protection of his shorts, a holly branch penetrated his rectum. To make matters worse, upon landing his pocket knife penetrated his thigh.

Hawkins, seeing his friend in considerable pain and agony, threw him a rope and tried to

pull him to safety by tying the rope to the pickup truck and slowly driving  away. However, in his drunken haste, he put the truck into reverse and crashed through the fence, landing on his friend and killing him.

Police arrived to find the crashed pickup with its driver thrown 100 feet from the truck and dead at the scene from massive internal injuries. Upon moving the truck, they found John deceased under it half-naked, scratches on his body, a holly stick in his rectum, a knife in his thigh, and his shorts dangling from a tree branch 25 feet in the air.

Congratulations gentlemen. You win. Five more idiots have been removed from the gene pool

and we are richer because of your supreme sacrifice.

[woodworker]

Those were truly inspiring, and gives one hope.  Thanks TBG.

The only sad thing concerning those that survived their gross stupidity is the fact that most likely it will be others that will have to pay for their medical expenses. 

Other than that it was like reading the funny papers with my cup of coffee. 

[TBG 150]

It did offer the same entertainment value to me this morning. Glad I could start your day with a smile.