Embarrassing Absent-Mindedness

Sean D. Schaffer

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Have you ever caught yourself doing things absent-mindedly that just flat-out embarrassed you?

I got to thinking about this tonight as I went to put sugar in my coffee.

I reached for a ball-point pen instead of my spoon and almost dipped it into the sugar bowl. :rolleyes: Only after having noticed the light weight of the plastic pen compared to my stainless steel spoon, did I realize I had actually picked up the wrong utensil.

I've done other things that were equally embarrassing or just plain bizarre, but I thought this would make a good OP thread.

What kind of stuff have you done, just completely absent-mindedly, that when you finally realized what you did or almost did, made you just take a second look and wonder, "What the heck did I do that for?"

:)
 

JoNightshade

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I did almost the same thing the other day. I poured myself a bowl of cheerios, filled it with milk, opened the silverware drawer, and grabbed a fork. I had it an inch away from the bowl before I stopped and just stood there, thinking, "Something's wrong with this picture."

I was kinda sleepy. :)
 

shakeysix

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the 3 worst

once, when my 3 girls were still in grade school, i left them in the car while i went into the store for just a minute. they pulled down the back seat and crawled into the trunk so i would think they were kidnapped. only i had forgotten all about them by the time i got back to the car. so i took off across the store parking lot. they were bumping and hollering but i was on a public street before i pulled over. had a heart attack when they popped out of the trunk.

another time i put a kettle of water on to boil for my breakfast tea. then i was called by a friend to cover her shop for an hour. after that i sat and had a cup of tea with her. when i got home the tea kettle was melted and dripping onto the linoleum floor. try explaining that one to an insurance agent.

and then i agreed to watch my friend's baby one night. she had had her wisdom teeth out. her husband was out of town. i said fine. my girls were staying with their grandmother. fed the little guy. put him to bed on one of the girls beds and read a good book till my husband got home. the next morning the ugliest song was on the radio. it went something like "waaaaa! waaa! auugghghh! " my husband sat up and asked "is there a baby in the house?" well, i'll be go to hell there was! poor baby was only about three months old. he was soaking wet, starving and had worked himself down between the mattress and the wall. you should have seen my husband's face when i pulled that baby out of the mattress. but the kid is about thirty now. he gave me a big hug in wal mart the other day. so obviously i did not scar him--s6

ps--to all you whippersnappers--don't smoke anything green. ever.
 
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joetrain

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i do stuff like this all the time. the craziest was when i peed in the kitchen trash can. i was pretty young, and had just woken up, and i had to pee. i was already in the kitchen, so i walked over, pulled the trashcan out from under the sink, and began urinating. about halfway through i realized why things didn't seem right, but i couldn't just stop, so i finished, put the trashcan back, and never mentioned it.

... did i mention that i was young, a child really ... i swear.
 

Sean D. Schaffer

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Oh, man, Joetrain, I hear you! :eek:

When I was a teenager, I was at a Thanksgiving party at my family's house. I wanted to go to the bathroom, and the bathroom was down the short hallway just beyond the dining room.

I walked up to the dining room table, where several people were seated and talking. As I walked up, I began to unbuckle my belt and open my fly. It took me about ten seconds of standing there doing this before I realized I was not in the bathroom.

Thankfully, no one looked; they just kept talking. I'm sure that, if I had actually gone through with what I had started, that would have changed pretty darned quickly.
 

threedogpeople

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I forgot Father's Day one year, completely and totally missed it despite the banners, commercials, store displays, notation on the calendar.....

I also have served more than one meal and left something that I had prepared in advance sitting in the fridge. Said item only being discovered while the kitchen was being cleaned (I'm particularly susceptible to this one during large events like Thanksgiving). I've learned the hard way to make a "cheat sheet" for myself so I serve the entire meal.

However, the cheat sheet doesn't always work - last week we had friends over for dinner; I made home-made chili and didn't add the beans. I didn't connect the dots even after hubby commented that the chili seemed quite thin & runny. As I was putting away the left overs (not many) from dinner, I realized what I had done.

Oh, man, and the number of times I have seasoned something with nutmeg instead of ground chili peppers or coriander rather than cumin or....some of the mistakes were quite inedible; like the garlic salt in the scrambled eggs - it tasted like the eggs had gone bad.

I showed up for lunch one day - a day early.
 

ishtar'sgate

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My husband and I went out to dinner with friends and during the meal I suddenly realized that everyone had stopped talking and was staring at me. I was carrying on a conversation while cutting up my husband's meat into teeny tiny pieces just like I did for my little girl!
Linnea
 

maestrowork

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I once came out of a restaurant and went to my car and tried to open it. I kept trying and trying and trying and trying but the key wouldn't go in. Then I realized maybe it wasn't my car. The most embarrassing thing was the owner of that car came out just then and said, "May I help you?"

:eek:
 

WVWriterGirl

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I routinely dole out food for both my husband and my 5-year-old son. The best are when I'm delivering the food to the table, sit the plate down in front of the boy and trot off to get my own food. Then he says, "Mom, this is too much." When I look, I've put my husband's plate down in front of the boy.

I do all sorts of absent-minded things ALL the time. I'm just too absent-minded to think of them right now...
 

maestrowork

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And how can I forget... In college, after I finished swimming I went to the changing room to change. Someone was taking a shower and when the person came out... I gasped -- it was a woman. She just stared at me, didn't say anything. I got so embarrassed I just left. I thought maybe she made a mistake -- but I realized I was the one who made the mistake.

I also went into the women's changing room at the wave pool once because I had my sunglasses on and I could only see the "MEN" but not the "WO"... and I couldn't hear my friends yelling at me from behind... I only realized my mistake when I saw the women... Oops.

I also went into the women's bathroom at Panera Bread once and when I realized there was no urinal, I backed out really quickly and checked the door sign again...

So... you see the pattern here. :eek:
 
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JoNightshade

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Ray, I think your subconscious may be trying to tell you something... ;)

When I was in college I had a roommate who would wake me up every morning at 6 AM as she got up to... do whatever. Anyway, I always had to go pee. One morning I woke up around 8 when she came back from her workout and I said, "Wow, you were really quiet this morning, I didn't wake up at all."

She says, "Are you kidding? You got up and went to the bathroom and flushed three times. I thought it was a little weird but I didn't say anything."

So that would be my one and only sleepwalking incident. :)
 

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We had guests, a couple, staying for the weekend. On the Saturday morning I took my dog for a walk at on the beach at dawn. On arrival back at home almost two hours later, I needed to pee so I just walked into the bathroom, to find Wanda, one of the guests sitting in the bath naked. I had completely forgotten they were in the house. For once in my life I was quick witted and said "Wanda, cover your eyes I need a pee". She sat there with her eyes screwed shut until I finished. I said "thanks" and beat a hasty retreat.
 

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I'm always trying to answer the phone using the TV handset. I actually tried to dial on it last night. Thankfully no one was here.
I served a pizza to friends, with the polystyrene plate like a doyley, still stuck to the bottom.

Maggie
 

Devil Ledbetter

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and then i agreed to watch my friend's baby one night. she had had her wisdom teeth out. her husband was out of town. i said fine. my girls were staying with their grandmother. fed the little guy. put him to bed on one of the girls beds and read a good book till my husband got home. the next morning the ugliest song was on the radio. it went something like "waaaaa! waaa! auugghghh! " my husband sat up and asked "is there a baby in the house?" well, i'll be go to hell there was! poor baby was only about three months old. he was soaking wet, starving and had worked himself down between the mattress and the wall. you should have seen my husband's face when i pulled that baby out of the mattress. but the kid is about thirty now. he gave me a big hug in wal mart the other day. so obviously i did not scar him--s6

ps--to all you whippersnappers--don't smoke anything green. ever.
If there's a cake, that story takes it.:tongue
 

JudyThomas

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I have to admit, I don't think I can beat the "forgetting the baby" story.

We had a really bad winter storm in 1983 (the reason I remember so well... I was six months pregnant with my middle child). The water froze in just about the whole town. My husband at the time went on it to keep the store open and called for me to bring him a plate of food for lunch. I grabbed his food and, when I got to his store, he asked if I would run to the grocery store and pick him up something. So... being the good wife I am... I jumped back in the car and took off to the grocery store. I'm in the middle of the store when I glance down and realize I am still wearing the hideous, large, green slippers with a frog head at the toe my best friends had given me as a joke for Christmas. I'd left them on because, after all, I was JUST running down to his store!

Another time, I sat for several seconds at a stop SIGN waiting for the non-existent light to turn green.
 

Eskimo1990

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Awhile ago, when I was still in middle school I thought my alarm had gone off. I looked at the clock and some reason to me the 2 apparently looked like a 5. So I got up and got into the shower. I was halfway through showering when my mom came in the bathroom and was like "What are you doing?" So I answered "Showering." Then she told me it was only 2 in the morning. Since I was already almost done with the shower I finished up and went back to bed for another 3 hours. Needless to say when she mentioned it in the morning I was pretty embarrassed.

Another embarrassing thing, actually just happened. I just forgot how to spell embarrassed so I pulled up Word typed it in to make sure. Click back on here to realize that the word Embarrassing was right there. hehe oops
 

sunna

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At least twice a year I lock myself out of my apartment. I'll get all ready for work, sling the purse over my shoulder, grab my notebook and my lunch, and wander out the door, locking it as I shut it - only to realize the instant I hear that 'click' that I can't get in, can't drive anywhere, can't call anyone because my cell's on the table, and my shoes are inside, and it's 10 degrees out.

I'm not my mother yet. Really. She leaves her keys in the freezer sometimes. I've never figured out how she manages that one.
 

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The worst mistake I made during my career as a road sweeper was waking up at what I thought was seven fifteen in the middle of winter. I was due at work at seven thirty am. Dressing, leaping aboard my trusty Honda 50cc and driving like a lunatic to the Highways Compound, to find it all locked up.
I’d looked at my watch upside down, and it was twenty to one am.
I had to go home and go back to bed freezing cold.

Maggie
 

maestrowork

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When I was at the dorm, my roommate was kind of a jerk. One time I took my term paper home and absently left it on my dresser (it was an A+). When I came home, I realized what I did and my roommate had written on it in red ink: "so fucking what?"

Speaking of locking myself out ... so many times it's not even funny anymore. Once time I was SO absentminded that I actually locked the car doors while the car was still running (the doors locked when you clicked a button inside the car). I went to the office and almost nine hours later I came back to the parking lot and was baffled: Why is the car still running, and why is the door locked? Since everyone in the office had gone home I had to call AAA to help me. It was so embarrassing.
 
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CaroGirl

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I have a few choice ones, aside from the everyday stuff: putting the sugar away in the fridge, leaving my purse hanging lonely over the back of a chair at a restaurant, and so on.

I set myself on fire once. I was making baby food (I had a baby at the time; I'm not that absentminded) and the mush was simmering away on my gas stovetop. I reached up to the cupboard above the stove and my untucked shirt (I was still big around the middle and wasn't tucking shirts in yet) touched the gas flame. Apparently the fabric was NOT fire retardant and the flame started crawling from the hem up the front toward my chin. I started screaming and batting at it with my hands, sending flaming sparks all over the kitchen linoleum, which still bears the scars. My husband sprinted upstairs with the information that he'd never heard me make quite that noise before. I bet.

And one of the worst mistakes of my life... In university I had final exam scheduled in a core course. I studied my butt off and felt pretty ready. I was on my way down to campus to write it when I noticed groups of people whom I recognized from my class on their way AWAY from campus. I had misread the schedule, thought it was in the afternoon and it was in the morning. I missed it and proceeded to have a panic attack. It was like those nightmares you had in school where you haven't studied, can't find the exam room, show up too late, etc. That was me. I still feel a little panicked when I think about it. shudder.
 

sunna

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Once time I was SO absentminded that I actually locked the car doors while the car was still running (the doors locked when you clicked a button inside the car). I went to the office and almost nine hours later I came back to the parking lot and was baffled: Why is the car still running, and why is the door locked? Since everyone in the office had gone home I had to call AAA to help me. It was so embarrassing.

I've done that too! Only it wasn't for a whole day - I turned the car on and stepped out to give the AC time to start working (it was about 100 degrees out), and forgot that when the car's running, the doors automatically lock about 30 seconds after you shut them. It was 6:30 on a Friday, so there was nobody in the lot, and my cell was in my purse... which was sitting on the passenger seat.
I ended up opening the back window (it was a Passport), squeezing into a space about 18 inches high, and crawling over two rows of seats. While wearing a light weight wrap skirt on a windy day.
An entire trainful of people got to see my polka-dot underwear & thigh-highs.


Ahhh, good times.
 

Shadow_Ferret

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There have been times when pouring myself coffee that I'll, for whatever reason, start to put the coffee pot into the cupboard. The only thing that stops me is that it doesn't fit. Otherwise I can image coming back for the coffee and then yelling at the family for hiding it on me.
 

Maryn

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We moved within the same town about ten years ago. For the first year, I kept driving to our old house, even pulling into the driveway before I'd remember we didn't live there any more. One of our former neighbors saw me and jokingly said that if I wanted to stay, we never should have sold the house. I still turn off at the wrong place once in a while, but usually catch myself before I drive onto our old street.

I've also gone to the former locations of offices, and once went to the wrong job, on a very sleepy morning not long after I'd transferred out.

Most of the absent-minded goofs I'm reading here are the same as mine--except maestro, whose "mistakes" suggest his love for naked women.

Maryn, glad she doesn't sugar coffee or she'd be inking if half the time
 

Pat~

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I forgot Father's Day one year, completely and totally missed it despite the banners, commercials, store displays, notation on the calendar.....

I also have served more than one meal and left something that I had prepared in advance sitting in the fridge. Said item only being discovered while the kitchen was being cleaned (I'm particularly susceptible to this one during large events like Thanksgiving). I've learned the hard way to make a "cheat sheet" for myself so I serve the entire meal.

However, the cheat sheet doesn't always work - last week we had friends over for dinner; I made home-made chili and didn't add the beans. I didn't connect the dots even after hubby commented that the chili seemed quite thin & runny. As I was putting away the left overs (not many) from dinner, I realized what I had done.

Oh, man, and the number of times I have seasoned something with nutmeg instead of ground chili peppers or coriander rather than cumin or....some of the mistakes were quite inedible; like the garlic salt in the scrambled eggs - it tasted like the eggs had gone bad.

I showed up for lunch one day - a day early.

I think you're my twin...(sorry about that!) I'm the Queen of Preoccupation. In fact, that's my next avatar slogan...

--making brownies from a 2-ingredient mix and forgetting the egg :Shrug:

--making a meal and forgetting to serve one part of it

--spacing out at stoplights or red lights until cars behind me honk

--going to the rink, and forgetting my skates

--arriving to a birthday lunch at a restaurant early; going to a nearby store, then returning to the restaurant next door instead...(waited 15 minutes until my friends started calling me and I realized my mistake)

--forgetting Father's Day this past year (we'd gone out of town)

--forgetting the day of the week, my cell phone number, people's names, and where I parked my car on an almost weekly basis

I'm sure there are more, but I can't remember them right now. :D