Are there moments you're pretty glad were never caught on tape? Have there been things that you've tried to hide about your past because you knew they'd become a huge source of ridicule?

Come on all of you Milli Vanilli lovers out there. Once we get it all out in the open, it's easier to heal. We are the only support group we've got.

Wanna join my "odd club?"

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Answers

Slightly off-topic, but I have to ask:

What IS "Free to Be, You and Me"? I don't remember this at all.

Should my lack of memory about this be considered an awkward moment or a moment of pride and relief? Should I feel too old or too young or just too out-of-touch? See, this is kind of odd. So it's not that much off-topic. Maybe. I'll stop now.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Oh there are so many, where do I begin?

The time I stepped on my hand while playing four square with my fourth grade class.

The time I overheard my boarding school roommates talking about me behind my back and staged an elaborate "disappearance" which required me to crouch in an overlooked corner of my dorm for 5 hours while an army of students and advisors tried to find me, and ultimately culminated in a heart wrenching "death scene" in which I willed myself to stay perfectly till as my "body" was discovered.

The time I got a crick in my neck during a class camping trip in fifth grade, which caused my head to tilt onto my left shoulder and get stuck there for several days. I really couldn't move it, and this unfortunate turn of events resulted in a really "fun" game in which all of my classmates tilted their heads onto their left shoulders and ran around screaming that they had the "Sarah Disease".

The time I wore two different colored flourescent socks (orange and green) with two different colored capezio shoes (black and white) to a Frankie Goes to Hollywood concert at which I insisted on squeezing myself right into the front row.

I have more...

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I wore Jams, parachute pants, and flourescent colors during the mid-80's. (At least everybody else was doing it too.) And, I confess, my sister and I each had a red pleather replica of that famous Michael Jackson jacket. You know, the one with all the zippers. We even had sparkly socks. Fortunately, no photogaphic evidence remains of that fashion nightmare.

There have been hundreds of mortifying experiences in my life, but I can't think of any right now, except for one. (I must have blocked the rest in my trauma.)

My junior year, I was Prom Chairman. That meant I got to stand at the top of a little stairway and help during the coronation of the Prom Royalty. As the King and Queen began their dance, the class president flipped the lights off. Unable to see my footing, I fell down an entire flight of stone steps, landing facing back up, my arm twisted around, still holding the rail.

Fortunately, almost no one saw the fall, aside from the pages, the principal, and my besti friend. I got up, my parents (who were chaperoning) came over and asked how I was, and I burst into tears. My friend escorted me to the bathroom where we discovered that I had note stained or damaged neither my peach-colored dress nor my white stockings. Miraculous. I did, however, bruise the hell out of my butt and couldn't sit properly for a week.

That was also the Prom where I was dateless 'cause I'd broken up with my boyfriend and didn't want to still take him, and *gasp* another girl was wearing the same dress. My friends assured me it looked much better on me.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

"Free to be - you and me" was some kids book from the 70s; at least that's how I recall it. I remember my sister getting it from someone when she was 6 years old. That and Alligator Pie. No idea if she has either any more.

Awkward moments? None that I can recall or would want to share publicly. :)

Oh wait, I remember one. I found my Dad's box of cheques in his dresser drawer when I was 10, and proceeded to write cheques to my classmates in a feeble attempt to buy them off as friends.

It didn't work.

I was royally grounded, if memory serves.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Oh, man. Now you're all asking for it. None of you are going to read my posts in the same way again.

My sister and I once dressed up in ripped jeans and New Kids on the Block t-shirts, put our hair in ponytails, wore backwards caps, and put on a show on my front porch, pretending to be Donnie and Joe from New Kids on the Block. Then my friend Morgan joined us as we put on our bathing suits and shorts and sang "I Wanna Be Rich." The sad part about all of this is that we charged admission to the other people in the neighborhood to come watch us humiliate ourselves.

I used to think my bike was a horse when I was... oh, 11 or 12, so I tied a length of twine to the handlebars and tried to ride around. I crashed in front of my friend's house, where she and some of my other friends were watching me from the window.

((This isn't so much embarrassing as it is stupid.)) I was walking with my sister to the gas station near our house to get candy when I was 8 and she was 4. A huge dog - a boxer - came bounding around the corner and stopped in its tracks when it saw us. Erin immediately started to run, but I grabbed her and told her to stand still. We had a face-off with the dog for a minute or two, and then it barked at us. I promptly took off my shoe and threw it at the dog. It hit the dog square in the nose and started chasing us down the street. We found refuge when we burst through my neighbor's door.

I have more but I'll think of them later.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I found it interesting that in today's entry you (Pamie) mentioned...

" I'm very thankful that there aren't permanent records of me during some particularly awkward and potentially embarrassing stages of my life"

...and yet, doesn't this whole "journalling" thing do exactly just that??

I envy you and all the other "journallers" out there, in cyberspace, allowing just any older web-voyeur to peek into your lives.

Aren't you paranoid of people either knowing too much, or possibly, doing nast things like stalking you/your friends?

I'm actually curious to know what other journallers (and yourself of course, Pamie) think about this self-inflicted "invasion of privacy"?

It worries me. What do you think?

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

That sounds like it's own forum thread.

I just wanted to say that everyone's stories are making me feel better.

and that check-writing thing for friends is hysterical.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I made the Aren't you Afraid of Journalling question it's own thread. You can discuss it here.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

In elementary school, we had roller skating after school once a week, and I had my own pair of cheesy skates that I could clamp on to my sneakers. One day they announced right before gym that we would be doing roller skating, so I ran to my locker like everyone else to grab my skates. Then I realized that I was the only boy pulling skates out of his locker. Only the girls had roller skating for gym.

I was crappy at softball, and when the girls went to their lockers to get their skates, I ran out with them. Apparently I was so strange, no one bothered to call me a sissy or anything.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Oh, my God, I just thought of another one...

I was in middle school chemistry, and we were partnered up with our neighbor for a lab on water pressure. We filled with water, glass things that looked like bongs, with 2 tubes to them. While Karen and I breathed into the tubes doing strange things to the water, I blurted out something like, "Ok, this time you blow, and I'll suck..." There's this dead silence, everyone is staring at us, and they burst into a roar of laughter. How much pressure does something like that put on a 13 year old?

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Ahh, easy. 10th grade. (Well, not quite ALL of it.)

I was absolutely, undeniably, in love with the senior who sat in front of me in World History. His name was John. He had wavy 80's brown hair, a unibrow, smoked, and didn't have the slightest idea who I was. It was terribly important that he know that I was his destiny, you see.

The night of Homecoming bonfire, I decided I had to tell him. We could be together, and he could take me to prom, and we could hang out at the pizza place on Friday nights together. But, being shy and 15, and having just learned of this marvelous thing called "beer", I had a few at a friends house before we headed to the bonfire.

We all walked over to the high school football field, drinking a few more beers, while I furiously memorized what I was going to say. It had to be perfect. It had to be flirtatious. It had to make him fall absolutely in love with me. It had to reflect that we'd be together forever. I tried all sorts of combinations during the 6 block walk.

I found him standing near the bonfire, with two friends, smoking a cigarette. My friends coaxed me along, and I took a deep breath and walked over to their little group, with friends waiting in earshot.

"John?" He looked at me without the slightest clue who I was. "Yeah?" Forgetting his friends were standing there, I took a deep breath and opening my mouth to recite the words of love I'd been building on all night... and what came out was....

"I'd like you to know that I find you extremely attractive, and I'd like to bear your children."

He stared at me, pretty much like I'd just said something as stupid as, well, what I said.

At which point, I started to cry. And ran away.

15 years later, and I can still remember what a momnumental ass I felt like.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Oh, man, there are so many....and I'm sure my family could add much more that I've blocked out! Let's start with: - I didn't feel I was getting the proper audience from my family, so I started talking to my hand - Hiding in the closet and making my cousins come find me. And feeling really sad that it took them so long to notice I was gone (I found out years later that they knew where I was but they thought I wanted to stay there!) - In second grade on the way to the school pictures a bird pooped on my head - The science fair project on "psychology" where I asked everyone to fill out a form on what they "really" thought about the other kids in the class. The amazing thing is that almost everyone did it! - When I had to take the PSATs in an evening gown, because I was the Math Club's homecoming representative and I had to go right to the judging.

I'm going to get a beer now....

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

In no particular order:

1. The times spent sitting underneath the kitchen sink with a strainer on my head, pretending to be an astronaut.

2. Freshman year of high school, singing my one solo in West Side Story - the opening line of "I Feel Pretty." I'd been nervous and a friend suggested making up a dirty version to make myself laugh and loosen up backstage. Nothing could make parents prouder than hearing their daughter bellow out "SHE MUST BE IN HEAT!" on opening night by accident.

3. I had the bangs, too, Pamie. Mine were more of a flower shape, though. The top portion I'd curl backwards, the bottom portion I'd curl downwards, and then I'd sort of poof out the sides. It looked like my hair was exploding.

4. The Tiffany tape and the Fat Boys tape I owned. Oh yeah, and the Miss Piggy's Aerobique Workout tape. That was a true winner.

5. The countless times I would be singing along to a song at the top of my lungs and blurt out the wrong word mid-lyric and have a friend catch me. The proceeding five minutes I'd spend trying to convince said friend that I had sung the wrong word "on purpose."

6. Head gear. Enough said.

7. The "I love _ _ _ _ _" I had written on every notebook, every folder, and every trapper keeper I owned during middle school. Aaron Mann, if you ever see this, thanks for tolerating me as a stalker for 2 years.

8. In the same vein, the clique I associated myself with in middle school...there were six girls. We had TUFF (True Ultimate Friends Forever) scribbled on everything we owned. Thank God I wasn't old enough to get a tattoo at that point.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

The first part's not really a secret to those who know me, but I shall admit to you all that I still own my New Kids on the Block pillow case and that, on occassion (like when a cat coughs up a hairball), I will actually sleep on it.

As for the rest of my embarrassing "thank god mom and dad don't own a camcorder" moments, I used to lock myself in our cellar with a tape of my favorite songs, which I would use to practice for the "night club gig" I had in my mind. In that world, all the boys loved me, but I only had eyes for Ricky Schroeder. And yes, he loved me too.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I can't believe I'm saying these things, but here goes-

1. At age 14 while trying to impress my boyfriend Tony on a Bronx bus I held onto what I thought was the metal pole to steady myself from the swaying bus, only to realize while i was standing there pouting my lips and trying to look luscious, that I was holding on to a fishing pole that a passenger was holding between his legs while he innocently sat on the bus. I kept wondering why the metal pole was so unsturdy.

2. On Thanksgiving day I left a pad (yes, that kind of pad) on the tank of the toilet of my boyfriends house (I was 15) his 5 year old brother went into the bathroom, slapped the pad on his forehead adhesive side down and went screeching through the dining room during Thanksgiving dinner making sounds like an Indian in front of 10 guests who were eating dinner there.

3. As if the two above were not enough- please.

Nancey

3.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Jams!

Sorry, the mere mention of that article of clothing sends me into fits of laughter. Why did they all feature at least 2 flourescent colours, anyway?

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Come on! Those lame stories are the best! My best friend and I routinely unearth the retarded things we've done. Sometimes she still wants to do them. We're 23 and she still drags out her boombox so we can play "radio station". Our station is WHOR. hehehe. Most of our retardation is directly related to New Kids on the Block, or at least took place during the NKOTB Era.

1) We went to a NKOTB concert in Maine and tried to convince these girls from North Carolina that I lived next door to Joe and my friend lived next door to Donnie. We said all about how we took the subway to their houses all the time. ("You take the red line to the blue line to the purple line and go two blocks and it's right there.")

2) The bangs. God. Do you know it took me a long time to break that habit even after they weren't popular? I didn't know any other way to do my hair!

3) The popular kids in the grade above mine - I was obsessed with them. I wrote stories about them where the girls were all my friends and the guys all wanted me but i was going out with the hottest one. Anyway, when we were actually IN school, I guess I stared a little bit. THEY CAUGHT ME! One guy was like "why do you stare at us all the time?" and it was the first and only thing he ever said to me. what did i say back? "Like I'd stare at you, shithead." I said that to my idol!

4) Fred Savage posters. More than one.

5) We dressed my friend up in a black felt debbie gibson-esque hat, sunglasses and "Dont Worry Be Happy" T-shirt and made her hover in the stairwell, hoping to deceive my other friends into believing Jordan Knight had dropped by my house.

6) Then there were the "Guys Next Door". Remember them? They had a TV show. We loved them. I loved Eddie, the guido. There was no hottie in that group. But we obsessed over those B-list honeys anyway.

7) Who wore SKIDZ!? I did! I was cool! I went on my very first date wearing plaid Skidz pants, tightrolled, a red Skidz shirt, red suede flats and my huge bangs. We saw Mr. Destiny. His mom drove. I ducked his kiss. Where is he now? He lives with his boyfriend!!!!!!!! I turned my first date gay!!!

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Hey, we had that club too! I started it, and I called it the "Odd People". Except it wasn't so much of a club as a pathetic attempt by me to pretend I had some real friends in junior high, which I didn't. There were like two other girls in the "Odd People" and both of them quit after two days.

Also topping my list of embarrassing crap I did as a kid is the time in junior high (why are all these in junior high?) that I did a header down the stairs right in front of the teacher that I had the BIGGEST teacher crush on. I'd been trying to walk all girly and suave so he noticed me, but I tripped on my shoelace and wound up flat on my ass on the floor with books all strewn around me. Was he impressed? You figure it out.

I also did the "write my secret crush's name all over all my books and folders and crap", except I'd write it and then scribble it out right afterward because I was desperately afraid he would find out about my crush on him.

I think the worst thing was when me and a bunch of other girls in fifth grade started bringing a "boom box" to recess and playing Janet Jackson songs that we would then make up complex, Janet-Jackson-esque dance routines to. Except they weren't Janet-Jackson-esque so much as they were, well, reminiscent of warmup exercises in gym class. All the boys used to laugh and point at us while we were doing this, and we took that to mean that they secretly "liked" us.

My God I'm glad I'm a grownup now.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I'd just like to nominate Nancey for the Mortification Award. Her Thanksgiving story had me laughing so hard that I practically wet myself. The best part about it? It sounds like that same thing could have happened to any number of people here. That was awesome, Nancey. Thanks for sharing. ;)

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I did that scribble-out-the-name-of-the-boy-you-like thing until my best friend and I (Junior High, anyone?) decided to rename our crushes into being called "Thoughts." Then you'd doodle on your book, "I love my thought!"

One time I was leaning over to give a note to a friend who sat a row over. This friend also sat right behind my current crush. I thought that if I leaned in the right way that he'd get a whiff of my "sexy scent" and my windsong would be staying on his mind, right? So I lean WAY over to pass the note and completely tip the entire desk over in the aisle, right at his feet.

Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!

and busted for passing notes.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I forgot one! We used to make up synchronized swimming routines in my pool. Bring the plastic chairs into the water and everything. Work for hours making sure we both did a five-seconds-exactly handstand before going right into a somersault. Finale: We'd take the "Nestea Plunge" off the stairs in the shallow end.

And I bet one of my other friends is seriously glad there was no camera around when some people were skinny dipping and she did the Macarena off the diving board.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Oh man, I shouldn't even let myself get started here. What a fun thread!

How about the Christmas that I took every box from every present that had been opened, flipped them over, drew a bunch of keys and buttons on the bottom with numbers, arranged them in a circle around me, and pretended I was piloting a spaceship. I constantly punched different buttons on my "computers", and stared ahead with a concentrated frown, so I could see the asteroids, space debris and enemy ships coming in time to hit the right button to swerve around them. If company came by, I didn't care. I just kept flying my spaceship and punching buttons. I don't think I played with any of my actual gifts, the boxes fascinated me for at least a week.

I also once made an "apartment" by throwing a huge blanket over a card table. I would go sit underneath and pretend I was waiting for my boyfriend to pick me up for a date. It wasn't long before I started trying to make it look like a real apartment, and my mother was shocked to find that I had dragged a lamp, sofa cushions, purses, make-up and food under there too. I actually planned to live there, but the funny thing was, this whole set up WAS IN MY BEDROOM. Why couldn't I just pretend my room was my apartment?

Oh, and there was the time when I was 11 and had just read Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. I was dying to start my period, and would check practically every 5 minutes for evidence of it. I went to the Yellow Daisy Festival, ran into a girl from school, and we went to find the bathrooms together. Inside the Port-A-Potty I discovered a spot of blood and was so excited that I had someone to share the news with. When I came out and told her I had just started my period, she laughed in my face and said, "You did not!", and just walked off laughing. She then went on to tell kids at school the next Monday that I lied about starting my period, and I was too embarassed to set her straight. She even brought it up in high school, IN FRONT OF PEOPLE. "Ha ha! Remember that time you lied about starting your period? Ha ha ha!" Well, yeah I do remember, except I didn't lie. But I also remember the time at a party that she barfed all over a guy that she had a huge crush on. And did I tell everyone about that? You'd better believe I did.

Or the time I had been watching Charlie's Angels and thought my dad had fallen asleep in front of the tv, so I started silently pretending I was on one of their missions, made a halter top out of my night shirt (you girls know what I'm talkin' about - pull the bottom of the shirt up and through the collar then tie a knot), and pretended my undies were short-shorts. I ran around the living room, posing like a prostitute and pointing an imaginary gun at imaginary bad guys, and kept checking out my sexy Angel self in the reflection on the sliding glass door. Then I noticed dad's eyes were open, asked if he had seen me being a Charlie's Angel, and he said he had. I was so embarassed, I couldn't look him in the eye for days.

I was staying overnight with a friend for New Year's Eve 1984 (I think) when the news came over the radio that the drummer for Def Leppard had been in an accident and severed his arm. I burst into tears and sobs, because he was the one in the group I'd had a mad crush on. My friend asked what was wrong and I yelled, "Didn't you hear? Rick Allen's arm was cut off! Now he can't play the drums anymore, and I won't be able to meet him when he comes in concert, and we won't get MARRIEEEEEEED!!!!! Waaaaaah!!!" I was SO convinced that he would fall in love with me and have no choice but to marry me. I think I picked him because he was closest to my age, and it seemed more reasonable that he would love me than Joe Elliott.

Man, I could crank out books full of this stuff.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

It was a pink, frilly, girly dress and I couldn't believe my good fortune when I found it hanging in my closet.

I tugged the dress from its hanger and quickly pulled in on over my head. I was 6-years-old, after all, and eager to go skip rope with my friends from down the street.

I'm not sure I've ever felt as proud as I did that day walking down my street wearing my pink girly dress that I picked from my closet "all by myself."

So full of self-confidence was I that when it was my turn to jump rope I didn't feel the breeze against my bare ass.

I forgot to put on underwear.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Moment number 1. My 5th grade teacher was never nice to me, and thus i did not care for her. One day in class i was passing notes back and forth to a "friend". He received a certain note from me, read it, then threw a different note on the ground. Of course the teacher saw the note, and requested that he read it out loud to the class. Well guess what, the little punk said it was mine, so I got to read it to everyone. I won't write everything it said, but there is one line i remember in great detail. Sweaty palms and flushed faced, i heard myself reading out loud "if you hold the spoon just right, it will tickle her butthole. girls like that." Neadless to say, the teacher didn;t let me finish much more, and a note home to my parents followed the next day.

Moment Number 2. My dad and I announced to the hosehold we were making a trip to wal-mart. Big mistake. My sister yells "I need some tampons". No big deal really, I was cool with walking around Wal-Mart with my dad and some tampons. We get to the asile and started looking, only to notice that there is no "generi-pon". You know, a tampon that works for all girls under all "conditions". Well, me and my dad are standing there completly clueless as to what to buy, we went in search of help. He asked the clerk at the pharmacy desk, who paged a Wal-Mart employee to help us. And of course, the most beatiufull girl i had ever seen had to be working that day. So, for the next 10 mins i stood by listening to my dad say things like "well how round is it? I am pretty sure shes a virgin, and i don't wanna buy anything that will hurt her" to this goddess of my dreams. That was so not cool.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Oh yeah, and there was the time I started The Secretary's club in the 5th grade. There were four of us, and each week at school we would take turns and bring in "Secretary Kits" for everyone in the club. One girl had it made because her dad was an insurance agent and had tons of office supplies at home, so she gave us tons of stuff. The rest of us pretty much just gave out paperclips and used pencils, and when it started getting old, the one girl said she was mad because no one gave out good scretary kits but her. I yelled out that her secretary kits sucked because everything in them said State Farm, and the teacher heard me and made me sit by myself for a while.

I also did the "attempt to buy friends" thing, only I was tempting them with candy instead of cash. I had been given $20 for my birthday when I was 9, and one of the popular kids was selling candy bars so he could go on a trip with band or something (4th grade, when the band kids were the coolest ones around). I whipped out my $20 and said casually, "I'll take twenty", so everyone could see how rich and unconcerned I was about dropping that much money. Then, I gave them all away, every single one, thinking I had just become the most popular girl in school, but of course, their love for me lasted only as long as the chocolate did. My mom was so mad when she found out what I had done with the money.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

here goes... *gulp* *AHEM* 1. rubbing my legs together feverishly while reading TV guide and babysitting. i think they call it "master---" something. 2. talent show: i'm wearing a sleaveless, striped sweater, blue skirt, PINK BERET with a doberman pin, and singing "let's hear it for the boy." 3. not wearing my glasses while performing "grease" in high school (i was frenchie), and stepping through the hamburger bun b/c i couldn't see the edge- i almost fell 4 ft- did leave a huge hole. 4. making out with this guy, all hot and heavy, and i called him another boy's name, and tried to pull it off like it did it to "get his attention." i don't think he bought it. (speaking of wrong names, i find i get obsessive in my head that i'll call someone the wrong name, that i'm on the verge of saying it, even though i know i'm just psyching myself up. anyone else?) 5. hanging out with friends and mistaking a BUTTON for valium, and making an ass out of myself, begging for someone to "split" it with me.

that's enough for now. i need to bathe.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Unfortunately my most humiliating moment was caught on video.

One night, drunk out of my mind in a bar in California, yours truly agreed to be on a popular dating show.

I had to basically say a bunch of things I never would have said and act like a complete slut.

Not to mention I was going through a really bad trendy phase. I wore a tight bright orange dress and huge white platform shoes(don't ask).

I believe everyone I know taped it.

When my husband(I had never told him about it) and I went home this past Christmas, of course my dad had to bring it out. I guess he was proud of his little trendy, slut daughter.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Ah, just remembered this gem: in elementary/middle school, my closest neighborhood friends were boys. Every once in a while, we played "Dukes of Hazzard." As the only girl, I got stuck playing Daisy. I think we also played "Goonies."

About the time I turned 17 and my sister was 12, she caught up to my height (5'3"). We had more than one stranger think we were either twins, or that SHE was the older one. On a trip to England, some woman said, "Oh, she (my sister) is 12? Does that mean your other daughter is 11?" *sigh*

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

This is quite terrifying, since I don't think I'd ever put this in my own journal. But here goes.

1. The neighbor girl and I made up this dance to Wilson Phillips' "Hold On." It was so embarrassing. My front porch was the stage, the yard was where the "audience" went. Luckily we never had a real audience. The dance started with us cartwheeling and trying not to hit the porch rails, and when they sang "break free from the chains," we would go from standing stick straight and leap up into the air, arms and legs spread. We had it all figured out. At one point, we would sit on the railing and sing, and I fell off once into the bushes below.

2. The neighbor and I dressed up in my grandmother's old dresses and put clown makeup on and put on a whole show for our families. I think the boys our age got a special show... we were like 8... glad that attitude didn't continue.

3. I thought it would be a good way to get attention to pretend to be crying and go running off, and fall into the grass sobbing. You know, like they do on those wonderful old movies. Well, I chicked out last minute and just kind of kneeled down, then tried to throw myself off my knees. I looked like a total moron.

4. I dated this guy who had fish breath, and I thought he was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Duh.

5. I dated a guy who I fell in love with after we were romantic counterparts in a play. He now lives with his boyfriend... I should have known. We were doing Shakespeare. He wore tights. He didn't mind wearing tights.

I'm sure I've got others... Ah, here we go.

6. I was so in love with this character on a TV show that I wrote my own script, with a character for me. I considered submitting it, but decided it was too short. Luckily, I never finished it.

I'm going to stop here before I say something incriminating. ;)

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

Oh, yeah, I remember those clubs. My sister, my friend Megan, and I all banded together to make an "Early Hoosiers" club. Yes, you heard me right. Early Hoosiers. That was the name of it. We pretended to be pioneers (again, our bikes were our horses) and we had a clubhouse in the woods behind my house. Well, it wasn't so much a clubhouse as it was an old piece of carpet placed in the middle of a clump of trees. Anyway, my dad got into the spirit of things and made us bows and arrows out of branches, twine and sticks.

And if you don't, for some reason, believe this existed, here's the proof:



Yeah, that's us... Megan, me, and Erin. Aren't we cool?

One of the more embarrassing things I've done recently is rework my webpage. I'd hate if you guys came and saw what a crappy job I've done. Really. And... I mean, if you signed the guestbook and told me how stupid it was, I'd be even more humiliated. I mean it.

image deleted by pamie

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

My little sister and I used to make up dance routines and synchronized swimming routines all the time. We even started a band once (the "Funky Something") and wrote a bunch of horrible songs that I still remember (such as "I love LA / I love to go to the bay in LA / prominent city / and they're awfully witty / all you could ask for / and lots more / they open the door / to you."

There were two dance routines in particular, Wake Me Up Before You Go- Go and Walk Like an Egyptian, that we used to practice on a daily basis in the living room. I remember we had our "star move" where I would grab one of her arms and one of her legs and spin her in a circle. We sincerely believed that if we kept practicing, we could go on Star Search. We kept asking our mom to take us to an audition and she just smiled and smiled.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

It was 1979 and I was 7. It was all over the news that the Skylab space station was hurtling towards the earth and was going to crash somewhere. I was so convinced that it was going to fall on my house or school that I went around wearing a helmet for a few weeks that summer.

My many crushes included: Andy Gibb, Scott Baio and John Taylor (from Duran Duran).

Then there was the time that I learned that no matter how good Southern Comfort and Wink tastes going down, it's just not worth it when it comes back up.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Em - bare ass -ing moments:

I don't remember this but I have it on good faith from my mom and other relatives that when I was two and just got out of diapers, I would always 'forget' that I didn't have them on and pee in my underwear. So my mom found out that if she didn't put any underwear on, I wouldn't go. I apparently found this condition very novel, because the next time I was at church, I was pulling up my dress and telling everybody "Look! I'm not wearing any underwear!" Including the Pastor.

Continuing the trend, in gradeschool we just had gym class wearing our regular clothes. I was always forgetting which days were gym class days and wearing a skirt. Well, we always had these excercises where everyone stood in a circle and 5 people would get to pick the excercizes for the day. Somebody would always look at me, giggle, and say "Upside down bicycle!" Which is where you balance on your shoulders supporting your back with your hands and bicycle your legs in the air. You wanna try doing that in a skirt without showing your nethers? One day I was ahead of them though. I got down, put my legs up in the air, my skirt fell away, and everyone gasped. I was wearing shorts!

I would've liked to conclude by saying that my main line of work these days is stripping, but life is never that straightforward. Plain 'ol desk job for me, hey.

Cheers!

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

-4 years old- During an especially boring sermon I yell "I hate church! I'm getting the hell out of here!" and made an unsuccessful run for it.

-6 years old- Trying to woo a girl by singing all of "Snoopy vs. the Red Baron"

-6 years old- Trying to impress everyone at recess by coming off as a zoological expert. I lied about all of the bugs on the playground, inventing the "Brazilian Vampire Beatle". I just wanted to be a little Crocodile Hunter.

-9 years old- In the vein of starting clubs, became President of the "Weird Al's", a group of not-quite-cool but not-quite-dorky boys who thought Hawaiian shirts, relaxed afro's and musical parodies were the coolest things ever.

-10 years old- Called in a request to a radio station for "Rock Me Amadeus" by saying, "I'm listening to WBAM and I want to hear...," then pressing play on my boom box so it blasted the title into the phone. I hoped I'd end up on a radio commercial.

-11 years old- Dedicating "I Can't Fight This Feeling Anymore" by REO Speedwagon to Cassie McDougal.

-12 years old- Spiking my hair straight up with toothpaste (only fags used mousse) and wearing a denim jacket and t-shirt regardless of the weather, walking around with a walkman listening to either Motley Crue, Men Without Hats (doesn't fit, I know) or a new group called Guns 'n Roses.

-12 years old- Running in front of a school bus so I could make it to my music class where I was to wow everyone by playing my electric guitar, then tripping and seeing my guitar go flying into traffic. Luckily it was a hard-shell case and torn jeans were cool. Everyone still laughed.

-24 years old- Being the only person who posts on this forum who doesn't have their own web site.

Sure, there was other stuff in between there, but the wounds are still healing.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

I was a weird, slightly obsessive child, and was also pony-mad. I did that pretend your bike was a horse thing as well, but I also did the rising trot when biking over car parking lines on the road. Also, my best friend MaryAnn Keenan and I used to pretend we were ponies as well, to the extend of building elaborate show-jumping courses in my parents' garden and competing against each other. We also used to have entire exercise books full of fictional stud farms, complete with maps, and large tables full of details of the ponies - their names, heights, colours, etc. Competition was fierce between the two of us when it came to getting the good names. Then we both actually got ponies, and things really spiralled out of control.

In my teenage years I was madly in love with then lead singer from Skid Row (Sebastian Bach? Pamie, I'm sure you can confirm this) and Bret 'the Hitman'Hart, and would video their videos/fights to watch again and again and again. Of course, I couldn't enjoy this alone, so I would force my little sister to join me. I mean force - if she tried to move I'd rewind and make her watch again from the beginning.

All things considered, my family are probably hugely relieved I'm now in the UK and they're in New Zealand, out of harm's way.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

I am still a kid, and I am slightly weird... but not too much

the most akward moment I had was about three weeks ago... I was at school, and me and my friends were sitting next to our tables (on them, on a chair next to them, or just standing) and talked. I have this friend who has silky curly hair (it's amazing) and we all like to play with it (braids and stuff) so I put my hands on her hand to make her a braid, and she had gel or something cause my hands just slipped off, and then I coughed (and it didn't really sound like that), eventually it turned to look like I was massaging her hair, and it looked extremely perverted. trust me, that was just too embarrassing.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

My most embarrassing moment really wasn't my fault. I had just got engaged and I had an ex-sorta kinda boyfriend call (3 states away) to declare his love for me and tell me his plans to come save me from my doom. If this wasn't bad enough, he called my fiance's parents house and my fiance's ex wife and declared this to all of them! I spent the evening of my engagement on the telephone trying to persuade him that he wasn't in love with me and begging him to leave me alone. My fiance's parents were great about it, but I'm sure they had some serious "reservations" about what kind of woman their son was marrying during that little episode.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Oh god... I have some stories to tell. i too, am still a kid (17) and one of these stories happened exactly one week ago:

I was at my friend Mike's birthday party (there were 7 of us there) and I was wearing my long black skirt and a red halter. Earlier, my friend Erin and I had been "playing" "Cherish" (we rolled around on the ground like Madonna in the video...yes, we are dorks. I have done this in public places too.) And my skirt was starting fall down. So I yanked it up and she started to attack me to pull it down again. So I tickled her. Anyway. A little while later we were in Mike's kitchen getting some food and I was talking to 2 of my friends when all of a sudden I felt my skirt go down. Yes, it was Erin. I was so pissed! Luckily I was wearing clean underwear. No one really cared though...we've all been friends for a long time and nothing fazes us anymore.

The second story is probably my most emabrassing moment of all time. I was in 7th grade and it was the last day before winter break, so we were having a party and we all dressed up. We were also in portables, so we had to walk around outside on these tiny sidewalks surrounded by wet mud. I was walking down the sidewalk to my locker and trying to manuver around this couple who were taking up the whole thing. I stepped in the mud, slipped and got mud all over my dress, nylons, and ass. Everyone saw. *EVERYONE*.

Theres a lot of little ones too...some I still do:) Like last year when we were presenting our "Decade's Projects" to our world history class and I was doing the 1960's and demostrated for the class (including the people at the party above) what Goldie Hawn did in _Rowan and Martin's Laugh In_ (remember? sockittomesockittome...it even included hip wiggling...) My friends still ask me to do it...

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Mousercise---my favorite selection was the "Pig Out" Walking around the block in nothing but high heels and see-through curtains(hey, to 5 year-olds they were ball gowns)with my friend Katie

Playing "Doctor" with my friend Andy. We barricaded my bedroom door with the vaccuum cleaner. My Mom walked in on it, though. Oh, the horrors!

Falling down an entire section of bleachers during 8th gradelunch in a broomstick skirt---it ended up over my head. I fall down a lot.

Being in love with the actor from the Flash Gordon movie and proclaiming my undying love for him in front of my parents and their friends at our beach house. However, I didn't know that they were watching. My parents thought that it was some great joke.

Auditioning for the Mickey Mouse Club and being told not to "growl" when I sing. Okay, that's enough. I am completely mortified.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Ooh---I forgot having the lead in the senior play. Why is this embarrassing? The name of the play was "My Gun Is Pink"

Playing "V". My friend Elizabeth was "Elizabeth, the Star Child" and I was "Julie". Her little brother was everyone else.

Throwing a fit in The Limited because my mother wouldn't buy me an Outback Red felt hat. I actually cried. I was like, 13.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Where to begin???

The time in High School (senior year - I'm a freak) I learned the group dance sequence from the end of Dirty Dancing - which I proceeded to show off to my friends at a party. The best part was when they made me teach all of them how to do it.

The time I was trying to make tiny snips in the very end of a curled ribbon on a Christmas package to "shred" the ribbon (this was before those little ribbon shredder tools) and the HUGE scissors I was using wouldn't close at the very tip. (The package was in the middle of the table and I had the ribbon pulled tight, the end close to my body.) I kept squeezing the scissors, not too hard, and couldn't figure out why they wouldn't close all the way. It wasn't until I pinched the hell out of my boob trying to get the scissors to close that I realized WHY...

Perhaps my favorite... during my PE class I was walking on my hands (I had just learned how) and my feet got caught in a volleyball net and I was completely stuck and had to have someone come over and unhook my shoes from the net.

There are myriads more, but I don't have time...

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

The memories just keep rushing back.

I rented a limo as a surprise for my boyfriend's 19th birthday, and planned for us to have sex in it while we rode around downtown. To make the endeavor easy, I wore a short, loose skirt and G-string panties. We chickened out on the limo sex, because we were convinced the driver was spying on us somehow and would tell my parents (tell my parents?!? paranoid much?), so my boyfriend just drank the entire wet bar instead.

By the time the limo dropped him home, he was hammered, so I said I would come in with him, and told the driver he could leave. We went upstairs, started fooling around, and he grabbed my underwear and ripped one of the side strings. As soon as the G-string was off, he passed out, not to be awakened again until morning. I had to go wake up his younger brother and ask him to drive me home, all the while trying to hold my panties up by, uh, clenching, because I didn't have a purse to hide them in.

When I got home, my parents were up, and asked me how the birthday surprise went. As I stood there telling them it was all fine and what we did (minus the drinking) my panties fell off and landed on my feet. The ripped string was all too visible. Doh! I'm sure my parents felt better when I stayed with and married the same guy 10 years later, so at least they could know their daughter wasn't a big slut in high school.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Oh, wow.

1) Every time I had a friend over and forced them to play Annie with me, where I was Annie and the friend played every other character. I abridged it enough that we skipped most of the songs that weren't Annie solos.

2) And how I assume that closing my door means no one can hear me -- like, say, when I'm playing Annie or singing other things at the top of my lungs. I did it all the time -- am I the only one who had that affliction? Ooh, I still shudder. I'm shocked my Mom didn't tie her tubes immediately.

3) My enormous, gargantuan crush on George Michael. If only I'd known what a waste of time THAT was.

4) The free posters I actually did put on my wall: Boy George, Wham! (loved them), Paul Young, Bryan Adams, even Limahl -- yup, of "The Neverending Story" fame. Holy crap.

5) The time I was four years old and my parents caught my friend Michael standing in his underwear, unzipping my dress, while I tried to take off my tights. Hey, we just wanted to take a bath because we both absolutely KNEW that playing in the tub was the shit.

6) The time my friend and I made up a rap about our lame classmates and rapped it to my older sister and her friends. They hated it, and us.

Sigh.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Heather--

I played that Annie game too! I'm not kidding. I was really lucky, though, because my little sister always wanted to be Sandy.

And I do remember swearing that Sebastian Bach was the prettiest person in the entire world. Anyone seen him lately? Is face shows the effects of the youth gone wild, man.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

I remember another one. When I was 8 in Bermuda, we'd often visit the family of an old Navy chum of my Dads, who was also posted there. They had 2 kids, Cathy (my age) and Rick (1 year younger.) I would have been 8-ish at the time.

Rick and I would always dig out his father's Playboys and leaf through them in Rick's bedroom, accompanied by exclamations of "Hey Rick! Check this out!" or "Woah! Check this out, Ron!" ("Check this out" seemed to be a big phrase for us.)

One night we got a little bold and dared Cathy to show us her, um, stuff. We bargained and agreed that the three of us would count to three and all drop our pyjama bottoms at the same time. Rick counted out (loudly) "One! Two! Three!" and the two of us boys went Floomph!!! and dropped our trousers. Cathy didn't. We tried encouraging her to join us. "C'mon, it's fun!" we cried. Rick and I proceeded to start dancing up and down, with the obvious effect of waving our wallys to the world.

It was then that we realized that their Mother was standing in the doorway behind us, watching our every move. Zwooop!!! Up went the p.j. bottoms so fast, we broke the sound barrier.

As we were escorted to Rick's bedroom, grounded, I turned back and saw Cathy standing there, an evil smile spread across her face.

She owes me big time, man.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Hmm, I appear to have joined the department of redundancy department.

Did I mention I was 8?

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

I never want to hear your "Blast" on tape. I'll say it now just in case it comes up in the future. Live is a different story...because you can't help it sometimes...but on tape...I don't think so. Not so much because of the actually noise but because of the little girl giggling in the background. That is just to creepy.

-mt

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Did you get in trouble after you broke the shower rod? That would be humiliating. You try to hang yourself, then you get in trouble. You're right Pamie, THAT'S THE MOST EMBARRASSING THING I'VE EVER HEARD!!!

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Jeff--

my parents didn't know about it, but how funny would that be that i'd get grounded for trying to kill myself.

jesus.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

My embarrassing moment..

When I was a sophomore in high school, I had a crush on the head of the football team (who wasn't?) and to top it off, he was incredibly sweet, and he talked to me in English.

One day I had a huge sinus problem/sneezing thing going on, and at lunch I had been eating a Reece's Peanut Butter cup when I laughed and sucked part of the cup into my sinus cavity (which hurt like HELL).

After lunch was English class, and Football Man turned to me to evaluate his term paper (only the most important thing in English II). I felt a huge sneeze coming on, but we were in the middle of the conversation, and I forgot to turn away.

I sneezed peanut butter cup all over his term paper, the one that he had worked on for a month. The teacher let him rewrite it, and I didn't speak to him for two years.

Sorry tim.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Oh my God! I forgot ALL ABOUT the Annie thing!!!! My friend Katie(partner in crime with the see-through curtains) and I used to dance around her living room to the Annie Record. We would move all of the furniture and close the french doors and blast the record and do all of the moves to Hard Knock Life. Between songs we would stop the record and act out the scenes from the movie. I never cared that she always got to be Annie--she had the curly hair--I always wanted to be Grace anyway. "We Got Annie!" Good Times.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

i had an embarrassing moment last year at work. i was wearing a pretty, mid-calf legnth, rose coloured dress made of that crinkly cotton material, like the stuff at the import shops. it had a cotton slip with it that kept riding up as i walked or moved in any way. it was a bit tight, but not obscenely so. anyway, i was called over to the other office building to do something, and id made a stop in the ladies room before going over there. i walked across the parking lot, into the building, up the stairs and around, greeting and being greeted by everyone i saw. i did whateveritwas i was there to do, and began making my way back. i stopped to talk to a couple ladies, and another woman came up behind me and started tugging on the back of my dress. somehow, in the bathroom, id gotten part of the slip, and some of the dress caught up in my panyhose! part of the skirt was still hanging down some, so most of my ass was covered at least, but still, id been walking around (outside, even, in bright summer sunlight, in plain view of a busy street and shopping center parking lot across that street) with part of my dress stuffed in my panty hose! i couldve died! ive never worn the dress again.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Okay, true story.

When I was five years old, I came across this raunchy porno mag -- the women were dressed in either nothing or next-to-nothing or some elaborate lingerie. The one thing they had in common was that their legs were spread so wide you could almost see their spleens. I stared at each and every page in that magazine in morbid fascination, until my mother came up behind me and asked me what the hell I was looking at. I started crying and begged her not to show it to my father because I didn't want him looking at "bad stuff" like that.

I think the really embarassing part of this story came a few years later when I realized that the magazine probably *was* my father's.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

1) Let's see...I also was one of those little girls who used to rewrite screenplays to add my own character...The Outsiders, Red Dawn and The Lost Boys come to mind (Keifer was just so HOT in that movie!)

2) I used to blare Pat Benatar in my bedroom late at night lipsinking (sp?) with an upside down turkey baster...(uh,yeah a turkey baster) I used to pretend it was a microphone. Can't imagine what my mother used to think when everytime she needed to use it she had to retrieve it from under my bed

3) The time when I was 13 my (so-called) best friend decided to call up the cutest boy in school and pretended to be me

4)I went bowling with a group of friends (the cool kids...sigh) in high school, and here I thought I had a perfect set up, but when I went to release the ball I stepped over the line and my lovely green and blue bowling shoe slipped and up I went, landing with my skirt above my head. The ball went flying into the other lane. oh boy.

5) Waiting in line 8 hours in the rain at Great Adventure to see New Kids on The Block and Tiffany!

6) All my school pictures from 1983-1989

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

hez The same thing (skirt stuck in the hose) happened to a friend. She was working in a French bank with a spiral staircase in the middle of a large busy lobby. She made it all the way to the top of the stairs before she figured out what everyone was laughing about.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Sixth grade. Theater in the round. I had the lead in the play. Suddenly, my costar ad libs and sends the audience, and me, into hysterics. Sadly, I had very weak bladder as a kid, and, wearing a dress, I tinkled all down my legs. It was the worst moment of my life. Strangely enough, no one seemed to notice, even though as I was saying my lines I was"mopping" the stage with my feet (thank god I didn't have shoes in that scene).

members.xoom.com/muffet/WrongNumber

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Then, the ill-fated makeup experiments. When I was in seventh grade, and woefully ignorant of cosmetics, my class went on a trip to York and I snagged a bunch of my sister's eye shadows. All of us gathered in the dorm room and painted ourselves ... then when we wandered into the hallway, our classmates collectively stared at us, completely agape. One girl stammered, "What did you DO to your face, Heather?" Turns out we hadn't noticed that our room was dark because the lightbulb was barely working, and we couldn't tell how much we had on. I think we looked like hookers.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Its 1977 and I'm in first grade. As I was prone to do, I slipped into my own little reverie world and sang every little bit of the song "Silly Love Songs" by Wings. Out loud. While the rest of the class was quietly coloring. Yeah, you remember the refrain: I repeated "IIII looooove yooouuu" over and over until I suddenly remembered where I was to look up and find everyone including my teacher staring and giggling at me. (Love doesn't come in a MINUTE! Sometimes it doesn't come at ALL...) If I hear it on the radio even today, I have to turn the station...

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

We performed concerts on our back steps as well - but our crowning glory was our special effects. Someone always had to stand to the side with some talcum powder and squeeze the bottle at important moments so a cloud of powder would arise. We thought it was a good substitute for a smoke machine. How cool were we?

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

OH man... i have had several as a teacher. sometimes it really blows being "in" on the jokes ya know. the other day i had a kid who was being very unruly. he kept cussing at his teacher. i am pretty much the only one this kid listens to, he is 17 and fresh out of juvinile jail. she asked him to come see here for a meeting and he responded with "f~ck that! i aint talkin to you! f~ck you!" so i tell her that i will talk to him. it was to be my fourth conference with him that day. the whole class is watching so i go, "please come see me" and he says "naw! f~ck that i aint goin nowhere" so i walk up to him and i say "can we please talk about this in the other room" and he says "naw! F~uck that and F~ck HER" to which i reply "no not her.. ME! " uh... oops. have you seen a hispanic chick blush?! well that was me but a much deeper red. i thought i was going to die. the class bursts into fits of laughter especially when he smiles at me and says "oh, is that right? is that what you want to do back there in the conference room?" i just stumbled and said, "uh no, umm. im just going to sit at my desk now and never speak again"... sigh. but he was in a better mood after that laughter and the class calmed down finally. sucks that it had to be at my expense, but hey,.. if i can save just ONE kid! LOL!! sigh. SOOOO glad there was not video of that moment.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

I tried to be left handed for the longest time. I would practice hours on end writing, cutting with lefty safety scissors, eating, throwing, etc. Hm.

When I was a kid I wanted to be Jewish. I even got one of those skull caps and wrote my name in Hebrew all on my turquoise Trapper Keeper.

Somehow I got elected 5th grade class president. I think that it was because I promised a teacher/student exchange week where the kids would teach the class for an entire week. (Kids will believe anything. Dumb kids.) Part of the responsibility of being 5th grade president was saying the pledge over the intercom system so that everyone could be patriotic at the same time. 'Good Morning Vietnam' had just come out and I thought I would be the shiot if I took a little liberty with the morning pledge. The lady in the office turned on the intercom system and I shouted, as loud as I could into the mic, "GOOOOOOOOD MOOOOOORRRRRNING UNIVERSITY ELEMENTARY." Then I said the pledge. When I was finished, all the ladies that worked in the office were kind of dumb-founded. The principal came out of his office and said "That was very lively." and told me to go back to class. It was incredibly quiet in the office as I left. When I got back to the class, my 5th grade teacher, Mrs. Hackler a.k.a Bitch with Big Ankles, told me I was an inappropriate little girl. I did it again the next morning anyway. But I will admit that I seriously considered running away from school as I was walking back to class. I didn't. But it was only because I knew I had left my dixie cup full of ladybugs in my desk and it was Friday and they would die over the weekend if I left them. I am such the martyr. Mrs. Hackler assigned someone else to say the pledge after that. Ho hum.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2000

Well...this is pretty bad. I'm almost afraid of releasing my e-mail address.

I used to eat dog food. I've grown up with golden retreivers as a constant presence. So, I just used to crawl over to the snack bowl and grab myself a mouthful. Purina, if I remember correctly.

Oh, and I liked dog biscuits too. The kind with the collie on the front.

One time when I was little my parents got mad at me, so I went outside and sat at the curb of my little urban cul-de-sac in front of my house. My plan was to throw myself in front of a car and die. Then they'd be sorry. Needless to say, my mom found me later. I told her I was trying to catch crickets.

I used to play in my back yard with my little friend Minna. We couldn't be bothered to go inside, so we peed in the corner. And my mother kept wondering why her orchids wouldn't bloom!

Oh, and I peed in a fit of laughter in fifth grade too. I told someone I peed if I started laughing really hard, and so she said, "Oh! Andrea! The tent we're staying in is going to float down the river of your pee!" That did it. Except people DID notice. Ah, good thing I can look back on it and laugh at all my pain. Heh. Heh.

In sixth, I managed to put the class guinea pig in the front pocket of my overalls. They were Gap overalls, and had a little stiching over the big pocket, so once I got the guinea pig in there, I couldn't get it out. I was late for P.E. and the school dean had to come in and use scissors to cut the poor thing out before it shat on me.

I also used to get really exited when we went on plane trips, because I was convinced I'd see the Care Bears up there in the clouds.

One time I asked my parents if they would give me to some family friends of ours whose kids got to have chicken fingers with ketchup for dinner every night. "Chicken fingers"? What the hell?

I joined a club in 2nd grade...we were The Waves or something, and we used to take twigs and scratch our parched skin on our forearms with wavy designs.

OK, there are worse, but it'll take me a few hours to dredge up all those really painful tidbits.

by they way, The Onion devotes a whole section to these atrocities. It's called Pathetic Geek Stories and they are quite amusing. http:// www.theavclub.com/pgs.html It's always easier to laugh at someone else's issues, isn't it? Of course it is!

Why is it that whenever you go to dinner with someone you'd like to impress, you ALWAYS, without fail, leave the bathroom with a little piece of toilet paper still stuck to your tongue? --Laura Kightlinger (Hey Pamie! She's your peer!)

-- Anonymous, January 15, 2000

Hey Pamie, I've noticed a pattern to your accidental thievery. I just recently read this entry as well as your Arrowheads incident (I can't remember what day that was). In both cases you mention you're afraid to return the things you accidentally "stole" because you were afraid they'd think you really did steal it. Convenient!

I'd also like to say that all those songs you were embarrassed about singing totally rock. T'Pau etc. In fact, most of the songs mentioned in this forum are really cool. Except NKOTB and Milli Vanilli. ;)

OK, my best embarrassing moment, a little story I like to call "I Punched the High School Girl of My Dreams in the Nose on Valentine's Day."

It started with a little contest our high school held for V-Day. The guys who were playing wore little construction-papers hearts on strings around our necks and had to essentially play the Quiet Game all day (you can tell our teachers thought this one up!). We had to give our "heart" to the first girl who got us to speak to them. The girl with the most hearts at the end of the day would win some prize. I played along, fairly successfully not falling for the tricks the ambitious girls tried on us boys. I couldn't wait to see the Girl of My Dreams Who I'd Had a Crush On for Three Years and find some excuse to talk to her just so I could give her my heart.

Cut to band practice. Our over-sized band played in an under-sized room, and at the beginning of the period we had to arrange all the chairs in that huge semicircle and sit in an exact order, because your assigned seat indicated your status in the band and all. Well, I dragged my chair over to the row I was supposed to sit in, but the two girls who I sat between had their chairs firmly wedged together and they weren't moving. Of course I couldn't talk to them, and they were making me mad, so I started gesturing wildly with my arms that I wanted them to move their lazy butts. And as I wildly and emphatically gestured my arms around, I felt one of my hands thump something behind me. It was my Dream Girl.

To be honest, I didn't really punch her in the nose, but I hit her in the face good enough to startle her. She told me later it was more of her chin. But it felt like her nose to me.

Anyway, I was of course totally chagrined at what I did and started spouting apologies immediately. She was okay; I didn't draw blood. But of course I was horrified....Later I realized that, indeed, due to my apologies, she was the first girl I talked to that day. :) I tried to give her my "heart", but she refused because she wasn't playing the game (she didn't have or want boyfriends in high school, it seems). Later someone stole my heart when I wasn't looking.

Fortunately, at that age (15? 16?), my friends and I were mature enough to appreciate the irony of the situation, and I think I was giggling at myself by the end of the day (but still utterly horrified at the same time).

DreamGirl never held the incident against me. We remained the same casual friends/acquaintances we were before....Hi, Sonlee.

-- Anonymous, January 15, 2000

OK. I'm 17 and standing in a newsagents with my boyfriend and another mate of his.

We're browsing the magazine stands, for God know what now...

I look out of the corner of my right eye to see my boyfriend looking at the centerfold of some incredibly slutty magazine. What ! He can't insult my fragile 17 year old ego like that!

So I put my right arm around his shoulders and dig him sharply in the ribs with my left hand saying " What the hell do you thing you're looking at?" In a loud and offended tone.

Well, of course, it wasn't him, was it. It was some older guy who had sneakily slipped in between us, and my boyfriend was on the other side of him. Oh the shame.

-- Anonymous, January 15, 2000

Ok, reading everyone else's (and laughing so hard my roomate asked if I was ok )forced it out of me.

1. I too bumped around the house pretending to be Helen Keller. My cousin and I would tape cotton balls over our eyes and take turns being blind. Years later when I got drunk and left my hard contacts in too long and actually did have my eyes bandaged for 3 days, I figured it was karmic retribution.

2. In junior high me and my friends (yes, I had a few) went thru a period where we would carve our "boyfriend's" initials into the skin of our forearms or the top of our hands. These weren't usually actually our boy friends but just guys we hoped would notice us. I did mine with dull pencils, until it bled. I figured it would scar better. (this sounds really sick) My best friend did hers with a Coke pull tab, back when the tabs came off. She would pick the scab and pour peroxide on it hoping it would scar. Ok, enough of that.

3. Jams, 3 pair, with big, untied white leather high top basketball shoes and neon surf T-shirts. In college.

4. Also in college. I was on campus and surprised by this big parade with Earl Campbell riding in some convertible, waving. While watching him, instead of where I was walking, I stepped off the sidewalk, sprained my ankle, ran into a tree and had to be carried to the student health center a block away.

That's it. This is frightening. Pamie, you crack me up. I'm so glad you made the Chronicle list, otherwise I wouldn't have found you.

thanks for all the laughs. your stuff kills me.

-- Anonymous, January 15, 2000

being male and a natural born klutz, it might be better to tell something that went right for me. but off hand as a little kid, when i tried to run fast i would clang my ankle bones together, i think i was the only kid who sported scabs on knees, ankles, elbows and chin - - eternally. as i grew old enough to really embarass myself, i did such strange things as carrying a flat of apricots in the house, my true love came riding down the street on her bycycle and as i was eyeing her i managed to walk off the end of the porch and fall into the flowerbed. and to make matters worse, mom screamed out, " oh, my apricots," causing this blabber mouth to say some rather cutting remarks in a loud voice. the next day the girl of my dreams asked me of i always talked to my mother that way. . . . . . . so much for that romance.

-- Anonymous, January 16, 2000

Spring of eighth grade, waiting in the crowded hallways to be called in for high school pom-pom squad tryouts. Of course, everyone was sprawled out on the floor stretching, or practicing their routines. When it was almost my turn, I went into the girls' locker room, and a glance in the mirror showed that I was sweating profusely from the combination of nervousness, practicing, and the heat from the masses of adolescent girls. In a burst of inspiration, I pulled out my stick anti-perspirant and rubbed it all over my face and neck. I think I also gave my arms and legs a light coating, just to be on the safe side.

A few minutes later, when I was standing right next to the door to the audition room, a girl asked me, "What's all over your face?" She pulled out her pocket mirror and showed me that I was covered with a layer of what looked like white ash, like someone who'd miraculously survived a nuclear bombing. I started frantically rubbing myself all over, trying to get it off. Of course, just then the girl before me came out, and I had to go in and do my tryout, with white streaks all over me.

(I made it anyway, which is perhaps the most embarrassing part of all, but I don't know how I managed to make it through my "audition" knowing I looked like a freak!)

-- Anonymous, January 16, 2000

Wow! I think life is a string of awkward moments. These come to mind.

I was a sophmore in college and my parents treated me to a braodway play and dinner for my birthday. We were having dessert and coffee when I placed my elbow squarely in my coffee cup. I was wearing a wool knit suit which soaked up the coffee in a most remarkable demonstration of capilary action.

I was walking down a hallway at work when for no apparent reason I was on the floor and then in the next breath up again and continuing my stroll. The man coming toward me had the most puzzled look on his face when he asked me if I was OK. He was desparately trying not to laugh.

I was having dinner at an Italian restaurant with a friend and we got to dessert . I had a canolli and espresso, but the canolli had a little mountain of powdered sugar on it. I thought I would discretely blow the sugar off the canolli before eating. Instead of the sugar landing on the plate it poofed up and formed a great cloud around us. We were in the center of the room. Everyone in that room stopped what they were doing to watch.

During a tennis lesson, the instructor was lobbing balls to teach us how to do overheads. The very first lob bounced off the top of my head.

-- Anonymous, January 16, 2000

I can actually think of quite a few imbarassing moments....(thats not a good thing is it?)

such as the time I thought my Pony brand tennis shoe was the height of fashion...I was smooooth.

Then there was the time that my mother was reading a book and in my mind not paying enough attention to me, thus I announced that I was running away. Mom calmly said "Ok" never looking up from her book...I think a walked about a block down the street and decided not to run away. Needless to say I returned home and informed my mother I changed my mind my mother was still reading her book "that's nice" she responded never looking up...

"Pegging" my jeans (that kinda of a tight cuff around the ankle for yall who are wondering...not sure if this was popular many places but it sure was where I grew up)

Pulling into the church parking lot with a friend with the windows rolled down and George Michael's blaring "I WANT YOUR SEX" for everyone to hear as they started into the church (needless to say that my Sunday school class was about "sinful music" that day.

I could go on...but needless to say I beleive this is enough...

-- Anonymous, January 17, 2000

Pamie, I'm always up for a bit of research, so I found this site about Sebastian Bach (apparently those in the know refer to him as 'Baz')- http://hometown.aol.com/EyRemembrU/Bazmania.html

He looks like he's aged fairly well, but is it just me or does he look like a complete fluffy pink cardie boy? He really should give up that hair.

-- Anonymous, January 17, 2000

Well, like many of your readers, Pamie, I have so many times in my life to choose from. There was the time in the 8th grade that a 6th grader called one of the most popular boys in my class pretending to be me. Telling him how much "I" liked him. I refrained from eating lunch for the remainder of the year so as not to run into him, hurling my parents into the neurotic fantasy/fear that I had an eating disorder.

One time in 7th grade my best friend and I had just learned the alphabet in sign language. She was signing to me across the room that she thought our teacher was cute. I agreed. You can guess where this one goes. How were we supposed to know that he had a long term relationship with a hearing impaired woman?

There was the time in 10th grade when I threw the bowling ball the wrong way (into the crowd instead of at the pins) in gym class. The topper to that one: the boy that I had a crush on for 2 years was there as well. (I guess that one wasn't so bad, we're married now!)

Mix in all the times where i was dressed like a freak, forgot deoderant, and fell on my face and it's a pretty complete picture of my teen years.

Where is my therapist's number again?

-- Anonymous, January 17, 2000

I think it's interesting that so few of these responses have to do with sex... but that's where mine is:

When I was thirteen, I was totally infatuated with the hot 'older' fourteen year old girl next door. She knew it, and teased the hell out of me. She managed to get me to smoke my first cigarette by asking me to blow smoke in her mouth, she would sometimes walk into the room, lift up her shirt, look at me and walk away. I was in agony... at thirteen, I was nothing but a single raging hormone, and had NO idea what to do about it. In retrospect, it was pretty obvious that she wanted to play, but at this point I was totally confused. I figured she was just playing around... until...

I was sleeping over with her older brother, and she had a friend over too. The conversation had been flirty all night long, and she finally got me alone and just flat-out asked me if I wanted to have sex with her. I didn't know what to say (the answer of course being YES YES YES) so I just asked her "Well, what if I say no?" She responded "No hard feelings." Ok, that's taken care of... I asked "What if I say yes?" and she comes back with "Well, I guess I'll just have to f*ck your brains out" and smiles.

At this point I walked out of the room in dazed terror. Later, after I figured out that she had actually MEANT it, I tried to make a comeback. Didn't work. I never did get to sleep with her... but I cringe at the memory every time.

-- Anonymous, January 17, 2000

when i was in 6th grade, i had a training bra fall out of my pant leg during gym class. (i'd fished my jeans out of a pile of laundry that morning.)

i had no need for said training bra, which made this experience all the more traumatizing.

-- Anonymous, January 18, 2000

I was at the grocery store last monday after fetching my jeans out of the clean laundry basket and while walking down the produce isle I kicked a pair of my gf's frilly lace panties out of the bottom of one leg and sent them sliding across the floor. Looking around to a few smiles and a few odd looks from other customers, mosly women, I picked them up and put them in my pocket, I decided not to buy any phalic looking produce that day.

Oh and its hard (no pun intended) not to forget being a teenage boy stuck in the on position for all of junior high school. I swear that is why I am so poor at math. teacher: Daniel can you come up to the board and due this math question? me:NO! teacher: come on you can do this one? me: NO. I also got in great shape running back to school after having to stay on the bus three stops past the school while thinking of car accidents so I could stand up without holding my bokks in front of me.

I was once over at my highschool gf's house laying on the floor in the family room (family present of course)and entertaining her five year old sister. The sister jumps on my stomak and squezes out a huge fart the I believe the next door neighbors could hear, oops was all I could say.

by the way, just got yelled at by gf for laughing so loud at reading others stories, its 3:45 am here as I write this.

-- Anonymous, January 23, 2000

Used to sing in a heavy metal band when I was a teen. Thought I was a really cool dude. heh. Remember my tight red spandex pants that just screamed; "So, what else do you want to know about me.." But the best was our first concert, where as the lead singer it was my job to "talk" to the audience in between songs. Trying to be "cool", I spent the whole concert talking in a really bad "tough sounding" voice with an English accent. Think of a pissed off Ozzy Osbourne. Being Hispanic only added to the effect. During the "oh too cool" drum solo, my loving older brother called me to the side of the stage and said; "Why in the hell are you talking like you are from London, you sound like an a**hole."

Well, needless to say, I was one subdued soft-spoken heavy metal God for the rest of THAT concert.

oh man, what a dork.

plenty more where that came from......

-- Anonymous, January 26, 2000

Is there some kind of limit as to how many times one person is allowed to humiliate themselves on this forum?

One night I was saying goodnight to my date, while slowly walking backwards toward my front door. As I gave a final wave, my heel hit the step and I fell back and landed on my ass on the porch. My purse came flying open and all the contents spilled everywhere. Graceful like a ballerina, that's me. The boy was nice enough to come help me pick everything up, but I bet he had a big laugh when he got inside his car.

One summer at camp, when I was about 8, we were all on the front porch of the main cabin playing a game where we had to get lower and lower and lower to the ground every time somebody said a certain word, until we were all precariously crouched and teetering in a little ball. For some reason, I thought it would be funny to give the girl next to me a little shove so she would lose her balance and land on her butt. Yeah, I know, ha ha, right? 8 year olds are amused by slapstick, what can I say? Anyway, I SWEAR I only gave her a tiny push, but she must have been poised in exactly the perfect position for disaster, because as soon as I did it, she not only fell backwards, but she rolled and rolled like a boulder RIGHT OFF THE PORCH! It felt like watching a slo-mo scene, and I was frozen in place, just watching her tumble away. A counselor had to go get her out of the bushes, and she was crying up a storm. I just stared straight ahead and kept playing the game, like she was just a big klutz and I had nothing to do with it. She didn't rat me out, so I let her have all my desserts for the rest of the week.

During the 8th and 9th grade in high school, I remember having these heart-stopping crushes on guys, but never letting them know because I was such a chicken. I would try and play it cool if the guy I liked spoke to me, but would inevitably end up breaking out in these horrible dark red neck hives that actually burned to the touch. There was no way to hide them, they would even creep up to my face sometimes. I could feel the heat in my skin, but didn't realize the nervous reaction was actually visible until once when I thought I'd pulled off a pretty calm and witty conversation with the current guy of my dreams, but when I walked away a girl I knew walked up and said, "Wow, you must really like him!" When I asked her how she could tell, she dragged me to the bathroom mirror so I could see what looked like a violent allergic reaction to shellfish, all over my chest, neck and face. I ended up being sent home because my teacher was convinced I was sick. Luckily I'm not that shy anymore, or I'd probably be dead by now.

Oh, and then there was the time that I was walking through the cafeteria towards the hall to my next class, carrying a boatload of books. I passed by a guy I had a 'thing' for, casually said hello and kept walking like it was no big deal that he spoke to me. When it was safe, I turned around to sneak a peek at his derrierre, and unknowingly started veering to the right. I veered myself right into the huge garbage can that was stuck in the corner of every hallway entrance in the school. It was at waist level, so upon impact I had a knee-jerk reaction, and my upper half swung down right into the mouth of the can. I dropped all my books inside, on top of the dumped out lunch food and various other nastiness, and had to dig them all back out while trying to look like I had meant to do that. I was pretty cool in high school. Not.

-- Anonymous, January 26, 2000

5th grade- On days when there were Girl Scouts after school, we had to wear our Girl Scout uniforms to school. I was wearing my green Girl Scout jumper. Well, it was hot in our classroom, and I was thinking I was wearing a sweatshirt. So, I lifted my jumper up over my head and took it off. In my head, it made so much sense. For a few seconds, I was only wearing my undershirt, day of the week underwear (when they were very uncool), and tights. Stupid, and humiliating.

7th grade- I was wearing stretch pants and a hot pink shirt (with bows on the sleeves). In gym, we were climbing the ropes, which I could do faster than any girl in my class. That day I learned you should never climb ropes while wearing stretch pants (I later learned you shouldn't really even be seen in public wearing stretch pants) because it will give you a giant whole in the crotch of your pants. I had to walk around like that all day. Once again, humiliated.

-- Anonymous, January 27, 2000