About fifteen years ago I was working on a campaign to inform students about mental health.
We were rewriting some information given to us by Aware, who are one of Ireland's leading mental health advocacy groups.
There was a list of about ten or so symptoms, and we were asking students to speak to a GP if they identified with three or more of the symptoms.
I typed the list up, and after every sentence I thought to myself "yes, I get that".
And it somehow never occured to me to go and get help.
Needless to say, someone else had the last laugh.
( Dr Preference AjcuiVd289, Fri 16 Nov 2012, 0:25, 1 reply)

Just the obvious one, for me
"Don't marry her!"

Sigh...
(North Utsira South Utsira, Fri 16 Nov 2012, 0:08, Reply)

A humourous reference to "Downfall", the 2004 biopic about the final days of Hitler.

(Elephant Balderdash attempting to bottle the absurd, Fri 16 Nov 2012, 0:03, 2 replies)

CAUTION! Floor slippery when wet.

(Elephant Balderdash attempting to bottle the absurd, Fri 16 Nov 2012, 0:00, Reply)

Don't stick massive things up your arse in the vain hope that they vote for the qotw about sticking massive things up your arse.
Or finger kids. Or dogs.
( Dr. Shambolic je suis charlie, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 23:20, 2 replies)

Don't loan your Sister and Brother in Law 65,000 quid on a short term loan
It won't come back ever as I found out.
( spazzcaptain Misses Valin @, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 23:02, 12 replies)

If you keep rubbing it, you'll go blind.
On the upside, I got a cool dog.
(Vigilante Man weeps because you're stupid., Thu 15 Nov 2012, 21:54, 5 replies)

USB
I.T. guru mate "Always use the thingy in the toolbar to remove your USB stick"

Me "Yeah ok" having never had anything bad happen up to this point the advice was ignored. You know where this is going.

Important files on memory stck, check. No backup, check. Pulls memory stick out without using the icon. Plugs stick into other PC. Empty.

ALWAYS have a backup. And use the "Safely remove hardware" icon. That is all.
(Outrun Is it the weekend yet?, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 21:24, 8 replies)

Every week some disembodied voices told me not to open that trapdoor. But would I listen? Would I fuck.

( drimble he'd been white, he'd been black, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 21:17, 4 replies)

close QOTW
But they never listen
(quintsy, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 21:04, 4 replies)

close your car window or that bear will smell us and attack!!!
I didn't believe her and it did smell us, but it didn't attack. Instead it ended up semi-humping the car...
(donald_semblance, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 20:51, 1 reply)

Not listening in school
I was told to study. Advised to study. Forced to study, but I had no interest. School was a minor inconvenience that got in the way of my NES and then later my SNES gaming.

I would never listen in class, mostly because I could never understand the teachers explanation of a subject and I would get frustrated and bored. I later found out in my 20's that I was dyslexic, which probably didn't help but I can't blame that, I just had zero interest in studying and I was lazy. Completely bone idle.
I Wouldn't do homework to the point both my parents and teachers gave up and they stopped even making me participate in class. My parents even stopped getting me up in the morning which, back then, suited me fine. More time to play Final Fantasy I thought.

Fast forward to being about 23 and working in a supermarket, stacking shelves with no qualifications. Not even a GCSE. Finally all that stuff my parents and teachers had been saying made sense. Long story short, got my GCSE's, then A-levels on a night course, went to uni and got my degree and now finally have some kind of a career.

Far too many years too late
( Bamboo Steamer, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 20:42, 17 replies)

Never trust a fart
1995, a hotel bedroom in Swindon, I'm relaxing on the bed watching MTV after a day at work and a good dinner involving a lot of rich food and profiteroles.

They were nice silk paisley boxer shorts too, and I never wore them again. I had to bin them.

Sadly, embarrassingly, true.
(rogerzilla, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 20:28, Reply)

Smoking.
I never listened. I wish I had.

Smoking is shit. So is my will power. I have tried the gum, the patches, 'cold turkey', prescription meds, electronic cigarettes, hypnosis, NHS cessation clinics, the fucking lot. Epic fails.

I smoke 30 a day. That's about £11 a day that i set fire to, which is approximately £4k a year out of net income. I stink of tobacco, my wife hates it and at the age of 39 I have smoked for more of my life than I haven't. Even becoming a parent hasn't stopped me (although I would never smoke anywhere near my daughter and never in the house).

We all make mistakes, some of mine have been significant with long term consequences, but out of them all, I wish I had listened to the advice i received and never started smoking.

serious post is serious. Apologies for the lack of... Etc.


( Fucking hell Jeff I am not a robot, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 19:22, 78 replies)

I didn't put it in the other hole.
She got pregnant.
(Yellow Car is now red, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 19:09, Reply)

Kids are stupid
Well, mine is.

Making coffee one morning, for the wife, I looked over and saw my then 5-year-old son reaching slowly towards the near-boiling kettle.
"Son," I said, "don't touch that, it's hot. You'll burn yourself."
He looked up at me.
"All right, dad."
I turned away to get a spoon from a drawer, then turning back noticed a little hand once more reaching out towards the kettle, which by this point was puking steam all over.
"Look, son, you really mustn't touch it. It's boiling hot, it'll really hurt."
Again he looked me in the eye and said solemnly,
"OK dad."
I turned away again to get the coffee from the cupboard.
"AAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHH! I burned myself!"
Terrible father that I am, my first response was not sympathy, or even concern, but rather "Oh, for the love of...", swiftly followed by "Oh well, maybe that way he'll learn."

He didn't.
( reallywittyname veraciously conspues lexiphanicism on, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 19:08, 3 replies)

I ignored advice about the proper use of a comma.
Yours,
Chthonic.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 18:51, 1 reply)

Oops
You better go now, there may not be a restroom available later.




edit: OK, I feel much better.
( flirting with badgers What? It sounded good at the time., Thu 15 Nov 2012, 18:16, 4 replies)

It'll heal quicker if you don't pick it..
(anvil, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 18:10, Reply)

'..replying to somebody calling them a cunt isn't very constructive and will just encourage people to keep trolling.'
You cunts.
( Amorous Badger NAKED BEA ARTHUR PHOTOS 4U, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 18:08, 5 replies)

Sixth Form Physics
Being told that the electric coil heaters on the desk were there because of a heating system malfunction. We were not to mess with the switches, and absolutely forbidden to touch them with our metal rulers.

Well, you've got to, haven't you?

One large flash later, I'm on my @rse, my mates are pissing themselves and the place is in darkness. I had to sit at the front after that.
( The Lone Groover has mal des nuts., Thu 15 Nov 2012, 18:08, 2 replies)

Everything....I always know better, untill I 'Fuck It Up'

( Evil_Ted is collecting wooden giblets, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 18:06, Reply)

"Don't buy British cars", they said.
I never seem to learn... so far I've bought-

a)Mini Metro 1.0'L'
b)Rover 216 mk1 carb (not the Honda engine)
c)Montego Si
d)Rover 820 Si (Honda Engine)
e)Escort 1.8D
e)Rover 420D
f)Rover 620 Si(Honda Engine)
g)Rover 820 Si (Rover engine)
h)Saab 900NG V6 (basically a tarted up Vectra)
h)Mondeo TDDi Mk 3
i)Skoda Octavia 1.9D

Of them all, the Skoda fetches 55mpg despite being on 190,000 miles, the Saab was a magnificent winter steed and the 620 was an incredible car that cost £600 but lasted 90,000 miles- but it was basically a Honda under the skin anyway. All the rest sequentially managed to disappoint, bore or annoy me- and all cost shedloads to keep going. About the only thing that I can say in my defence is that I never bought a Maestro, which would have given me the complete British Leyland Bingo set.
( Rotating Wobbly Hat That's not a banana. THIS is a banana., Thu 15 Nov 2012, 17:48, 14 replies)

Booze
21 units per week.
(Dr Skagra glorious glargzhem, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 17:40, 11 replies)

'It's times like this I wish I'd listened to my mother'
'Why, what did she say?'

'I dunno, I didn't listen' ;-)
( JamHamster My eyes, my beautiful eyes!, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 17:38, 2 replies)

fourth?
wooo
( Bamboo Steamer, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 17:37, Reply)

never ever say anything in an email
that you wouldnt say face to face.
A, its just good manners.
B, ive lost a job because i didnt adhere to this one 'weird old tip'
(magictorch, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 17:15, 1 reply)

I should have listened....
Don't get married they said. Don't have kids they said.

I should've fucking listened.
(PubicWildlife, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 17:09, 1 reply)

Don't buy a wooden boat
"Buy" isn't quite the word. It was free. Free boat! How could anyone resist? The fact it had been sunk at the bottom of the Basingstoke Canal for 10 years was a minor detail.

Strangely, not everyone quite had our eye for a bargain. My boss at the time, vastly more experienced in all things boaty than I was, said it'd be a bottomless pit of money, time, and effort. Pah, said I and the couple of mates who'd chipped in to pay for it to be towed halfway across Britain so we could fix it, industrial-size bilge pump running all the time. We knew it'd take six months of solid work and some cash.

But we were ready for it. This is a historic 70-year old boat we were saving. This is Important Work and our priceless heritage yadda yadda would be better for our effort.

It's now even more of a historic boat. It's now a historic 83-year old boat. Because that six-month schedule was set 13 years ago and the ----ing boat has only just, this week, gone back in the water with a fully mended hull. After a significant five-figure spend, and countless lost weekends spent arm-deep in horseshit. Yes, that's how you fix wooden boats. You mix horseshit with boiling hot tar to produce a noxious substance known as chalico. I am, sadly, not making that up.

Still, we now have a floating boat. All we need to do now is build a cabin and install an engine.

*weeps*
(ChaRleyTroniC is invincible with his chips and cheese, Thu 15 Nov 2012, 17:02, 10 replies)