Naughtiest things you did as a child
Discussion
Some good stories here.
I set fire to my Mums house. I used to like using a lighter on tissue paper and then throw it into the fire place.
Once piece of tissue paper must have had some chemical on it as it literally went up in flames rather quicker as opposed to just slowly burning away.
I dropped it and had no idea what to do. So it fell onto the carpet (in a massive living room) and started to spread. My Mum smelt the carpet burning from the kitchen (again quite big) after a couple of minutes and must have been a 2M square section of carpet that was ruined.
Luckily she had a big chinese - type carpet that covered up the burn quite nicely...
I set fire to my Mums house. I used to like using a lighter on tissue paper and then throw it into the fire place.
Once piece of tissue paper must have had some chemical on it as it literally went up in flames rather quicker as opposed to just slowly burning away.
I dropped it and had no idea what to do. So it fell onto the carpet (in a massive living room) and started to spread. My Mum smelt the carpet burning from the kitchen (again quite big) after a couple of minutes and must have been a 2M square section of carpet that was ruined.
Luckily she had a big chinese - type carpet that covered up the burn quite nicely...
A litany of things, but making petrol bombs from milk bottles, petrol, and kitchen roll then launching at the wall of one of the barns we had was particularly stupid. Though never got boring.
Broke into a grain storage unit, ridiculously dangerous walking along the top walkway alongside 40ft drops either side into empty grain hoppers in the dark. Probably not as stupid as jumping into one that had grain in it, a very easy way to drown/suffocate/bury yourself alive.
Broke into a grain storage unit, ridiculously dangerous walking along the top walkway alongside 40ft drops either side into empty grain hoppers in the dark. Probably not as stupid as jumping into one that had grain in it, a very easy way to drown/suffocate/bury yourself alive.
karona said:
A few years later I was experimenting with aluminium foil, put some over a power socket and plugged the kettle in. It blew the cooker switch/socket box off the wall and blacked out the entire married quarters of Swanton Morley, during Coronation Street.
Every cloud has a silver lining, I'm surprised that you didn't get a medal for "services to the community."I suppose I got up to the usual naughtiness that any boy growing up in post war London did, but one that my mother never let me forget, was the times that I would drag my dad's lease-lend 38 calibre U.S. revolver from under the bed, and struggle to carry it out into the streets of Brockley to play cowboys and indians.
He somehow "forgot" to hand it back when the war ended.
Fortunately he'd removed the bullets, I think they were in the loft, out of reach.
Never knew what happened to it, they divorced in the seventies, I loved him to bits, but I'm surprised my mum never shot him.
Me and my Sister tied a long length of elastic from inside a golf ball to a door handle inside the house, then threaded it through the letter box and stretched it right across the other side of the road. We then tied a load of washers to the end of it, with the intention of them getting fired through the letterbox and into the house. We didn't think about the large window in the front door, just above the letter box. It looked and sounded like a rifle had been fired at our front door, but luckily our story was so unbelievable, we got away without too much trouble.
1 I drilled a deep and very visible hole in my Dad's newly fitted sandstone fireplace with a plastic fisher-price drill like this.
Sorry Dad.
2 I shot someones TV aerial off their rooftop with a small piece of flint fired from a home made slingshot/catapault.
The slingshot used a big rubber belt we found in the road and we could barely pull the thing back it was so stiff. The stone made a brilliant ricochet noise like a bullet when hit the aerial, which then fell down in slow motion. Absolutely superb shot TBH. And to my shame I only realised how
ish it was years later when the wind blew down my own aerial and I had to go up on the roof and replace it. Arse of a job.
Sorry to whoever's aerial that was.
Edit:
forgot that my sister and I caught a hoverfly, tied a string round its body and kept it on a lead. He did not appreciate it
Sorry Dad.
2 I shot someones TV aerial off their rooftop with a small piece of flint fired from a home made slingshot/catapault.
The slingshot used a big rubber belt we found in the road and we could barely pull the thing back it was so stiff. The stone made a brilliant ricochet noise like a bullet when hit the aerial, which then fell down in slow motion. Absolutely superb shot TBH. And to my shame I only realised how
ish it was years later when the wind blew down my own aerial and I had to go up on the roof and replace it. Arse of a job. Sorry to whoever's aerial that was.
Edit:
forgot that my sister and I caught a hoverfly, tied a string round its body and kept it on a lead. He did not appreciate it
Classic quad bikes and dirtbikes on the roads.
Set fire to a pot of petrol, panicked when the flames got quite large and thought that pouring it onto the ground would extinguish it....
Meant to be back at 4 so parents could drive me home, I did the "one more go" whilst jumping my bike. End up falling in a bog and covered in mud... father wasn't impressed.
Releasing a neighbours dogs from their kennels... my bad...
Not so naughty, but I fell and hit my head in a playground at Disney Land Paris, mother comes running over, "are you ok, do you know where you are..." I thought it would be funny to say no and pretend to not have a clue. Meant I got spoilt for the rest of the day after a trip to the Dr's.
Set fire to a pot of petrol, panicked when the flames got quite large and thought that pouring it onto the ground would extinguish it....
Meant to be back at 4 so parents could drive me home, I did the "one more go" whilst jumping my bike. End up falling in a bog and covered in mud... father wasn't impressed.
Releasing a neighbours dogs from their kennels... my bad...
Not so naughty, but I fell and hit my head in a playground at Disney Land Paris, mother comes running over, "are you ok, do you know where you are..." I thought it would be funny to say no and pretend to not have a clue. Meant I got spoilt for the rest of the day after a trip to the Dr's.
Broke into my neighbours house to have a look at the christmas presents my mum was storing there.
She did some housekeeping bits for them as they lived in france most of the year.
The worst part?
The owners of the house chose the exact moment i was sat in the lounge rummaging through the xmas gifts, to return from France, and walk into the house to find one very embarrased looking ten year old.
She did some housekeeping bits for them as they lived in france most of the year.
The worst part?
The owners of the house chose the exact moment i was sat in the lounge rummaging through the xmas gifts, to return from France, and walk into the house to find one very embarrased looking ten year old.
We lived near a canal where boats would moor up for the night. We'd harvest apples from the nearby trees, untie the boats, push them away from the bank and then pelt them with the apples!
I remember riding my BMX and the canal one winter when it froze over, seems massively stupid now!
I remember riding my BMX and the canal one winter when it froze over, seems massively stupid now!
R8Steve said:
Where were you for this to happen?
Unless you were in Texas that is one of the strangest things I've heard.
Close by the River Ouse in a place called Poppleton near York, I was about 10 years old.Unless you were in Texas that is one of the strangest things I've heard.
Didnt think anything of it at the time, I suppose at 10 you are very accepting, and very grateful to have got out.
grumpy52 said:
Nothing too drastic , a narrow road full of terraced houses that we linked all the door knockers together with 5lbs fishing line and then send a mate down the road going full pelt on his push bike .
My Dad and his four brothers used to do that in a road in north Watford when he was a lad in about 1910. They just knocked on one door and started a chain reaction...Similar sorts of things to people here. Which would have me spewing with rage as an old fart if any kids did the same to me:
- Approaching bonfire night, buying things like airbomb repeaters which we'd set off in someone's front garden. Or sticking a banger to a metal garage door, lighting it and running off
- Garden hopping, particularly if there was a bushy privet hedge. One house had a tiered front lawn with a bushy privet on the bottom tier. Cue large gang of young adolescents diving off the tier above onto the privet (and pretty much flattening it).
- Apple and rhubarb scrumping
- Getting black widow catapults, stealing pebbles from someone's drive (the one where you have two concrete strips and a middle strip of pebbles), firing pebbles through greenhouses and street light covers
- Camping in our back garden with a couple of mates (aged about 13), going for a 'midnight wander' through the local back lawns, came to a massive hedge we couldn't get over, one of my mates found a huge rock and shot puts it over the hedge. There must have been a greenhouse right on the other side that we couldn't see and this rock must have demolished pretty much one of the sides of the greenhouse given the huge smash that sounded.
Quite a bit that I look back on now and think it was probably a bit silly...
Messing around on the railway line was probably one of the more stupid things, used to put stones on the tracks and also taped coins to it to see if they'd get flattened. We got chased away by some railway workers one day. Surprised we never got arrested really.
Usual stuff with fireworks around bonfire night, so much fun to be had with bottle rockets. One evening we were setting off stuff over the local recreation ground firing rockets out of the goal posts horizontally when a police car came hurtling over the field towards us. Suffice to say we legged it and I dumped the remains of my fireworks somewhere along the way, luckily we hurdled the brook on our escape and they failed to get us. There was some concrete storm drain tunnels near a mates house, firing rockets down them was good.
Random arson, particular favourite was the boundary rope for the cricket pitch at the local park, we'd diligently gather that up, stick it in a bin and torch it. Burnt for ages
I wasn't there but a mate managed to "accidently" ignite an entire wheat field.
Was never allowed an airgun but we did sneakily buy a Black Widow catapult from the local fishing shop, the excellent collection of marbles we'd got as kids didn't last too long. Found a load of glass sheets dumped in some waste land so we promptly dealt with those for target practice.
Didn't get much better as we got older either. My Dad's poor old Volvo estate used to take a right hammering doing handbrake turns around a local field sometimes with someone hanging onto the roof rack. Again how nobody got hurt is anyone's guess.
The came drink and drugs, won't even go there...
Messing around on the railway line was probably one of the more stupid things, used to put stones on the tracks and also taped coins to it to see if they'd get flattened. We got chased away by some railway workers one day. Surprised we never got arrested really.
Usual stuff with fireworks around bonfire night, so much fun to be had with bottle rockets. One evening we were setting off stuff over the local recreation ground firing rockets out of the goal posts horizontally when a police car came hurtling over the field towards us. Suffice to say we legged it and I dumped the remains of my fireworks somewhere along the way, luckily we hurdled the brook on our escape and they failed to get us. There was some concrete storm drain tunnels near a mates house, firing rockets down them was good.
Random arson, particular favourite was the boundary rope for the cricket pitch at the local park, we'd diligently gather that up, stick it in a bin and torch it. Burnt for ages
I wasn't there but a mate managed to "accidently" ignite an entire wheat field.Was never allowed an airgun but we did sneakily buy a Black Widow catapult from the local fishing shop, the excellent collection of marbles we'd got as kids didn't last too long. Found a load of glass sheets dumped in some waste land so we promptly dealt with those for target practice.
Didn't get much better as we got older either. My Dad's poor old Volvo estate used to take a right hammering doing handbrake turns around a local field sometimes with someone hanging onto the roof rack. Again how nobody got hurt is anyone's guess.
The came drink and drugs, won't even go there...
At primary school the top year used to have to take it in turns to do the the teachers washing up. I objected to this on moral grounds so swapped the sugar in the sugar bowl with salt. It didn't take Poirot to work out who did it as 3 family members worked at the school. One of them took sugar in her tea. I'm a middle aged company director and I'm still not allowed to make tea at her house.
I was given a load of craft knives (spare corporate gifts) 'to use at school'. So I thought it was fair game to sell them to my friends. What got me caught was when I approach the head of art and offered to undercut whatever he was paying for theirs. I was stunned when stepfather defended me to the head by saying ' ...misguided but shows the entrepreneurial spirit that this country needs'. I was not disciplined in any way for selling knives in school. Yay for Thatchers Britain everyone!
One of the less bright chaps in the village was encouraged to become, er, acquainted with a pig. We all told him we'd done it. We hadn't. It was an awkward moment on the school bus when he proudly told us. 35 years on he now runs a successful garage, but still has the nickname 'piggy'.
I was given a load of craft knives (spare corporate gifts) 'to use at school'. So I thought it was fair game to sell them to my friends. What got me caught was when I approach the head of art and offered to undercut whatever he was paying for theirs. I was stunned when stepfather defended me to the head by saying ' ...misguided but shows the entrepreneurial spirit that this country needs'. I was not disciplined in any way for selling knives in school. Yay for Thatchers Britain everyone!
One of the less bright chaps in the village was encouraged to become, er, acquainted with a pig. We all told him we'd done it. We hadn't. It was an awkward moment on the school bus when he proudly told us. 35 years on he now runs a successful garage, but still has the nickname 'piggy'.
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