We all have some. I’ll go first.
There was these sad TV ads in the 60’s with burnt out forests, and a sad smoking semi charred bear. They always ended by saying “only you can prevent forest fires.”
Why only me? It seemed that at least someone else should help me save these sad bears. I was only 6 and was afraid to light a match until I was 11.
That was “Smokey the Bear” I wonder whatever happened to him.
And “ash wendsday”
At times I would go with my mom to church and they would feed me the body of christ. Seriously ? My mom told me this was heaven, I expected buttered lobster on brie, with better wine then I kept sneaking when she wasn’t looking.
What did I get ? You know it , a dried cracker that wasn’t exactly a ritz, and not enough warm grape juice so I could wash down their shitty lame ass dry dusty cracker. All this money, a huge ass building with stained glass windows, an organ, a choir of pretty girls and gold collection plates. Then that. To put it mildly, if he’s the king of kings, a saltine please. I wasn’t demanding a ritz with blue cheese, but seriously? Why, for the love of god why? All that build up and then that shitty cracker.
I was afraid of tornadoes. I grew up in the Midwest, where it’s reasonable to be afraid of them, since they do happen there. After a while, somehow I figured out that tornadoes are pinpoint-type things; they only really destroy what’s directly in their path so the odds of being shredded by one were pretty remote. Also I moved out of the Midwest.
I moved to Long Island, and in my first year there I experienced a hurricane. A very large tree fell right in front of my car while I was trying to move it away from a bunch of other trees! Hurricanes are scarier than tornadoes. They do less damage per square foot, but they cover a much wider swath!
If I remember correctly, Smokey is based on an orphaned bear cub that was found after a forest fire. He was nursed back to health and may or may not have served as a live spokes-bear during the early days of that campaign. Not sure why they moved away from Smokey the Bear as a spokesperson, but they have changed some of the approach to wildfires. After an especially devastating fire in Yellowstone in 1986, it was realized that forests need the occasional fire as part of their life cycle. By preventing fires for so many years, the amount of “fuel” that built up in those protected lands burned very brightly when it did finally catch. Some types of tree, such as redwoods, can withstand a fair amount of fire and continue to thrive, with less competition, afterward.
That’s an interesting way to phrase the question. So are you a Catholic? 
BTW, if you think your local church was decadent, you should check out St. Peters in Rome. We went there last summer and it was fascinating. The Catholic church does a tremendous amount of charity work, but they definitely don’t live poor…
School. School sucks. I hated school. What kid wants to be institutionalized?
You call it institutionalized.
I call it being locked up with dozens of attractive young ladies with raging hormones.
Yeah, that bothered me.
Smokey the Bear
Breaking your arm
Always a good time, everyone should do it once. I would advise getting a motorcycle, they are the most fun you can have while breaking your arm.
So anyway, I am 6 and don’t have a motorcycle, neither did my friends, so we had to get creative. Mike (an older kid) had this cool game, rocket man. He would lie on his back, bend his legs, and I would sit on his feet. Then he would kick me high in the air. Great fun, really. Until the time I fell wrong and broke my arm. To be honest with you, it did hurt, but I am a physical autistic, and stuff only hurts when I look or focus on it. Otherwise, I’m good.
Not wanting to get Mike in trouble, but also not wanting pain (it didn’t hurt if I mentally looked away), I ran inside crying for a bit, but soon came back outside and told the kids I was OK. I just didn’t want to play rocket man again for now.
Several days went by, and I had mentioned nothing to my parents. My mom noticed I was quieter than usual, but I was usually quiet, so I said nothing about that. But then she pointed out that I was now left handed. I was resting my right arm in my lap and eating with my left. I hate being questioned
by adults, so I parried that my sister Jen is left handed, and now I am to. We are just left handed, no bodies fault. Yet they blamed me anyway. My dad took my right arm and squeezed it hard, feeling the bone. That hurt, I could not avoid wincing, and he pronounced it broke.
This terrified me, to me , a broken arm was like on a doll. It is going to come off, and I really didn’t want that. But I didn’t want my dad to squeeze it again, so I went with them to the doctor. Dr Williams had a good manner and he took the time to explain to me what the xray showing the crack meant. I had to have a plaster cast for 8 weeks, but my arm would not come off. That reassured me greatly, for a while there, all these adults had convinced me it was broken.
Having to eat LIVER
The taste, feel, smell…disgusting !
Oh wait, nothing has changed…it’s still disgusting. 
Liver just cost to much
OK, I don’t care for it either.
But me and Allan were sharing an apt in Boulder, C in the 80’s. Ramen noodles will kill you, or at least make you wish someone would kill you. But there is an appalling lack of ammunition in this country, so what do you do ?
At first I thought he was nuts. On second thought, I knew he was nuts, but it became OK because I had known him a long time, he meant well, plus I was starving.
We started eating stuff weirder than liver. Gizzards are like a pouch in a birds throat where they swallow rocks and the muscles in the gizzard will sort of grind dry seeds and stuff up before they swallow it. We ate a lot of that. I polished off a deer with a hammer once after it had been hit by a car. Not my car, not my bad. It likely wanted to die, smashed leg and all. Everyone that eats meat, and has tried it eats venison. But we also ate the liver. I gave the kidneys away, call me a coward, but Ramen that tastes like piss could be off putting. We also ate the heart, surprising lean and tasty. Bambi had a good heart.
answer to John Foss
No, I wasn’t Catholic. My mom told me I was a pisscup palien, which now that I think about it , does sorta explain the taste of their juice. I so wish I had been born Welsh’s.
Actually, I think the eating the body and drinking the purple piss of Christ is common to most denominations, at least at some times of the year. But did you know that if you aren’t careful, they will have a child molester take a dirty finger and put a smudge mark on your forehead ? Now that’s Catholic. In our church the minister was so nice to everyone it just kinda pissed me off a bit. None of that Catholic fondling.
As a kid, like most kids, I hated being told what to do, and when I asked why the answer was either “because I say so” or “do it or else…”
Being a kid is cool in many ways, esp to an adult’s eyes, but that’s only because adults have control over their destiny, kids on the other hand are kinda stuck with a destiny that is chosen for them.
I really hated being told to eat foods I did not like! Cooked carrots literally made me gag!!
Funny thing about not liking veggies as a kid: I’m a vegetarian now 
If you are a parent and you are reading this, please, pleae, let the kids be kids, don’t insist they “grow up” or “act their age”, all kids grow up too fast and too soon, there is no reason to push them before it’s time; and “time” is how they see it, not you.
I love working with kids, they are so quirky and wierd
Kids are rational, but rarely logical.
well I am still young 
all my life I have been spending lot of time in a dreamworld of mine : only my body was there (in the real world) but not my mind.
So bossy teacher: “bear! what did I say?”
me (rewinding wildly back several minutes in time): “well you said that and that …”
teacher : "amazing! how can you do that? you were obviously not listening to me 
"
me: “well not exactly: I had left part of my brain in the real world :D”
as an adult this habit is not funny: I have lost lots of friends that way …
to me it was the intro music of a last 70’s/early 80’s TV show: Les dossiers de l’écran wich consisted in a movie followed by a talk about a subject related to the movie.
The movies where sometimes dramatic, sometimes light and funny but this music ( Protest from the Spirituals for Orchestra (1941) - Morton Gould), man, this music still triggers a shiver down my whole spine, just by thinking about it.
On Thursday nights, this music was sometimes the last thing I heard from my bedroom before sleeping. Creepy.
try it here
Never listen to French music
I don’t know what’s wrong with you people. French music is to the ear what frogs and snails are to dinner. Oh wait, you are french, let me explain that to you. Non french people don’t like pain in their ears, or vomiting.
Only your girls are good. Although the french language sounds OK, it doesn’t make a lick of sense to anyone else on earth, and when you start singing, it gets a lot worse.
There are hundreds of fantastic english and american bands. Name me one good song that came from france. “Court of the crimson king”. I knew you would say that, you only have one,that’s why I wrote it ahead of time. But Crimson wrote it in english, that should tell you something.
I don’t wish you to think I hate your country, but you and North Korea are vying for the bottom of the bottom 40 list of pop songs. Honestly, after fries and toast, you should have called it a day. I have a french name, but I will not tell it to you, because I am appropriately ashamed. If only you would start fighting the british again and get it over with, at least that would be entertaining. Just don’t try to do a battle of bands. We all might die.
Oh yeah, and thank’s for saving our ass in the late 1700’s. Greatly appreciated. But we sorta paid you guys back by kicking Clause later, and I am glad it’s German’s now, and not you, that made my motorcycle. The only thing worse than french music was their motorcycles. Oh wait, I can’t think of one. I don’t wonder why.
OK, so I hope you realize we have a serious problem here. I lie awake at night sometimes terrified that they might form a rap band in Quebec, and I will have to shoot myself. And there is a serious lack of ammunition in this country.
OK, thank you very much, mister asshole.
Oh, BTW, Morton Gould seemed to be an american fellow.
Thank you
OK, but help me with the cultural angle here. Bla is the stuff you put on the snail before you eat it right? Sorta how yanks butter lobster?
And I never said all american music is good. Only that Morton Gould was posted by a frenchman, so of course it’s not good. No one here is surprised at this. We are all sure you were trying your best and you have our sympathies.
Also, in the future, I prefer to be called asshole. No need for the formalities zzig, we all love each other here, even the french, sorta. Especially kissing your girls. Sometimes it almost feels like they have a frog in their mouth. Love it.
Brilliant!
I must admit that you really fooled me with your Xth fake account, Maestro8. The character is very consistent, you’re getting better and better at it.
GG
I will let M8 take this one
I think it is his turn to be funny now. Obviously, we cannot rely on the french. If we had, we would all be drinking beer and looking at large breasted blond girls bringing us more beer. The horror. Save this thread Maestro8, I need you now, a fat chick is sitting in my lap and I can type no longer.
There has been Québécois rap since at least 2005:
It’s even a free song online or at least it was when the politics were still relevant.
As for things that bothered me: people who ran bike tires backwards without realizing it, especially the front.