When a person qualifies to appear on Jeopardy!, they are asked to complete a survey about themselves.
There are some questions to provide the contestant with an idea on what to write.
When I made it through the trials in May of 2003, I followed the suggestions on the sheet, including what was the most embarrassing thing ever to happen to you?
That’s our guy.
I wrote down a time when I went cliffdiving in Greece and threw my bathing trunks into the water BEFORE jumping, only to watch them float out to sea.
Unfortunately, I had to walk through the resort back to my cabin sans shorts. However, I was never that embarrassed when it happened.
The story below was a different matter entirely.
The condo I owned in 2003 was…average, but the bedroom closet was AMAZING.
It was a walk-in, something that allowed me to store a LOT of stuff.
It was pretty well organized, and spacious enough that I could walk in and grab my clothes for school without turning on a light or paying much attention. I usually woke before my alarm (around 5:30), showered, grabbed my clothes from the walk-in, dressed in the bedroom, all the while respecting my cat asleep on the bed.
This particular morning was no different than any other – I usually spent the night before in Philly, so I may have been a little more tired than usual, but it’s no excuse. I went to school, and was presenting something on an overhead projector to my classes.
Four periods went by. And not a word from a colleague, student…
…no one.
Fifth period, however, had two very outspoken young ladies in it, and they were very aware of my fashion sense. One of them started cracking up.
“C! Why are you wearing two different shoes?”
I misheard the question. “I get dressed in the dark, so I never really pay attention to the socks matching my shoes.” I was responding to a question I’d normally hear from the girls.
“NO, C! YOU’RE WEARING DIFFERENT SHOES !!!”
I looked down…and she was right. On my right foot was a brown docksider shoe; on the left, a black Timberland boot…two shoes that couldn’t have been more different, unless I’d been wearing a clown shoe on one foot and a high heel on the other.
The way the class laughed, I might as well have.
The great thing about overhead projectors – they came on carts, and for the afternoon classes, I stood with my feet directly underneath them, but it didn’t stop students from asking…after all, the earlier class told EVERYONE. My most embarrassing teaching moment ever.
I don’t know who picks the questions/comments Alex Trebek makes to each contestant when the show comes back from the first commercial break, but he could’ve picked:
But no. He picked the Naked Cliff Diving Story, and he ended the conversation with a corny joke.
I’d almost prefer to have been embarrassed all over again.
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Well, it’s a good thing that your two embarrassing encounters weren’t combined, and you had shown up to class naked. That’s classic nightmare material right there!
My embarrassing story is only personally embarrassing…I hope.
I was working in the basement of a retail store doing shipments. My time was just about up, and I bent down to pick up one of the last boxes to ship…and then my khakis split up the back.
I didn’t have a mirror handy, but from what I could tell, it was bad: a massive rip.Thankfully I was alone in the basement at the time, but I was still freaking out. How could I go upstairs and talk with my coworkers and customers in this state?
I could straight up tell them about the tear, but that just guaranteed embarrassment. (note: later in life, I would have done exactly this, but I was a shy kid)
What if I simply acted like nothing was wrong, and left for the day? It was a pretty small shop, so I reasoned the chances of someone looking down at my ass were actually pretty slim. As long as I acted like everything is normal, and I’m just headed out for the day.
And you know, that strategy actually seemed to work, as far I could tell. No one seemed to notice anything was odd. And crucially, there were no giggles or teasing later on. I’m pretty sure no one noticed.
Of course, getting home was a bit different. This was in Manayunk PA, at the bottom of a giant hill, and I lived on the top of the hill. I usually enjoyed the walk to and from work, but today was a bit different, for obvious reasons. Thankfully the only pedestrians I encountered were headed downhill (it is quite a steep walk up, after all), but who’s to say what a random driver may have seen?
Once at home, I saw the full damage, and it was worse than I had thought! My boxers had torn as well, leaving pretty much nothing to the imagination. Everyone gets embarrassed, but not everyone gets em-bare-assed!
I wonder if those drivers thought they had spotted Prince?
… and the good people of Manayunk still wonder to this day the origins of some people snickering about”Mans-a-junk”….
They are free to yunk it up to their hearts’ content!
It’s not like there was much of anything to see anyway. I am not Prince in that regard.
You know what would be embarrassing? Forgetting to vote in round 2 of the TNOCS Spooky Song Supreme! https://www.polltab.com/bracket-poll/rMcyTEQxehL
Also, playing a 45 minute set of heartfelt, original music with your fly down.
1. How does one not notice the difference when putting on those those vastly different shoes?! How they feel?! The Timberlands probably had a massive sole on them; how does one not notice the height differencial? Too funny. On the bright side, they at least weren’t both left foot shoes also!
2. There HAS to be more to the cliff diving story dude. Who throws their suit off first? Like, that was your way of gauging the wind direction? 😆
I seem to have successfully blocked any horribly embarrassing moments from my memory banks, but I did recall a particular scenario that wound up being too perfect to be embarrassed by it…
Totally waving my band geek nerd flag on this one. So our MS band was on stage practicing for some upcoming concert. That meant stage crew had set up all the risers etc for our seating. However, they had a tendency to not align the risers flush to each other, and every now and then if you pushed your chair back too far, the back legs of the chair fall through the gap.
Well, this particular day in practice, for whatever reason, in one of the songs we were playing, the trumpets had to stand up for group spotlight or something, I dunno. There were 6 of us trumpets on our particular row, and not a single one of us bothered to do the mandatory check for the gap. So we all go to sit back down, and szzzzuup, every one of the trumpeters in my row have their chairs drop into the gap, and all of us look like turtles on our back, legs flailing in the air, momentarily stunned.
Thing is, the 6 of us not only were the top chair trumpets, but we were the seniority for the MS band and therefore felt it was our duty to be the smart aleck band clowns, and so we had a tendency to goof off. Alot. So our band director gives us a staredown like the most unamused parent EVER, fully believing we’d caused that disruption in sync on purpose. The realization as we’re scrambling to help each other up of just how perfectly timed this particular accident was set us off on the most hysterical laughing fit ever. Which was saying something for our crew. And did nothing to convince our director we really did not plan it in advance.
Bunch of easily amused dumb schmuck 13 year olds. 😁
Getting dressed in the dark so as not to disturb the cat: you are a man after my own heart, gue.
The big question: Did Alex pronounce your last name correctly?
Sartorial Aberrations in the Dark.
Wow, thegue. Makes me “glad” my most embarrassing moment was passing out in a hot tub in college and requiring four friends to pull me out …