When John, Mike, and I were 13 and 15, one of my dad’s oh so responsible employees showed us how to build a potato gun.
Because everyone knows the combination of pipe, potatoes, a bottle of WD-40, and a flame tool are landmark in safety and you should share them with teenagers.
We made the biggest potato gun possible and spent our afternoons launching the potatoes into targets… *cough* the pool deck… *cough* the new trees… *cough* the house siding… (sorry ‘bout those dents dad)
On a particularly hot day, John filled the chamber up with Rave hairspray and WD-40. The fumes filled the air as he quickly spun the cap on and pulled out the matches. As soon as he touched the flame to the side, a loud BOOM exploded into our ears. Mike and I looked down to see John on his back, his shoes smoldering and the lawn burst into flames.
He hadn’t spun the cap on tightly and instead of launching the potato, the force rocketed the cap and the flame onto John’s shoed feet.
Responsibly… we laughed hysterically at John.
We laughed so hard, we overlooked the fact that the lawn was still on fire… in the middle of summer. About 60 seconds of laughing at John’s blackened shoes went by before we suddenly became aware that the fire was growing. And then we realized, if mom saw the fire, she’d never let us shoot another potato again.
Mike ran for the hose while John stomped out what he could. It’s not like his shoes could get worse.
Fortunately they got the fire out (hence the reason they are such good firefighters… they started young) but there was still a huge problem…
Now there was a huge black spot of charred lawn directly in front of the screen door that mom surely wouldn’t miss. We couldn’t think of a believable story for the burn spot and we certainly weren’t going to tell the truth sooooo…
We dug out the lawn, tossed it off the back hill so no one would find it, threw on some fresh dirt, then went inside and told mom the dogs had dug a patch of the lawn out and she should be mad at them.
As for John’s shoes? ‘Pssshhh. Mom, that’s a fashion statement. Don’t you know style?!?!’
Why do I believe there is a God? There is NO way I would have survived childhood in the country without Him.
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8 comments:
Oh, I'm all atwitter with anticipation over Debbie's response to this one...
I never heard that story!! I can't believe you kept that secret so long.
I never heard about that one! Where were Nicole and I????
LOL!! That is just so freakin hilarious. Thank god the guys work now to put OUT fires. =)
YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!!!!! It was bad enough that you sent gophers and squirrels to their death, but dad's lawn???? And John's shoes?? (For those of you who are worried over the sweet little critters, they were constantly destroying our yard, eating our produce, carriers of disease, etc.. the kid's dad actually paid them a dollar for every tail they gave him, which they, in a sense, gave up to 'send' off the little creatures for the ride of their life.) Brother!!! You know, the stories that are now coming out are rather frightening. You HAD better thank God that you are still alive........because dad and/or I would have killed you had we known what had really happened out there! You three would have been 'sent' to see YOUR Maker, and it WOULDN'T have been the ride of your lives.
I'm thinking I still love you, mom
By the way, about the dogs. Was that around the same time that I had finally had with them and they were in more trouble than they knew? And poor dad. You know how he was about his lawn. Those dogs really paid for it when they got the urge to dig his lawn up. Did you guys not even feel slightly guilty????
I think we should build an even bigger potato gun, grease it up really good and send one of you, or better yet, Thorny up in it. How about that?
Love, I think, mom
I have never laguhed so hard, Ok Mike Rebekah and John your not allowed alone time with my son. LOL :)
Lisa, you're lucky we didn't have more time with him in October. We had such big plans...
Potato guns...
Gopher tricks...
How to not get rabbies... (though that involves a lot of prayer...)
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