I am a dentist, semi-retired at the moment. A few years ago, late on a Friday afternoon on a day full of emergency work-ins, a woman came in with a complaint of pain when she bit down. I intended to start my sphiel about how a crack develops in the enamel, causing pain when there is pressure, yada, yada. Well it came out "You have a crap in your tooth." I could not believe that I said that. I immediately apologized. She just laughed and said she knew what I was meant. And yes, I fixed her tooth no problem. I still laugh when I think about that faux pas.

I went to a small private school from 5th to 12th grade. Everyone knew everyone. Along about 7th grade, a new boy came to school. "H" was born with only one hand. No big deal. He was in the band too (NO, we weren't geeky. It was actually cool to be in the band at our school...REALLY!) Anyway, long about 12th grade "H" and I were in Art. I was drawing and he said "Oh, you're left handed." I said "Yes." He said "I am too!" I said "Really?" He just looked at me and laughed! It took about .5 seconds for me to realize what I had said, but don't really look at it like shooting myself in the foot since it actually shows we didn't think of him as being different. I think of it more as sticking my foot in my mouth.

Can I shoot my DH in the foot?

In the good old days before he got wise I used to pull a drive-through trick on him that just cracked me up. I'm not sure why I thought it was so funny, but hey ~ I was young and blonde. We'd go through a drive-through with him at the wheel and thus, ordering. He'd turn to me to give him each order and then turn back to the window to repeat what I'd said. Me: "A cheeseburger" Him, turning quickly, "A cheeseburger". Me: "And a small fry" Him, "and a small fry". Me: "And a diet coke", Him: "and a diet coke"... etc etc. At the end I'd always say, "And we want it To Go" and he'd instantly turn to the window like the well-trained DH that he is and say, "We want that To Go" at which point I would roll on the floor laughing at him and he'd give me the evil glare once again.

Sigh... those were the days. Now, of course, my sense of humor is much more sophisticated.

This isn't shooting myself in the foot as much as it is just a stupid situation, but here goes.

I went to the bathroom at work before going to the cafeteria. I was the first one in for the "lunch rush". I had on flats (those shoes were in style then), and I never use my hand to flush the toilet. Always the foot flush. Well, more women started coming in and waiting in line. I go to flush with my foot, the sweat on the handle made it slippery, so my heal slipped past the handle, and when I pulled it back my shoe caught.

My shoe then flipped into the air, and even though I've got lightening fast reflexes ;) my only thought was I was going to lose the shoe in the toilet. I grabbed for the shoe, bobbled it pretty hard, and it went up and OVER the top of the stall door. It hit the wall outside the stall with a thud then fell to the ground with a louder thud.

Now picture this... 4-5 women waiting in line, minding their own business. They hear a commotion from my stall, see a shoe fly out the top, and all I could do was hobble outside, slip my shoe on, wash my hands quickly and leave. Never said a word to anyone.

I'm just thankful I didn't hit anyone in the head!!

These are all very entertaining!
Gee, I've never done anything like this.
I've never told a lie, either.

Sadly, the old adage that, "It's better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt (Twain, maybe?)" is so specifically tailored to me that I long ago learned to keep my mouth shut. For whatever reason, I seem to perpetually say dumb things without meaning to. I'd rather be thought haughty, shy or mysterious than idiotic, so I don't talk much unless I'm with people I know well.

Aren't y'all the lucky ones!

Awww if we remained quiet, there would BE no forum...

At my husbands ten years reunion, we sat with his brother and wife and another couple we didn't really know. This woman was large and wearing a very loose tank top dress with a shirt underneath (I am sure you can see where this is going). There were two empty seats next to my BIL between him and this woman. Well, when they brought the salads, the waitress almost put one at the empty seat thinking maybe someone was just away for a minute. I wasn't really paying attention, but heard my BIL say something with "eating for two" in his sentence. A few minutes later, I said to the woman, "When are you due?"

She responded with, "What do I do?" Immediately my SIL said, "Yeah, what do you do?" She proceeded to tell us. Apparently there was a display by the door about her work rescuing injured birds of prey. What a save by my SIL!

My BIL leaned over a minute later and said, "that deserved a good laugh, but it will have to wait!"

That's a mistake you only make once. After you've done it once, you wait for the fat person to tell you if she is pregnant...

Somebody asked me that once. I nearly strangled the man.

Hey, *I* was going to tell the mistaken-for-pregnant story.
Guess I wasn't the only person to try to congratulate someone who had just gained weight. Unfortunately, my gaffe was with the checker at a small grocery store I visited about twice a week, and there was no nice "save". We got past it...eventually.

I'm a lurker, but I have to add this....MANY years ago, a woman asked me when I was due.....I had given birth to full term twins 2 weeks earlier and wanted to strangle her:) BTW...I am also firmly in the camp of "better to be thought a fool..." unfortunately, I still speak on occasion...and usually end up a fool:) another Val

I asked a wife of someone at a 10 yr high school reunion when her baby was due...she did look pregnant and I heard them talking about a baby. Turns out baby was 2 weeks old. I had 3 of my own at the time: 4 months, a 2yr old and a 4 yr old. I really didn't feel bad at all for my goof - it does take awhile to get back to "normal," whatever that is after giving birth!

My least favorite part of being pregnant - well, except for that first 5 months of relentless vomitting - was having people walk up to me and say things like, "ohhh, twins!" when I was about 7 months along.

Nope, just one. Thanks for telling me I look huge, though. 'Cause I don't feel huge. Not at all. Dumb@ss!

I know people were trying to be congratulatory and supportive, but NEVER, NEVER, NEVER even think to imply that a pregnant woman looks big. She knows that, she's probably already sleep deprived, she can't go more than 15 minutes without peeing, and you aren't helping.

I've got one that's worse. The check out girl at the grocery store was preg. with twins. She had been trying for quite a while and was so excited. She lost them in about the second trimester. I didn't know she lost the babies (she was still carrying quite a bit of weight) and asked her when she was due. I have never been so mortified in my life. I truly had no idea.

That's it. Amy wins the award for worst "shooting self in foot" incident. Sorry to rob you, Val, since you started this thread. But Amy messed up BIG TIME.

Bet none of you ever referred to anyone as an "ignorant squid", not knowing they were standing right behind you? I did.

When I first started dating my DH, we were sitting in his kitchen, and I made some off handed comment about "that's like being a used car salesman!"

Come to find out, his dad was a used car salesman. I thought we were through at that point... but here we are many years later!

Amy, I don't know if this will make you feel any better but a similar situation happened to me, except I was the pregnant one.

DH & I were married for about 3 years and we worked at the same company. His mother & father also worked there. I had found out I was pregnant and told my in laws, but told them we didn't want to tell anyone else until I was further along.

I miscarried about 1 week after I found out I was pregnant. It was not a terribly sad time. It was so soon after I had found out, that we took it as being, "one of those things", or "it was meant to be." I don't think I was pregnant long enough for it to sink in really.

Well.... dear old MIL had told everyone that she knew at work she was going to be a grandmother! I could have killed her! Word spread fast that I miscarried but all was well.

About 3 months later, a woman that I had worked with about 2 years prior was transferred back to our office. We were so happy to see each other. We got along great and it had been so long since we had seen each other. She threw her arms around me and said, "I heard the fantastic news! When is the big day?"

I looked at her with what must have been the strangest expression on my face. I had no idea what she was talking about. She said, "The BABY!! When is the baby due? Do you know what you're having?" and "We'll have to throw you a huge shower!"

My bottom jaw must have hit the floor! She heard through the work grapevine that I was pregnant, but the news of my miscarriage apparently hadn't spread that far.

I felt horrible! I told her what happend and she was mortified! I'm sure she felt exactly what you were feeling. I felt so bad for her and it was because of how SHE was feeling. I kept trying to comfort her and tried to explain to her that I was ok with everything and it wasn't her fault that she only heard the good news and not the bad. I don't think she honestly believed me. Our relationship was never the same after that. I tried so hard to get her to get over this, but she was never comfortable around me after that moment. I was very saddened by this. I was only 25 and she was 60. She was a very dear friend but I could always sense that she was uncomfortable around me after that. She retired about 5 years after that and passed away 2 years later. We would get together once in a while after she retired and I would stop by her house on my way home from work to give her flowers or some sweets from the store.

I know that my situation definitely wasn't as tragic as the one you were in, but I just thought I'd share a story from the other side.

And I suppose I should stay on topic with the thread so I'll tell my foot in mouth story.

About 7 years ago I was interviewing for a new job. I liked my current position so it was going to take a lot to get me to move to a new company. A previous co-worked was recruiting me to leave and go work with him.

So I go for the interview and I'm sitting in this huge conference room all decked out in my pin stripe suit and in walks this dude in a hawaiian t-shirt and shorts! He looked like a typical software engineer and I was thinking to myself, oh boy, what a dork he is. This should be a great interview.... not! So we go through the motions and after it's over we leave the conference room and we hook up with my old co-worker. We're laughing and joking and stuff. It was such a non-typical interview and it was actually fun! They escort me to the front lobby, we all shake hands and say our good-byes. I then said, "Maybe next time, the boss with take the time to fly out from Chicago to actually meet me!"

Yup, you guess it.... the dude in the hawaiian shirt WAS the boss! And I actually was offered the job! It was the best job I ever had and he was the best manager ever. Sadly, our company sold our division to a far-away country and we were all laid off. We still kepp in touch and my old boss will occasionally remind me of my unforgetable first impression!

I did the same thing at a high school reunion. THe girl had just had the baby, so it wasn't like she was JUST not pregnant.