CW: Accidents and death.
The danger of live television is that you can't go back to the editing room to cut something out.
While most live television is on a five-second or so delay, mostly to edit out bad language, that still doesn't guarantee that audiences won't see something that wasn't intended to be part of the broadcast.
From Ashlee Simpson's infamous lip-synching debacle on Saturday Night Live, to the slap heard (and seen) round the world at the 2022 Academy Awards, there's no planning what may happen on live TV.
And sometimes something going wrong on an awards show or news program is far more exciting or memorable than anything seen on a football or hockey game.
"What is the most unexpected thing you've seen live on tv?"
Not As Cute As He Seemed...
"In the UK a TV personality and her son who is disabled were on a live tv show."
"From what I recall the topic being discussed was online bullying."
"When her son was asked about what to say to these bully's his response was: 'hello you c*nts'."
"Absolute classic British TV right there."- garillar
And This Was Only The Beginning...
"The OJ Simpson Bronco chase."
"They interrupted the NBA playoffs to show it live instead of the game."
"It was surreal."- PaulsRedditUsername
All He Had Hidden, Was A Let Down...
"Al Capone's vault had ........... nothing in it."- MerryBandOfPirates
al capone inmates GIF by History UKGiphyNo Thanksgiving Is Drama Free
"It was Thanksgiving morning in Los Angeles, and a news team went to surprise a family in need with a full Thanksgiving dinner."
"They showed up to the house, and I really think they went to the wrong place."
"The person at the door looked confused by the name the reporter was giving them, but they were live, and I’m sure the reporter was freaking out so she shoved her way into the home with the camera crew and a bunch of people with food."
"They’re all standing in the living room, and the reporter is telling this bewildered woman about what food they brought."
"Then the woman, takes a picture off the mantle, and starts crying, telling the reporter her baby died."
"The reporter was trying to turn the conversation back to the surprise dinner, but the woman only wanted to talk and show pictures of her dead baby."
"It was the cringiest thing I’ve ever seen on live TV."- adventurer84
Some People Just Get Used To It
"The reporter standing at a 45-degree angle, holding onto the street sign for dear life in a wind/rain storm as he was reporting."
"And the two dudes casually walking past, not leaning whatsoever and without difficulty."- Kinky_mofo
An Unforgettable Tragedy
"The Space Shuttle Challenger exploding into the Florida sky."- IfIKnewThen
A Life Threatening Rush...
"A Formula One driver hitting a wall at Imola and attempts being made to resuscitate him on the track."
"They weren't successful."
"Roland Ratzenberger died during Qualifying and things continued to get out of control as crew, drivers and spectators were injured over the weekend and Ayrton Senna died during the race."
"Motor racing is obviously not 100% safe but the number of incidents and two fatalities over the course of a single event was astonishing."
"It really was like the track was cursed."- JMW007
In Case Anyone Missed It...
"I was watching football (soccer) a few years ago and the referee stopped play for a foul."
"The slo-mo replay showed the fouling player grab the other player’s shorts as he stepped across him, and use them to try to stop his momentum."
"The shorts stretched a long way, exposing his penis, which then proceeded to flap around in slo mo, for about 5 seconds, whilst the commentators pretended it wasn’t happening."- Thefdt
Copa America Football GIFGiphyBoxing Doesn't Involve Teeth
"Mike Tyson biting Evander Holyfield’s ear."- wintermacaw
Everyone Wanted To Look Away, But Couldn't...
"Anderson Silva's leg snapping like a twig."- KeyRageAlert
In Real Time
"Hostage situation during the news."
"The news presenter was talking when an armed man walked in and took them hostage."
"It was wild."- HappyDutchMan
GOOOAAAAL!
"Christian Eriksen legit collapsing and dying on a soccer pitch only to be revived and make the most epic comeback the following season."- True-Expression3378
Going Out on A High
"One time I was flipping through channels and nothing was on."
"Snow mobile freestyle on the winter X Games caught my eye for no good reason."
"Then the guy is in the air either trying to backflip or he just rotates too far on a big jump."
"The snow mobile lands what looks like directly on his chest."
"I’m shocked thinking surely he wasn’t going to survive."
"I can’t recall what the normal announcers were saying or if they cut to something less dramatic."
"But then the sideline reporter type woman said she interviewed the athlete while he was being taken away and he 'felt like he just woke up from the longest dream ever'.”
"So I was optimistic since he was able to speak."
"Maybe even walk off under his own power."
"But I looked it up over the next day or two and he died in the hospital."
"That line from his interview still sticks with me."- FancyPantsHess
There's no going back for a second take when it comes to live television.
So, for better or worse, what happens will potentially be seen by millions of viewers, and most likely never forgotten.
People Break Down The Single Greatest Photographs In History
Photographs hold a special place in our society. They remind us of precious memories with friends and family, they let us share the ridiculous things our pets do with the world, they teach us about the state of the world far away from us, they've even become a form of shorthand communication in the form of image macro memes.
The phrase "A picture is worth a thousand words" is definitely a cliche for a reason.
Content Note: This article contains some very disturbing imagery.
Redditor Curlaub asked:
"What do you think is the single greatest photograph in history?"
Explosive
"This one makes my heart race every time."
"A pickup truck flees from the pyroclastic flows spewing from the Mt. Pinatubo volcano in the Philippines."
- Thuxedo
\u201cA pickup truck flees from the pyroclastic flows from the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines, 1991.\u201d— History In Pictures (@History In Pictures) 1439659810
Space
"The photo of Bruce McCandless floating untethered in space:"
"https://www.nasa.gov/astronautprofiles/mccandless"
- that-one-man
NASA.gov
"That is f**king terrifying."
- TheWolfAndRaven
"Imagine skydiving and the chute fails, but instead of having a couple of minutes to contemplate your fate as the ground rapidly approaches, you have hours as you slowly drift off into space, wondering whether your suit radio will go before your oxygen does, knowing there's nothing you can do but watch everything every other human has ever known drift away from you for all eternity."
- vonmonologue
Prepare
A bomb disposal expert walks to defuse a potential explosive device in Northern Ireland (1970)"
- YouKnowABitJonSnow
"Context for anyone who doesn't know what the Deep Field is:"
"Back in the day, NASA asked 'hey, what do you reckon is out there where there's no stars?'"
"So to answer this, they pointed the hubble telescope at a spot in the night sky where nothing was visible. No stars, no galaxies, no nothing. To our understanding on that day, there was nothing there. Maybe one or two galaxies would shine dimly in the distance, with light so faint from so far away that we couldn't pick it up with conventional imagery."
"But instead of hubble giving us an image of darkness and emptiness (Which is ostensibly what most people though was out there before this image) it beamed back THAT."
"THAT is what is all around us. Pick a tiny speck of the night sky between any two stars, and zoom in far enough, and this is what you see. Galaxies, thousands of them, stretching off into infinity."
"Every speck of light in that image is a new galaxy, comprising millions to billion of stars."
"And when Hubble first looked there, we thought it was empty."
"This isn't the night sky. This is past the stars. This is in between, beside, and behind every single star in the sky. Galaxies stretching off into infinity, innumerable to count."
"Close your thumb and forefinger into a circle, so there's a tiny gap you can look through. Now hold your arm out to the sky and look through the gap. That picture would fit in that gap (probably, I'm not a mathematician or an astronomer but just go with me on this)"
"Now move your hand back and forth across the sky and remember that picture every single time your hand moves."
"That is what we discovered the day that image was made."
"More recently, NASA released the 'ultra deep field' which is much the same thing. An image that is one ten-millionth of the sky."
"The following link is to that image and is 60 megabytes (so be warned if you're on mobile) https://zebu.uoregon.edu/hudf/hudf.jpg"
"That, times ten million is what is around us."
- Why-so-delirious
The Burning Monk
"My vote would go to the burning monk"
- Curlaub
"David Halberstam wrote:"
"'I was to see that sight again, but once was enough. Flames were coming from a human being; his body was slowly withering and shriveling up, his head blackening and charring. In the air was the smell of burning human flesh; human beings burn surprisingly quickly. Behind me I could hear the sobbing of the Vietnamese who were now gathering. I was too shocked to cry, too confused to take notes or ask questions, too bewildered to even think… As he burned he never moved a muscle, never uttered a sound, his outward composure in sharp contrast to the wailing people around him.'"
- BownSawIsReady
\u201c\ud83e\uddd8\ud83c\udffd\u200d\u2642\ufe0f The Burning Monk, 1963\n\n\u201cNo news picture in history has generated so much emotion around the world as that one.\u201d \u2014John F. Kennedy\n\nLink: https://t.co/c7tryYWcHs\u201d— RAHH (@RAHH) 1663754108
Horror of Horrors
"The last Jew in Vinnitsa, 1941"
- shaokim
"This photo came to mind as well. World War II is such a bottomless well of history."
- kpwill96
"It was arguably the first truly "'modern' conflict (although that title is sometimes awarded to WWI, the Korean War, or the Vietnam War, depending on context), and was thus the first time in history that war could be captured in such remarkable detail. Widespread photography allowed moments of unimaginable strife, conflict, and horror to be preserved indefinitely, and thereby permeate public consciousness. It was the point at which the focus of war journalism shifted from large-scale statistics to the experiences of individuals, whenceupon newspapers could show an entire nation the fear in one young man's eyes, or the inhumanly thin, spindly limbs of a woman who starved to death. Looking back, this seems like the moment the world realized, 'why are we doing this to ourselves; this is horrible.'"
- aronenark
Aid From the Padre
"The priest and the dying soldier by Héctor Rondón Lovera"
- Deleted User
"The priest was known in the town and so neither side shot at him. He spent the battle picking up the wounded and giving last rites to the dying. Here are more: https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/priest-dying-soldier-1962/"
- Deleted User
Rope Tricks
"For me it's this picture of a nuclear blast a fraction of a second after it detonated, by Harold Eugene Edgerton"
- thesnowguard
"Is there a size reference for how big this is?"
- syntaxlegend
"I had a presentation about this once, really interesting stuff. This is about 100 ft / 30m in diameter."
"You can read more about it here and here (also more photos). They look eeriely unnatural. Video of it"
- JMB-X
Oldest Photo of a Person
"https://unitedcats.wordpress.com/2007/06/12/worlds-oldest-photograph-of-a-human-being/"
- giantmantisshrimp
"And the only reason they got it was because the one guy was getting a shoeshine, so they were pretty much motionless for a while. It's interesting how you can become famous completely unexpectedly--and in this case, presumably even unknown to you yourself. This guy probably got his shoes done, paid, and went about his day, and he had no idea that people decades later would be seeing it happen and that it'd be one of the world's most significant images."
- macphile
Lunch Atop a Skyscraper
"I really like this one picture where workers in New York (I think) are doing construction on a skyscraper and they're all sitting on this giant steel beam that's just hanging hundreds of feet in the air. It's called lunch atop a sky scraper. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunch_atop_a_Skyscraper"
- Deleted User
"Almost every lifetime journeyman Ironworker I know has this picture [in] their home somewhere"
- dougielou
Transplant
"Zbigniew Religa after first 24 hours heart transplant operation."
"The patient outlived him."
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CvYdrBdWgAAaX93.jpg
iuve
Double Helix
"Photo 51, the first photo showing the structure of DNA; image taken by Rosalind Franklin in 1952." - MalevolentGoblin
"Just a small correction - this shows the X-ray diffraction pattern of DNA, not the DNA itself. The pattern was used to deduce the helical nature of DNA." - FluffyCloud5
Earliest Born Person
"Hannah Stilley. Earliest born person ever photographed. She was 10 yo when Mozart was born. She lived the French Revolution and the creation of the US. Just think about it." - UncleVolk
Photography can expose us to knowledge and experiences far outside our own lives, but it's important to remember that a photo never tells the whole story. Context matters.
People Describe The Most Memorable Stranger They've Ever Met
We can pass by hundreds of people in a day out of the house, and most of them go completely unnoticed or we forget about them almost immediately.
Every once in a while, though, there's someone who just sticks out from the crowd and stays in our memories for years.
Redditor Djimaro asked:
"Who is a stranger you still remember?"
Breakdowns
"Old car of mine broke down in the rain. Got it off the side of the road, had no idea what to do."
"Was a poor 18 year old kid and couldn’t fix a car or pay anyone to do it. Seconds later a guy pulls over and says 'what’s the problem?' and tells me to pop the hood. Stood there for ten minutes giving me a basic lesson on my car."
"Got it running a few minutes later (dirty rotor on the distributor). Hands me his card and says 'ever need any more help come see me, advice is free'."
"Turns out he owned an auto repair place specifically for my type of car, and just happened to be driving by."
- autorotater
"My story goes a little differently."
"My old car breaks down in the middle of the road. I get out to push it off to the side of the road. Guy pulls over and asks me for directions while I'm pushing car. Like WTF. At least offer to help get it off the road man."
"And no, I did not know how to get to where he was going, so he drove off and left me to continue pushing my car to the side of the road."
- Diligent-Wave-4591
"When I was about 4 years old my parents were driving cross country from California in our little RV to visit relatives in South Dakota and Maine. As we were heading down an off-ramp, my older sister and I saw a tire roll past. It was our RV's back tire."
"It was Sunday morning in the 1970s—decades before cellphones—in the middle of the midwest with nothing near the interstate. As my parents were getting ready to walk to find an emergency call box, a tow truck came down the off-ramp."
"He stopped and said he was headed home, but could tow us. He towed our camper to his house where my sister and I spent the day playing with his 5 kids, my parents drank coffee and talked with his wife while he called around looking for the parts to fix the RV."
"By late afternoon he got us back on the road."
"My memories of their faces are hazy because of the years, but I clearly remember the whole family being really nice people."
- LakotaGrl
Fire Ants
"I remember when I was little, and I stepped into a big fire ant hill. It hurt all over and my dad didn't know what to do. Our Mexican neighbor saw from a distance and told us to use lemon/lime juice and pour it all over my body."
"It was hard to understand because he only spoke Spanish and a little bit of English. Once that lemon juice was on me, I felt great. I never saw him again after that though. He was a really kind man."
- 64-BitGamer
Back From The Brink
"A man who sat next to me on the plane and was survivor of stage 4 lung cancer. I was 14 and he must’ve been in his 50s. I just remember how thankful and incredibly happy he was that he was going to see his family for the first time in remission"
- One-Ice-9259
"OK damn I’m tearing up. 🥲"
- Switchbladekitten
"He was a really friendly guy. I wonder where he is now. This was 11 years ago"
- One-Ice-9259
Flowers For A Bad Day
"Years ago I worked in a small restaurant with an open kitchen."
"One night, things were really slow, just one customer eating, and only two of us working. I was hanging out, chatting with the cook."
"He was having a rough day and was just venting to me about how he was feeling. Our customer (who had been within earshot) pays, leaves, and then comes back about 20 minutes later with flowers."
"He hands them off to the cook, with a note that says how good the food was and how he hopes things get better for him."
"I just witnessed it go down, but still think about how kind it was."
- babysfirstbreath
An Angel
"I crashed my car with my 4yo in the back seat; nothing big, but my car didn’t run and my son and I were in a bit of a shock. I got out of the car and pulled my baby out, he was scared but unharmed."
"We stood there by the side of the road and my mind was a complete blank, I was clueless and all I could do was hold my baby and comfort him."
"Someone came along, a young man, he brought a chair from somewhere, asked me to sit down and told my boy he was being very brave: he got some people to help him push my car out of the street, called a tow truck, brought us water, found a bathroom for us to use, waited with us for the tow truck to arrive, helped them load my car and made sure we were all set to return home."
"I didn’t get his name, but he was an angel if I ever needed one and I’m an atheist 😉"
- AdministrationLimp71
Love By The Garbage
"Once a bin man didn't see me and nearly rammed a bin into me but another bin man noticed and swung it around at the last second and asked if I was ok"
"He was mad tall and had nice eyes and I fell in love with him for a brief second surrounded by the smell of hot garbage"
- riarum
Just Playing Along
"This wasn’t too long ago but I'll never forget this:"
"A friend and I were at a city festival. Being sort of drunk and in a funny mood, we started to pretend that our empty cups were a string phone."
"Just dudes being dudes and finding it the funniest thing ever."
"Then this approximately 50 year old grim looking guy slowly walks towards us, lifts his bottle to his ear and goes 'DUDES, I WAS LISTENING THE WHOLE TIME'."
"Still has me chuckling :)"
- bkend_31
Rescue On The Tube
"Many years ago I got my arm stuck in the electric door of the tube in a very rare work trip to London."
"There was an alarm going and the carriage wouldn't move so it obviously detected my arm and I thought that the doors would open again like a lift would, but they didn't."
"It got tighter and tighter in my arm, I couldn't pull it free and the colleagues I was travelling with were absolutely no help, just dying with laughter at my utter panic."
"It was peak travel time and the carriage was packed and the only person who helped me part the doors to free my arm was a stranger on crutches as he had one of his legs in plaster."
"He was my hero that day."
- MissionSorbet2768
We can't possibly remember every single stranger we meet, but there will always be a few who stick in our minds forever.
We are told, from a young age, not to interact with strangers. And let's be honest, that is sound advice.
With plenty of creeps and weirdos around, it's best for parents to just nip any possibility of abduction in the bud early.
But when we grow into adults, we can take care of ourselves. We develop a keener sense of people: who is approachable, who's not, and when it is or isn't a good time to strike up conversation.
That well-honed sense can open us up to so many amazing interactions that, without being just a little bold, we would never have the chance to experience.
Some Redditors recalled the times they read the moment right and got a very memorable encounter out of it.
Defiant_Cat7301 asked, "What's the most memorable moment you shared with a stranger who you never saw again?"
Many times, the moment begins with an act of kindness from one stranger to another. Simply lending a helping hand can be enough to smash things wide open and lay the groundwork for a great back and forth.
Shockingly Similar
"I moved across the US a few years back (Washington to Ohio) and the first night I stopped at a random truck stop in Montana (I slept in the back seat of my truck). The next morning, I was letting my truck warm up when I noticed someone a few spots down was having a hard time getting his truck started so, of course, I went to help him."
"We got to talking and come to find out, not only did we work in similar lines of work, have similar backstories (both graduated in the same year from small towns, were navy veterans that were on subs, similar degree, etc.), but he was coming from Columbus Ohio going to Centralia Washington, and I was coming from Centralia Washington heading to Columbus Ohio. It was really weird."
-- UrasnoFlake2
Reese's Retrieval
"I was standing nearby this couple in Dollar Tree. I was deciding what snack I wanted and I overheard that the guy really liked Reese's bars but they didn't see any. Pre-Covid, I had frequented that particular Dollar Tree often, since it was nearby my house, and I knew that the store usually had those bars, they just weren't usually kept in the snack isle."
"I quickly checked the one island between the isles and the checkout and I found them. I went back to where the couple was, tapped the girl's shoulder and silently pointed them to the Reese's bars. Then I went back to doing my stuff."
-- CopyJ300
True Friends
"I was in the Flagstaff, Arizona area and hiked up 12,637 ft. Humphrey's Peak with a small group of people. On the way up, we met a young woman who had been hiking up the mountain with a group of her friends, but for some reason they left her behind."
"She was a slower hiker, but they should have never ditched her. She joined up with our group and made it to the top of the mountain, but on the way down it was clear that she was slowing us down. We weren't going to leave her behind like her friends did, however, so we went down the mountain at her speed."
"We ended up being on the mountain much longer than we planned, and soon it got dark when we were only about halfway down. That's when we realized we only had two small flashlights for 6 people. Hiking in near-pitch dark slowed us down even more, so I think we didn't even get down to the trailhead until around 10pm. It was unnerving not being able to see where we were putting our feet down, and I was sure someone was going to break an ankle. Luckily we made it down safely."
"When we got there, her friends were waiting, and they were mad that they had to sit and wait for her! After we made sure she was safe and good to go, we said goodbye and told her that she needed some new friends."
A Very Clutch Hitcher
"I was heading out on a three-hour drive from West Texas to The Metroplex. Stopped to fill up and, as I was pulling up to the pumps, saw a car pull in and let a hitchhiker out. When I was about to pull out of the parking lot and head for the highway, he started yelling, 'Wait!' and 'Don't let her leave!' which pretty much freaked me out until several people looked my way and signaled for me to stop."
"Turns out, I had a tire that was seriously under inflated. He helped me get air in the tire and we chatted for a bit. His last ride lived in the area, so had dropped him here beside the highway to catch his next ride. First and only time I've ever taken a hitcher while driving solo, but if ever a hitcher earned a ride, it was this guy. Made for a really quick trip, too, because he was smart and funny and made great conversation."
Major Upgrade
"I missed the last bus home (hour and a half away) after a big night out. I resigned myself to sleeping at the bus stop and was trying to get comfortable when some locals walked past. They asked me what i was doing and when I told them they said they were heading home and to come party and I could crash there."
"Went back to this guys waterfront mansion and drank and listened to classic records. Crashed out and left before they got up. I had his number so i texted him thanks later that morning and got a 'no worries champ' back. Never contacted him again."
Safety in Numbers
"Was being followed on campus and I ran up to three girls who were walking the same direction as me. I pretended to know them and quietly explained what was happening."
"They immediately incorporated me into the group and even when the guy stopped following me, they walked me to my dorm and made sure I got into the building okay."
Former Flat Earthers Explain What Finally Made Them Come Around | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
Science is science. Fact is fact. Truth is truth and simple is simple. These are things we must now attest to in 2021. Can we please all get onboard with wha...Suddenly, Roses
"A homeless guy gave me roses."
"I was barely scraping by as a daytime bartender, my car had died and I had to take a bus. The nearest stop to my job was in a dirty, edgy area of downtown and I had learned to not make eye contact with anyone."
"But one afternoon I saw a guy wearing nothing but a pair of filthy, bad-fitting overalls come ambling up the street barefoot, carrying something red. I did a double-take and our eyes met. Before I could react, he was standing in front of me with a bouquet of red roses, the stems wrapped in newspaper. He shoved the flowers into my hands, wished me a nice day, then went on his way."
"I was too stunned to react in the moment, and I looked for him every day after that, hoping I could buy him a sandwich or something, but I never saw him again. It's such a strange story that I wouldn't blame anyone who didn't believe it, but it really did happen and I'll never forget that guy."
"I was going through a tough patch and his strange and kind gesture reminded me that good things can happen when you least expect it."
Other people talked about a time that, for whatever reason, conversation began and everything else was history. They spent either a memorable moment, or even hours and hours, with a new person because the vibe was right.
Just a Good Day
"I met a guy at a restaurant. We were both in town for a short time. Me, for a convention and him for work. After eating and parting ways, I ran into him again, so we decided to explore the city together for the next 5 hours."
"He then walked me to the train station and I will always remember that day very fondly."
Like Minds
"Stuck in a traffic jam for almost an hour and got bored and did the swervy thing you see NASCAR drivers to during the pace lap. In my mirror a few cars back I spot a guy doing the same thing. He only ever did it after I did and we continued our swerve dance until traffic cleared up."
"He eventually caught up to and passed me, but not before exchanging a friendly wave as he went by. Hope he's doing well."
-- pnkstr
Glacial Buds
"Met a woman on a glacier excursion in Argentina. We went and had some beers afterward and had an absolute great time. No hookup or make out or anything -- just a great night out at the bar with a British chick, telling each other about life in our respective countries."
"This was like 16 years ago and I still think about it sometimes. Great night."
-- iLoveLamp83
Under Her Wing
"She was actually a cousin but still a stranger to me. We'd gone to visit my dad's family and to attend his family reunion one summer when I was 8. I'm the youngest of 8 (next sibling is nearly 10 years older) so I was basically an afterthought. She was 17 and it was my very first time meeting her."
"We were there for 2 weeks and for most days she took me on an adventure. Ice cream. Snow cones. Fishing. Flying kites. Swimming. Bike riding. She would tell me about how she always wanted a sibling and wanting to go to college to get out of that small town and she would listen to me drone on about things that my siblings could care less about. She even let me drive her car once. I had to sit on her lap and we ended up in a ditch but it was so much fun."
"She made me feel like I had a real sister and I loved her instantly. When we left I cried myself to sleep. I never saw or heard from her again because a few months later she was killed by a drunk driver."
-- IDGAF_GOMD
Sometimes, however, the circumstances were a bit grimmer. A crisis or medical emergency can be just the thing to dissolve the social norms and create some serious closeness, if only for the brief time that's necessary.
A Worthy Bystander
"Driving my kid to school last year and came up on a young woman laying in the road. She had just wrecked and was thrown from the vehicle."
"I covered her with a blanket from my car (it was late February in Indiana) and held her hand until the ambulance arrived. I hope she's ok."
-- indianayall
Nurses: A Unique Breed
"I was rushed into the emergency room to deliver my baby whose heart rate had dropped off during delivery. They literally ran me in the room and started operating. I could not move or talk or anything from the fear and shock. God bless the nurse that was right there by my side."
"I can't even remember what she said, and I never saw her again, but she just keep saying the most reassuring things in the worst of moments."
-- kragglemama
Shared Horror
"Definitely the time I was on a crowded bus with an incredibly erratic (and possibly drunk) driver. The person next to me and I kept joking around that we were gonna die every time the driver swerved the wrong way, pumped the breaks in the middle of traffic, and drifted in and out of traffic lanes."
"It became WAY less funny when the driver almost drove off the freeway & into a body of water below three times. People riding the bus had to come up to the front and literally help steer the wheel and navigate back on course, a couple people were on the phone with 911, some people in the back were literally crying."
"It was insane, and for sure the most memorable moment I've shared with a group of strangers. Never saw any of the people on that bus ever again, hope they're all doing well & haven't had to experience a bus ride like that ever again."
-- Reapermanee
A Worthy Distraction
"I was at a music festival with friends when I got a pounding headache (dehydrated most likely. Drink water people!). I told our group I was going to sit down for a bit against a nearby wall."
"I'd only been there for a short while when a girl came over with a look of genuine concern, asking if I was ok. I said I had a headache, but was feeling better after having a bottle of water. Anyway, she sat down and told her friends she'd catch up with them."
"We ended up talking for about an hour or so. We had heaps in common. At no time did I feel as though I should ask for her number or anything. It was just a really nice, easy-going chat about different subjects."
"Time went by so quickly that we were both surprised when my friends came over and said the next band I'd wanted to see was about to start. I thanked her for checking on me, she thanked me for a chilled chat and we both went our separate ways."
"This would be about 20-25 years ago and I still clearly remember it."
-- R0XiDE
So next time you're wandering around among plenty of strangers, maybe take a second to deliberately open yourself up. Put on an approachable face, or even make a comment out loud.
You never know the kind of day you might have after it.
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The finite nature of a hotel stay can lead guests to behave in ways they wouldn't normally. And where there is saucy behavior, there are the artifacts left behind.
And who is there to pick up those pieces on the following morning? The hotel staff--cleaners, maintenance people, technicians, even managers when things get unruly enough.
Some Redditors who've occupied those positions recently shared the wildest things ever left behind by guests.
Some were gross, some exciting, and some just downright puzzling.
MichaelJCaboose_ asked, "Hotel cleaners of Reddit, what's your most memorable find left behind by a guest?"
Many people chose to share the times they came upon the disgusting remnants of an uninhibited night before. The guests responsible left a collage of artifacts that looked more like a still-life picture of hedonism than a living quarters.
Alone Time
"Three empty bottles of wine, about two dozen cherry pits scattered all over the floor and under the furniture, and red-colored puke all over the bedspread."
"There was only one guy staying in the room."
-- OneWayRabbit
The Consequences of Fame
"Found a human poo in the kettle once. Worse part was it was a 'celebrity' (crappy uk reality show) doing a guest appearance at a local club."
"Him and his mates filled the rooms iPad with di** pics too. Hotel got rid of the iPads shortly after that."
-- Geknock
Taking it Literally
"By the tub: empty gallon JUGS of milk next to empty CONTAINERS of Quaker Oats."
"Ma'am that is not how you have an oatmeal bath."
"If it matters, it was whole milk."
Of Another Species
"Not me, but my best friend works in house keeping at a hotel chain. I've heard some nightmare stories, but there are two that really stand out. The first was after a furry convention came through town, and there was an absurd amount of sex toys left behind. It's pretty common to come across them from time to time, but this almost had to be purposeful."
"The second was a massive unflushable sh**. She refused to dispose of it, and left the task to her manager. She described it as inhuman, and the size of a football. It took a spatula and a knife from their kitchen to make it manageable enough to flush."
People Explain The Worst Thing That's Ever Happened To Them On Their Birthday
No Closet Is Too Nice
"Friend worked a 5-star hotel and found a turd in the closet." -- Boganvillia
"That's not a very nice thing to call your guest, but as someone that worked in customer service, I agree. They are turds." -- theassassintherapist
"Closet poopers are what happens to shy poopers if they don't face their poop anxiety." -- Stunning_Honeydew201
OTC Drug Use
"Packets and packets of ibuprofen. Just everywhere - bottles too. It was football players staying there."
-- Locust45
Work Retreat
"I do maintenance. Had a group of part time housekeepers that are mentally handicapped working with their job coach go into a suite with adjoining door. There were 3 construction workers staying, 2 and their supervisor."
"In the one side with a pull out couch and DVD player, they found a full size blow up doll, empty small bottles of lube, used condoms, several beer bottles, and a stack of porn on DVD. Doll was on the pull out couch and everything else was all over the bed."
Other former cleaners described the times they came to a vacant room to find some very unexpected objects. These weren't as gross as the previous examples.
But the mysteries of what exactly the guests did with these items are still unsolved.
Steer Clear of Gadgets
"Almost tazed myself with a 'tube of lipstick' that I found under the bed." -- Naprisun
"insert lipstick taser gif here" -- georgiomoorlord
"so nobody's talking about this person using hotel bed lipstick" -- ST4R3
Hisssss
"Wasn't the cleaner, was overnight manager. The morning shift housekeeper called me to a room that had a live diamondback rattlesnake in it. We were located downtown, no way it just came in from outside."
"Found out a week later the guest was part of that snake handler church."
Back on the Road
"My friend's family owns a motel. He tells me they once found an auto transmission in the bathtub of a room." -- smorkoid
"Yup, I've heard of this before. You go to the town on a bachelor party, take a pill and then wake up and your transmission is in the bathtub full of ice and 3rd gear was removed" -- cavegoatlove
Making it Cozy
"I worked as a hotel cleaner during undergrad."
"My first day of work someone left a hatchet in the bathtub."
"Also, someone completely decorated the room with framed family pictures.. and left them all there. I think their stay was only 2 days. They set some up on the furniture.. but also legit hung some on the walls."
-- Eric_Partman
Finally, some people shared about the times they were pleasantly surprised to find that guests left behind some really nice stuff.
And, of course, finders keepers was in full swing.
Ahhhhhhh
"I worked for a hotel that had cabins, so I would be in and out all day in the hot sun. On one of those hot days I opened the fridge to find an unopened bottle of Dr. Pepper in the freezer part.. it was perfectly slushed."
"It made my day. This was years ago, too!"
-- Syndaquil
As If They Knew
"A whole box of magnum ice creams. My fave!" -- nightcana
"If this was in Melbourne, you're welcome. I bought them but got invited out. Checked out the next day and left them in the freezer and I couldn't stand the thought of putting them in the bin." -- hemansteve
Repurposed
"My partner gets apartments ready for the next people renting them out after leases are up, they've found so, so many bdsm toys. One of which (a flogger) is my cats favorite toy over all others now including her very expensive cat toys hahaha"
Celebrity Guest
"My girlfriend worked the front desk at a hotel where snoop Dogg stayed."
"He left his drawers and white tees. Snoop also left a bunch of Tic Tacs."
"But the best thing he left was a plastic Tupperware bowl over the smoke detector."
-- niketen
It's a fun idea to think back on all your hotel stays and recall anything you've left behind over the years.
And then, depending on what exactly it was, you can imagine what the other side of that story turned out to be.
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