1,001 Facts That Will Scare the S#*t Out of You: The Ultimate Bathroom Reader (47 page)

334

FACT :
Skiing carries a high risk of injury to the nervous system that can result in quadriplegia and death.
Recreational skiers can easily reach speeds of up to 40 mph
when traveling downhill, which can lead to injuries similar to those seen in car accidents.
If you don’t believe it, ask Sonny Bono. Oh, wait, never mind. He’s dead.

Julian E. Bailes and Arthur L. Day, Neurological Sports Medicine: A Guide for Physicians and Athletic Trainers (Thieme, 2001).

335

FACT :
The use of trampolines carries a great risk for catastrophic injury. In one study,
thirty-two out of fifty instances
of spinal cord injury in gymnastics involved trampolines.
Still, they’re a lot safer now than when I was a kid. We didn’t have safety nets or spring covers, and the trampolines were made of asbestos, covered in lead paint, and often surrounded by a ring of fire or piranha-filled water or land mines. I saw a lot of good kids go down.

Julian E. Bailes and Arthur L. Day, Neurological Sports Medicine: A Guide for Physicians and Athletic Trainers (Thieme, 2001).

336

FACT :
Golf may be considered a benign sport, but it carries risk of injury and death, most often from lightning, power lines, heart attack, and heat stroke.
Other deaths have occurred from freak injuries.
In one instance, an angry golfer killed his caddie by swinging a club at him after missing a shot, and another player broke his club on a tree, only to have it rebound and impale him.
No one who has played golf considers it a benign sport.

Julian E. Bailes and Arthur L. Day, Neurological Sports Medicine: A Guide for Physicians and Athletic Trainers (Thieme, 2001).

337

FACT :
In the United States, at least seven fatalities and numerous severe injuries have been reported among
bungee jumpers using a hot air balloon as a platform
. In two instances, no one noticed that the balloon lost altitude, making the jump cord too long, and the jumpers hit the ground.
Oops. I hope they got a refund.

Julian E. Bailes and Arthur L. Day, Neurological Sports Medicine: A Guide for Physicians and Athletic Trainers (Thieme, 2001).

338

FACT :
Bow-hunter’s stroke is caused by
the narrowing or obstruction of main arteries
supplying blood to the brain stem or cerebellum. This can be caused by forcibly turning your head to one side, commonly on a head rotation of 90 degrees or more to the left, as an archer does when aiming.
The most common cause of death during archery remains the same as always: letting someone try to shoot an apple off the top of your head.

Julian E. Bailes and Arthur L. Day, Neurological Sports Medicine: A Guide for Physicians and Athletic Trainers (Thieme, 2001).

339

FACT :
No one would consider lawn darts dangerous—unless he knew that the sport has been associated with skull-penetrating injuries,
half of which cause permanent neurological impairment
. In fact, the head is the most common body part to sustain injury, usually in children.
Of course it is. Head shots are worth fifty points, plus an extra ten if you hit them in the face.

Randolph W. Evans, Neurology and Trauma, 2nd ed. (Oxford University Press, 2006).

340

FACT :
Injuries in equestrian sports are almost
twenty times more common
than injuries in motorcycling.
Except when you’re thrown from a horse, you don’t bounce off the windshield of a car or skid 200 yards down the asphalt on your face.

Randolph W. Evans, Neurology and Trauma,2nd ed. (Oxford University Press, 2006).

341

FACT :
Noodling is
a dangerous type of bare-hand fishing
used to catch large—and powerful—catfish in underwater holes. Noodlers have been drowned, suffered broken bones, and been severely bitten by turtles, beavers, snakes, and muskrats. Noodling is illegal in thirty-seven states.
Even more dangerous is canoodling. Catfish aren’t affectionate, and unwanted advances will earn you a bite or a barb.

“How Noodling Works,”
HowStuffWorks.com
,
www.howstuffworks.com
.

342

FACT :
Children spend
greater time watching TV
than all other activities, except sleep.
Do you know what babysitters charge these days?

Huston and Wright, “Television and Socialization of Young Children,” in Tuning In to Young Viewers, ed. T. MacBeth (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1996), 37–60.