The Real Most Dangerous Game

I just feel fortunate to be alive really. I participated in the most dangerous sport in the world recently. And it’s not football. Listen, if that bumbling idiot scarecrow could get a new brain by walking for awhile, I’m pretty sure 10 million dollars a year could get you some pretty decent concussion coverage and a half coherent speaking ability. And let’s be honest, the NFL is getting softer and softer every year. I think we forget that at one point, there were guys playing this game in leather helmets. Man, if I were a ref, the only time I’m calling pass interference is if as a receiver, you are at the 40 yard line, and your arm is at the 45. And I know some of you are thinking cheerleading, cheerleading has the most injuries per year. But I think that maybe if half of the pyramid stopped dating the quarterback at the same time, we would see a dramatic drop in cheerleading injuries. It’s like the great pharaoh King Tut once said, “A pyramid divided against itself cannot stand.” Just one of those girls on the bottom of the pyramid is like “Oh, so Kevin the All-State quarterback dumped me for Bridget just cuz she’s a Flyer? Well he better hope that she can fly! If he loves her so much, he’ll catch her.”

 And people say hockey is the toughest sport in the world, give me a break. With all of the advancements in tooth paste and floss, hockey players are the only reason dentists are still in business. And an Olympic event where Canada repeatedly takes home the gold is not the toughest sport in the world. You want to know what the most dangerous sport in the world is? Public sledding. And here’s why, public sledding is the only activity where the only thing more dangerous than doing it, is getting back up the hill to do it again. You’re sled doesn’t come to a stop at the bottom of the hill and you’re sitting there like (sigh) Well, that was a marvelous and enjoyable ride.” No sir, you’ve got thousands of little kids with wool caps that cover their eyes hurtling toward you. You’ve got families of eleven that think it would be a good idea to link arms as they all sit on their tubes and go spinning down the hill slicing people apart like a giant humanoid battle ax. You are running up that hill with the drive and determination of a Black Friday shopper. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh! You’re hurdling little nine year olds like you’re in the Pedophile Games holding your sled up like your part of the riot police in Los Angeles.

 I’ll never forget the first time in my life that I was absolutely certain I was going to die. I was in the 6^th grade, it was wintertime and I was sledding at a friend’s house. We decided to build a jump, because clearly a cheap plastic sled, icy conditions and a mentally and physically underdeveloped teenager aren’t dangers enough. Ladies and gentlemen, you know that feeling that you get that something bad is going to happen even though it hasn’t happened yet? Well, let me rephrase the question, who in here has ever been kissed by their grandmother? Ok, because if you’ve been kissed by your grandma as a little kid then you know this premonition kind of fear that I’m talking about. Just this pair of saggy lips covered in 80 years of tobacco, racism and economic collapse rushing toward you. That’s how I felt as I rocketed down my friends’ front yard. On the outside my 6^th grade self is going “Yay! Sledding!” But that one percent of the male teenage brain responsible for rational thought and logical reasoning is going “Hey, it’s me, logic! Sorry to interrupt, but do you remember that time when you were 5 years old, sitting in that pile of mud, and you kept telling yourself that the mushy brown stuff on the ground was Boston Cream Pie? So anyway, I’m shaking in this sled like an epileptic on a pogo stick. I didn’t hit the jump head on, I kinda glanced off it on this angle. And anyone who didn’t spend their time in high school Geometry leafing through Fantasy Football magazines under the cumulonimbus cloud cover of cigarette smoke permeating from the five trashy cheerleaders behind him fresh off of a smoke break in the girls bathroom will tell you that this is not a good thing. So I smack into the ice head-first. And I have a pretty high pain tolerance as long as I don’t know that I’m bleeding. And the first thing my friend says to me when he ran down to where I was was “Oh my god, you’re bleeding!” So in order to save a little face and salvage a little pride in myself, if I haven’t completely destroyed it by this point, I’m going to skip ahead a little bit to when I’m in the hospital getting the stitches. Because something that absolutely amazes me is how freely the nurses and doctors yell out to each other what they’re about to do to you and the size and sharpness of what they’re doing it with. This poor nursing assistant is being yelled at by this doctor who’s just going to town on my forehead with this mini hose thing like he’s trying to put out a Yellowstone National Park wildfire. And debris is just flying off my forehead like the Tasmanian Devil excavating an Ancient Grecian site with a jackhammer. And the doctor is yelling at this poor woman the whole time. And let me just pause here for a second and say that I sincerely believe that the medical community seriously needs to come up with little code names for the tools they are getting just to ease the tension on me a bit as blood is gushing out of my forehead. I swear, from across the office the doctor turns to the nurse as I’m lying there, not sure if my pants are covered in my own urine or water from fire chief tantrums’ spray-fest, and he yells “GET ME A 6 INCH NEEDLE AND A SCAPEL!” Ok, I know that I didn’t go to medical school, but shouldn’t there be some kind of code for that? He might as well have said “yep, send a letter to the family, this one’s not going to make it.” I mean, not only is he telling me it’s a needle, but he had the courtesy to give me the measurements too! Like I’m going to think to myself “Ok, a six inch needle is nothing to worry about. There’s only a sharp object half the size of a ruler dangerously close to my brain…..so do you enjoy your work?” But seriously, would there have been any miscommunication if he had just turned to her and went “Ya, I’m going to need a mid-size Ouchy Bar and a Grave Digger.”