I think we’ve all had those ‘foot in mouth’ or ‘ground please swallow me up moments’. Well, at least I hope it’s not just me. These kind of occasions seem to happen to me rather regularly (a little too often), so I wanted to open up the floor (no pun intended) to you to ask if anything similar has happened, as well as letting you in on my top 3 most horrifyingly embarrassing moments.
1) A few days after I got my very first car (just a few weeks after passing my test), I was left to drive alone for the first time. Prior to this, a parent or sibling had always been with me, and well, I’d felt much safer this way. For some reason, as soon as I was on my own, it was a whole different ball game. After dropping my mum off at work, I then drove the short 5 minute journey to school, however in the middle – I was met by a set of four traffic lights (you know, the crossroads where one lane of traffic goes at a time, so the lights take agesss to change).
Upon approaching the traffic lights, they changed to red, so, like in all my lessons – I slowed down in plenty of time and stopped in front of the lights. They take around two minutes to change, as the crossroads are near a school and have crossing children (bear in mind this is school morning rush hour too), so after waiting patiently, the lights turned green and away I went. Or, so I thought. I stalled my car trying to pull out and it just wouldn’t move. I re-started the ignition. And stalled again. The lights turned red. I tried to pull myself together and started revving the car, practicing for when the lights went green again. I was already bright red from embarrassment.
Another two minutes passed and the lights went green. I revved my car as hard as I could, determined to shoot off and avoid any further embarrassment. But I stalled again. And again. And again. By this time, people had started to get out of their cars to see what the commotion was, they were tooting their horns, sticking their fingers up at me, swearing loudly out of their windows and the entire traffic packed crossroads was staring at me in my little Hyundai. I very nearly got out of my car and walked away, crying to myself (told you I’m emotional) ‘I can’t do this’, ‘I can’t do this’!! Ground swallow me up. However, on the third set of traffic lights I managed to pull away and into the distance. It took me an hour to pull myself together and walk through the school gates.
Above: Oh, and I’m being extra generous and sharing some EMBARRASSING photos with you. The above is a sure contender for the strangest/ugliest outfit ever award.
2) This one is more of a ‘foot in mouth’, think before you speak moment, rather than a ground swallow me up, but hopefully you will appreciate the awkwardness. I am usually quite a tactful person (or at least I consider myself to be anyway) and judge the situation around me before speaking, as I know how one wrong move can immediately have an undesired effect on the people around you, and I hate upsetting people.
However, as I was pulling into my drive, and entering the comfort of my own home, I seemingly forgot about my diplomacy. As I was pulling into my drive, I spotted this horrid garish yellow car parked on the street. I’m normally not fussed when it comes to cars, but I couldn’t see how anyone could possibly drive around a sick coloured car, and so, being the nosey person I am – I went to take a closer look. Inside was even worse. There were horrid tacky pink and white leopard print seat covers and the entire boot shelf was covered in rubbish. I was pretty horrified. I’m not a clean person (my car is pretty messy) but all these clashing prints, rubbish and colours. It was all too much for me.
I rushed back up the drive, eager to share my disgust with someone other than myself. I burst into the porch, opened the hall door and loudly exclaimed ‘URGH, have you seen the state of the car outside. I’ve never seen something so ugly. It’s full of rubbish and HAVE YOU SEEN those tacky seat covers’. Even waiting for the usual on que response that never came didn’t arouse my suspicions (I was having a really bad day and I needed to moan about something). ‘I can’t believe anyone can drive around in that thing knowingly. Who does that to themselves’. By then, I had reached the open plan kitchen/diner and walked through the arch. Only to be greeted by a family of four looking up at me meekly. ‘That’s our car’, they whispered. I couldn’t rush out of that room soon enough.
3) You know when you’re really tired, you’re almost intoxicated? Like, you start slurring and mumbling and saying things even you don’t understand. Well, I was having one of those days. I had just got home from an eight hour flight back from Florida and I went to the local shop to get some milk and some bread. Sounds simple right?
I was successful right until the very end, when I handed over the bread and milk at the till, ready to hand over my money. It was then that I noticed the shop assistant had really bad breath. I mean really really bad. I might have been tired, but his breath could knock someone out. Meanwhile, the shop assistant had scanned my items and the money due came up on the till. ‘£2.40’ he asked, whilst shooting some of his horrid breath in my direction.
I handed over a £5 note and he handed me back the change. It was in this moment, that my tiredness peaked. Instead of saying ‘thank you’ as I normally would, I loudly proclaimed (and it came out really loudly) ‘URGH’. Our eyes met and I didn’t know what to do. I ran out of the shop and I’ve only been back since. I’m not normally rude (I promise). But my brain had mixed up my words and my thoughts. If you’re reading this, Mr shop assistant, I’m sorry. And invest in some mouthwash.
Above: (credit to whoever captured this special moment, I don’t know who you are, YET). Who is that strange looking, ugly giraffe brushing her hair (the face indicates how knotty it is). Oh, yep, that’s me!
And, I’m sure we’ve all had these moments (please don’t let it be just me).
– The time I wore my new bikini to the new water park (with my friends) and one of the strings caught on a plastic ridge in the slide. My bikini top (which was loose anyway, I was being a little over zealous when picking out the size) ripped off, meaning that when I ‘plopped’ out of the end, I was topless.
– The time I started my first period (yes, I am sorry boys – I’m going to talk about periods on here) and I was on holiday in a posh restaurant, wearing white mini shorts. I was sitting on a plush white cushion (on one of those fancy expensive looking chairs) and it was a busy, bright, sunny day. I will say no more. I think you can take the rest from here.
– Or perhaps the time on the flight to Spain, when halfway through that annoying Blackberry alarm sound started going off (you know the one, you must know the one). No-one rose to claim it so I started shooting everyone dirty looks (bear in mind, I thought my Blackberry was safe within the clutches of my friends handbag, which was next to me). As it continued into the one hour mark (and still no-one claiming it), even the air hostesses were asking people to turn it off, I loudly expressed my disdain for whoever the culprit was and kept shooting dirty looks. As the plane grew wilder and wilder with discontent for this annoying sound, it suddenly dawned upon me that I had tucked my phone neatly into the side pocket of my handbag in the overhead locker (which was opposite me). It took me another twenty minutes to pluck up the courage to get it out and turn it off. I stayed quiet for the rest of the flight.
Above: believe it or not, in the photograph above, I am not expressing disdain at my disgusting jumper but posing for a photograph for my 3 yo sister who was giving me directions about how to pose. It’s just an ugly/horrid photo all round. And no, I don’t know what I’m doing with my arm either.
Please say you’ve got one or two embarrassing moments to share? If so, please leave them in the comment box below! I’d love to know I’m not the only one that gets myself into embarrassing situations. Also, if you have enjoyed this little snippet of my ‘awkward’ self, let me know and I might disclose some of my most embarrassing little sister anecdotes, which is even worse. Kids really do say the most hilarious/awkward/shocking things sometimes.
