Disclaimer: I in no way vouch for the authenticity of any of these stories. If people's lives are so dull that they want to lie about these things, I can't really stop them... but feel free to call them on it either on the forum or drop me a line and I'll post the comment here or on the mailing list.
In other words, please don't lie... or you'll probably be exposed in the end and won't you feel stupid then???

"My Brush With Morbidity" by Christopher
"I work at a seafood/meat processing plant in the Buffalo area, one day, it was really slow, so we were hanging out in the warehouse fu**ing around. Our good time was interupted by a horrible screaming. We mess around about cutting ourselves for the workers comp. so we thought it was a joke..... but the screaming didn't stop. Then two of the meat plant workers came out carrying another between them. I caught a glimpse of his hand, and all i saw was a bloody stump. I found out later that while he was cutting porterhouse steaks on the bandsaw, he got distracted and his hand got caught in the saw.... needless to say he got the comp we all talked about, but seeing that WE dont want it!"
11.26.01

"My Brush With Morbidity" by Dragonqueen
"This story happened in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. In the 9th grade a bunch of us would hang out at the back of the schoolyard, which is at a river's edge, during lunch time. We arrived at our usual spot only to find a funeral home truck and some firemen (Yeah, I know...Firemen???). They were fishing out a dead and bloated body out of the water. We arrived there before they put up a blanket to hide what they were doing, so as they pulled the body out of the water, I thought the body had no head! But it was because as they pulled it out, the head dropped back as if there was no muscle or bone to prevent this - I guess the neck must've been broken. I noticed that the body had a cord around the abdomen, and seemed to have holes...Gunshots perhaps? Anyway, this body definitely was murdered. The story behind this dead body to this very day remains a mystery"
And, to think, the most exciting thing I ever saw at High School was... ummmm... hmmmm... give me a few hours, I'm sure I'll think of something!
09.06.01

"My Disgusting Brush With Morbidity" by AMY
"I just started a gross anatomy class in medical school and I'm pretty excited about my cadaver! He turned out to be a large man of color... maybe 300-350lbs. His mouth is horribly crooked, open to one side with some kind of translucent film dangling out from it. Our first assignment was to examine the back and the back muscles. As my classmates and I began to roll the corpse over, his rectal muscles somehow clenched... or unclenched I should say. Feces began pouring out of the man's anus, all over the table and floor. A few of my classmates vomited on the spot. The smell of dead flesh and "aged" feces was overwhelming. What a delightful first memory of medical school! Yuck! "PS Not important really.... but consider that I had to wipe his ass after he was "done". I think I could've used a whole bar of antibacterial soap in the bathroom afterward! I feel that my effort deserves some kind of recognition!"
As do I, AMY! Give that woman a purple heart, or something like that!
08.30.01

"My Brush With Morbidity" by ktrain
"Once when i was a youngin - probably about 10 or 11 - i was hunting with my uncle and father. we were walking a wooded glenn at about 8 in the morning when we suddenly we heard a shot followed simotaniously by 3 more gun shots. like anyone we ran to see what someone had shot at 4 times. when we arrived there was a man leaning over a body and he was crying at first i thought he was laughing but then i saw the blood staining the grass all over near the bodys head. then when the man crying stood up i saw what i will never forget, he had been shot in the head and his whole lower jaw was gone all i could see was parts of his tongue and bits of broken teeth and a bloody hamburger texture. what happened is the man had sat his gun on a barb wire fence and it went off right under his chin."
Very interesting, isn't it? I agree with Sam - I'm sure the Chicago mobsters utilized the pond as their OWN dumping grounds!
08.24.01

"My Brush With Morbidity" by Sam
"I live in Chicago and it's not a big secret that we used to be the butcher to the world and until recently most of the old stockyard buildings were still up in an area on our city's southside. I was watching them tear a building down and they were stirring up the ground as they were and it smelled like, well, dead meat. Back in the day people who worked in the stockyards had to be trained as firefighters because the wood floors would get so saturated with fat, grease and the such that they would become candles. One strange little secret in "The Back Of The Yards" as it's called is Bubbly Pond. It's the end of the Chicago River, or an end, I'm not exactly sure, but it doesn't drain much or have much current. Over the years, animal remains from the stockyards have been illegaly dumped there. As the bacteria decompose the meat, they breath and the result is Bubbly Pond. On a clear, sunny, summer day you can look at Bubbly Pond and it will look like it is drizzling, circular ripples from the bubbles coming from the bacteria below. First I saw it was in August 1997, and I was told that it used to bubble a lot more. I can only imagine if it were Jacuzzi Pond. When I saw it, it looked like it was drizzling. I think it can only be accessed through private property, so it's not like there's a riverwalk around it. I find it hard to believe that only non-hominid animals are down there."
Very interesting, isn't it? I agree with Sam - I'm sure the Chicago mobsters utilized the pond as their OWN dumping grounds!
08.13.01

"My Brush With Morbidity" by Kiran
"when i was 16 and had just gotten my driver's license, a friend and i decided to go for a cruise down one of the main drags in seattle (my hometown!). it was rather late, probably 2:00 a.m., and the streets were pretty clear. up ahead of me, i saw two cars relatively close to each other. i saw the brake lights activate on both cars, the first one continuing on, and the second pulling over to the side of the road and doing nothing. i didn't think much of it, and when i came to the point in the road where i saw this, i glanced into the center lane, and saw what i thought was a large dog. suddenly i realized it was a human being, and whipped my car to the side of the road. my friend and i jumped out of the car, and he directed traffic to the far lane as i ran over to the body that lie in the street, alone. i am certified in first aid and CPR, but when i saw the victim, a young woman, i knew there was nothing i could do. i had picked up her head and noticed that there was a stream of blood going from her head to the gutter, and i felt a lot of crunching in her skull. her pulse was barely detectable and was not breathing. both of her legs were broken at the pelvis as well. so i just held her and stroked her hair until the paramedics got there. after speaking with the medics, i got the full story on her, and the events that had taken place. she had been drinking a little, and was crossing the street after an argument with her boyfriend. evidently, the first car struck her, causing her body to fly up in the air and land back on the pavement. the second car inadvertantly ran over her, pulled over, and froze. the first car never stopped. it turns out she was only 23 years old, and three months pregnant. the first car was never found, to my knowledge. needless to say that this affected my life pretty heavily, being that i was 16 years old, and had never seen anything like that before. it was frustrating, the knowledge that no matter how much training i had, there was not one thing i could do to help her. i still remember it vividly...and i hope the driver of the first car was caught. if not, i hope it eats away a little part of him each and every day."
08.11.01

"My Brush With Morbidity" by Serina
"A friend of mine and I were on our way to a nearby town to go see her boyfriend on January 24 of this year, when we came upon an accident. At first there were a few cop cars at the accident, and we couldn't exactly see much because of a semi in our way. After about 10 minutes there were about 5 squad cars, 3 ambulances, and 2 fire trucks. Roughly ten minutes after all the emergency relief people had responded and were crowding the scene like ants on a carcass [gotta love that analogy - despair], traffic was allowed to go by the accident and be on their way. This whole time I had a terrible pain in the pit of my stomach, I told my companion that I knew someone had died; I was positive. When we drove by the accident we saw it involved a little Dunham Express truck with a topper, and an untouched semi. Looking over the scene, I saw it. My first dead body. I was amazed that the police didn't have the decency to at least move his body off the road, but at the same time thankful that I could have viewed him. He lay on the pavement, sprawled out, with a white cloth sloppily thrown on him. One arm was casually streched out above his head, with his hand poised in what reminded me of a renaissance style painting--graceful...and dead. We were later to find out from friends at school with parents who are EMT's what happened was that the man had had a seizure and crossed the center line. Upon doing so his truck slid under the above mentioned semi, and was dragged for roughly 75-100 feet. The little truck rolled numerous times and landed upside down on the side of the road. The man was strangled to death by his seatbelt. They had to use the jaws of life to remove the lifeless body. It's amazing how death pierces your perception of everything around you. I'm 16 and a half and am still a tad weary of getting my driver's license." 08.06.01