We've all experienced this before. The time when our brain goes on autopilot and we end up doing something stupid that we can't even explain.
“I was psycho…”
“After an 8 hour day of cashiering at Target (which has so many robotic-small talk conversations), I stopped at the dollar store. The conversation went something like: Cashier: Hi, how are you? Me: Good, how are you? Cashier: I’m good, thanks. Me: That’s good. Did you find everything okay today? That conversation was had to the effect of everyone in line and the cashier looking at me like I was psycho.”
“That was a long night…”
“I took the metro home then realized I drove to work.. that was a long night.”
“I obviously toss my toothbrush into the toilet…”
“After getting my toothbrush, I’ll occasionally grab the deodorant instead of the toothpaste and stare at it for a minute while my brain tries to figure out how one is supposed to go on the other. Another time I picked up my toothbrush to brush my teeth but I also had the urge to piss, so I obviously tossed my toothbrush into the toilet.”
“Just chilling there eating the cat food while I pet its back…”
“When I was in high school and living on the family farm, I used to feed the horses and barn cats every morning. Waking up at 6am for this as a 16 year old guaranteed that I was half asleep. So, I grabbed the cat food like I always did, walked to the table where my cat’s bowl was like I always did, and poured some in. My cat always jumped up on the table right away to start eating right away, and one morning as something jumped up in front of me I absentmindedly pet it as usual. The hair felt a little rough so I looked down and instead of my friendly orange cat, there was a skunk. Just chilling there eating the cat food while I pet its back.”
“Turns out he was hailing a taxi…”
“Was jogging late at night. A guy reached out his hand in front of me as I passed. I high-fived him. Turns out he was hailing a taxi.“
“Thank you for choosing McDonald’s, may I take your order?…”
“As a teenager, I worked at McDonald’s. My McDonald’s was 24 hours and, during the summer, I worked the overnight shift. My sleep schedule would get all messed up. My parents woke me up for dinner one evening. I zombie walked to the table and sat down. My dad asked me to say grace. I bow my head and say, ‘thank you for choosing McDonald’s, may I take your order?'”
“It still makes my cry with laughter…”
“During a similar earthquake my girlfriend who is a light sleeper woke up pretty much as soon as the shaking started and yelled as fast as she could say ‘HEY WAKE UP! THERE’S AN EARTH QUAKE! WHAT DO WE DO!’ I heard everything she said but I’m a pretty heavy sleeper so in my panic and drowsiness all I could think was to say ‘stop drop and roll!’ (I guess my half asleep mind remembered that from elementary school when they teach us what to do if you’re ever on fire). Of course I don’t do it as I’m still trying to wake up and gain motor functions, but my girlfriend in her panic and probably semi drowsiness rolls off the bed and literally ‘stops, drops, and rolls’ on our bedroom floor until she’s fully awake (a few seconds after the earthquake stopped) then she proceeds to yell at me for playing a prank on her while she was half asleep and scared. By this point I’m still in bed and can’t move due to the laughter at watching her do it. I didn’t actually want or try to prank her, it was just the only thing my brain thought to say, but to this day she thinks I did it to f**k with her. It still makes my cry with laughter every time I think about it.”
“Then I remembered it was the middle of my shift and…”
“The two that come to mind are while playing XBOX I got up to get a drink, then sit back down and can’t find my freaking controller. I’m tearing cushions apart, looking under stuff, looking in drawers, etc. Turns out I took a soda out of the fridge and put the controller in the spot I took it from. The other one happened the other day. Drove home from work, parked, went upstairs, opened the door, started to take off shirt. Then I remembered it was the middle of my shift and I hadn’t left to go home, but just go buy a drink.”
“Cup of coffee in left hand, phone in the right hand…”
“Cup of coffee in left hand, phone in the right hand. Go to my room, take a sip of my phone and throw coffee on the bed.”
“I went to turn it off, and flipped the kitchen light switch…”
“My sister had a brain fart and left the water running in the kitchen. I went to turn it off, and flipped the kitchen light switch. Repeatedly. Then started cussing when the switch wouldn’t cut the water off. Then got my tool box and started taking the faceplate off the light switch so I could see why it wasn’t cutting the water off. At that point my other sister, who witnessed all of this, kindly pointed out that I had lost my ever loving mind and cut the water off herself.”
“Luckily not that many people fly at like 430am…”
“I dropped my pants when going through TSA….For those who fly in the super early morning it can be rough. I purposely didn’t drink coffee so I could sleep on the plane…I was on the security line, and did the normal routine of taking stuff out of my pockets and putting them in my laptop bag. Then off with the shoes, placed on top of my luggage, then off comes the belt as usual. Then of course when you take off your belt you take off your pants…..uhhh Nope damnit. Put them back on and WTFed for a moment as I finished up in security. Luckily not that many people fly at like 430am.”
“Oh, there’s an ostrich across the street…”
“Sometimes I will see something out of the corner of my eye and apparently your brain kind of does an autofill and tells you what you’re seeing without actually seeing it. So I will be walking my dog and see a bush or something and think to myself for a split second ‘oh, there’s an ostrich across the street’. Then my I’m like ‘wtf is an ostrich doing here?!’ and realize it’s just a bush.”
“My mailman must think I’m retarded…”
“I tried to mail my buddy a check, and it had been a while since I mailed anything. Long enough to forget how mail works apparently. What I did was I wrote my name and address in the center, and his name in the upper left hand corner. The letter then got returned to me. But still, my first thought wasn’t, whoops, I failed at mailing this check. Instead it was, well I guess this stamp is old, and the price of stamps went up. So I put another stamp on it and sent it again, to myself, again. My mailman must think I’m retarded.”
“Definitely one of the dumbest things I’ve ever done…”
“I once got my car impounded via brain-autopilot. I lived across the street from a gas station and didn’t drive very often. Once I was filling it up, went inside to buy something, forgot I was getting gas, and walked home. A few days later I reported my car stolen since I couldn’t find it in the apartment garage. About a month later I get a call from the police, saying my car had gone up for auction and only then was it discovered it had been reported stolen. I had to pay about $1500 in impound fees to get it back. Definitely one of the dumbest things I’ve ever done.”
“I screamed and immediately threw the chicken breast…”
“I was trimming a raw chicken breast and saw a spider in my kitchen. I screamed and immediately threw the chicken breast at the spider and embedded it in the meat. Whoops.”
“I caught my wife…”
“I got off a red eye and drove almost two hours to my old home, only to wonder WTF was going on when a guy pulled into the drive in front of me and went in the front door of MY HOUSE… Had the dread that maybe my wife was cheating on me somehow and this was one of those ‘come home early and catch her in the act’ I’m devastated for a minute, then angry, then resigned to at least see it to conclusion… Then I realize I f**king moved a couple of weeks before. So I had breakfast at the old diner then drove the hour and a half back to my new home where I caught my wife…. Sleeping in!”
“I was pretty tired…”
“I was driving home one night and I was totally zoned out. I was almost at my house when I pulled the key out of the car and the car was still in drive. Needless to say you’re not suppose to be able to do that. But the car kept going and I put it in park and then turned the car back on and pulled into the driveway. I was pretty tired.”
“They shared a good laugh about it…”
“Co-worker of mine told me about the last time he went to the cinema. As he was walking out, he hit the remote unlock for his truck, them watched a few seconds later as a guy and his wife climbed into his vehicle. Theirs was parked two stalls further down, was an identical vehicle, and the guy had hit his unlock at the same second and watched my buddy’s lights flash. They shared a good laugh about it.”
“Not one customer even paused or acknowledged the fact…”
“I used to work at McDonald’s drive-thru. 5 days a week, 8hrs a day; so I had been hard-wired to say, ‘Welcome to McDonald’s. How can I help you today?’ Every single time I heard the headset beep. Straight-up Pavlovian. One day there was a particularly wily fly that was always just a second ahead of me. I became very focused on killing this fly. I don’t know how many times I said it before a coworker finally stopped laughing long enough to tell me, but it turns out I’d been saying ‘Welcome to McDonald’s. How can I kill you today?’ To every car in the drive-thru. Not one customer even paused or acknowledged the fact that Ronald McDonald threatened them with murder. They just wanted their goddamn nuggets.”
“Needless to say I got out of that room really fast…”
“I am currently at university and live on the fifth floor of a dormitory. All the floors are identical other than the colors of the paint on the wall. One day I was taking the elevator up to the fifth floor and I was sending a text to my mother. When I arrived at my floor a person I had never seen before got on the elevator. I consciously noted that it was weird because I knew everyone on my floor, but I walked to my room and walked in. My living room seemed slightly off and then a girl walked into the living room and casually goes, ‘what are you doing in my room.’ That’s when I realized I had gotten off on an earlier floor and I just absentmindedly walked into someone else’s room. Needless to say I got out of that room really fast after realizing what I had done.”
“I exposed myself to my new coworkers…”
“During a period when I was unemployed for a few months I got into the habit of undoing my trousers before arriving at the bathroom. This lead to a very embarrassing situation I found myself in when I became employed again and just undid my belt and trousers in the hallway while heading to the toilet! Thankfully I realized what I was doing before I exposed myself to my new coworkers.”