many moons ago...
when i was about 6, maybe 7 years old, i used to go to after school french classes, and afterwards my mum would pick my and my friend jules up and drop jules home. at the time my older brothers weren't quite old enough to be left at home on their own, so mum would bring them with her when she came to get me.

anyway, one particular afternoon, mum had dropped jules off at his dad's and was just popping into the doctors to pick up a prescription, leaving me and my brothers, tom and dan, in the car. dan, always the tinkerer of the family, wanted to see how the cigarette lighter in the car worked. tom, the sensible one, said "don't dan, mum won't be happy."

dan ignored him.

pulling the lighter out, he gingerly touched the heating element but there was no warmth to be found. he turned it over in his hands a few times and then realised that the opposite end to the element had a button. he pushed it in, saying "oh, this'll do it." he pressed his finger against the heating coil, obviously thinking it would take a while to heat up. not so, as it happens.

it was extremely, hideously hot. dan's face went white and the car was filled with the smell of burning flesh. he stuff the lighter back in the socket, sat up straight and said nothing. "you're for it now!" said tom, with a strong note of i-told-you-so in his voice. mum knew something was up as soon as she got back in the car, but didn't realise that it was the end of dan's finger until later on. she bollocked him, and then, being a former nurse, treated it appropriately.

that was a stupid experiment, and a story that is pulled out regularly, to illustrate dan's idiocy.
(notjustahatrack peeling a sausage..., Fri 25 Jul 2008, 14:31, 1 reply)

Not stupid enough to use it on my own flesh, but still stupid
You've reminded me of a similar incident...

I'd been a good boy, and for a treat I was going to be taken to see the first Star Trek movie. Yay! Before we went to the cinema, however, my parents had to do some shopping and, as was common at that time, I was left in my parent's first ever brand-new car. Left to my own devices, I started exploring and quickly found the cigarette lighter. To test the thermic value - rather than sticking a finger in it - I pushed the near molten metal against the car seat.

I managed to put out the flames, and tried to repair the damage using the touch-up paint I found in the glove department. Unfortunately the pear drops smell of the paint did nothing to mask the stench of burning velour, and on their return my parents decided that I could no longer consider myself to be a good boy and for that reason would not be seeing the movie, or indeed the outside world until I had done enough additional chores to cover the cost of a new car seat. (about 8 years).

I had the last laugh, because the first Star Trek movie was pants.
(Mr Broadtrousers, Fri 25 Jul 2008, 16:20, closed)