The Stupidest Thing I Have Ever Seen. (Long, language!)

[SeeMe]

So, I've been reading a while, and finally decided to sign up and share what (little) stories I have. This is my first story, and it takes place a few years ago, so some of the details are a bit fuzzy. Anyways, here we go.

I was all of fifteen years old when, for some reason still fuzzy in my mind, Ontario decided to give my mom a big hunk of cash. I think it was 'back pay' for a baby bonus thing they do. Not sure, since, after all, I was fifteen and not really interested in where money came from, so long as we had it.

Anyway, we did have it, and we decided to go on a vacation, back to the States to visit family and friends. We'd take our land yacht (A Buick older than God's grandma) and cruise the USA, visiting places that my brothers and I had never seen. (My mom has seen damn near everything there is to see.). Yosemite, Yellowstone, San Fransychotic (as my mum has dubbed it)--If it was on the west coast/south coast/middle bit of the United States, we were probably going to see it.

It was a pretty uneventful trip until we got to Yellowstone National Park. We were all pretty excited about this, to the point where my younger brothers were reading out every sign that might have something to do with Yellowstone and I didn't tell them to shut the heck up. Once we got inside the park, it was madness.

"Stay in your car!" They chorused. I told them that yeah, I was planning on it.

"Do not feed the bison!" Because they don't like cold McDonald's french fries. They prefer Burger King!

"Do not litter!" Right on, man. Shave the whales and all that, right?

"Do Not Feed The Bears!" Because we've run all out of pick-a-nick baskets and they don't accept no imitations.

And so on, so on. Actually going through the park was awesome, my brothers shut up when they saw some animals, and everyone was pretty stoked about seeing animals, trees, and other such National Park-y things. We took some pictures through our windows (Better safe than have a good picture.) and sometimes, when it was deemed safe by our mom, (ie: when we had more time to roll up the windows than it would take the animal to leap inside and punch us) we half-rolled down our windows (Child safety windows, don't you know?) and snapped a picture. We saw no bears. I was pleased. I like bears the best when they're on TV, and not making me try to recall whether or not bears can open car doors. It was a pretty normal trip until we headed toward the "exit".

That is where IT happened. This is, without a doubt, the stupidest thing I have ever seen. Ever. And I've seen some damn stupid things. But this just made me wonder "how in the hell does the human race manage to have an average life expectancy of eighty years!?". Now, a good six years later, I can just look at my mom, and say, "Hey, remember at Yellowstone..." And she'll reply, quite heatedly, "That was SO DAMN STUPID." Capslock and italics included.

There was a nice long queue to get out of the park. So we waited, looked at the trees, read out signs when we crept toward them, the normal thing to do. When suddenly, my youngest brother pipes in with: "A bear! There's a bear!" Where!? what!? No! Bad!

I look out my window where my brother's pointing, and there is indeed a bear. It ran to a spot that would be perfect for a picture (from my angle anyways) and sits down. It is a brown bear. I am not a bearologist, but I do know that there are two types of bear. One of them is the brown bear. And the other type is a Grizzly bear. Neither of them are bears I want to come within sniffing distance of. I lock my door, take out the camera and lift it up. The bear is small. And that's when I realize that this is a brown bear cub. Oh hell.

Another thing I know about bears is that the mothers are protective of their young. You do not mess with bear cubs. You do not think about messing with their cubs. You do not think about thinking about messing with their cubs. "It's a cub!" I say, and there is the deafening roar of all doors locking. I guess I'm not the only one that doesn't know if bears can open car doors or not.

Since we're in a big old Buick, with steel around us on all sides, locked and Safe-Tee Glassed away from anything that might want to harm us, I figure it's safe to take a picture. And that's when I notice that the bear is panting. As I peer through the viewfinder, I notice the bear look over it's shoulder, open its mouth as if to bleat, and then pick itself up and continue running. What the hell? What is it running from?

A moose? A tidal wave? A volcano? A badass stray cat? Should we be running too? We can't run! We're in a queue! I pray it's not a volcano, or a moose and I quickly snap a picture of the fleeing cub. I'm about to take another picture, just to be sure, when, instead of a bear, I'm looking at an overweight child in a loud hawaiian shirt. I set down my camera and rub my eyes. My brother shouts out what I'm hoping isn't true.

"They're chasing the bear!"

And they were. At the head of the pack were the children, then the younger, more spritely adults, and then the elder ones. (The teenagers were probably in the car, groaning about how stupid their parents were, how stupid nature was, etc.) They were all chasing the bear, shouting at it, and trying to take pictures.

Let me say this again: They were chasing a baby bear and trying to take pictures of it.

And if that wasn't bad enough, I looked over at the ladies in the car next to us, and shake my head, horrified at this mass stupidity. Chasing a baby bear. In Yellowstone Park. I expect a nod and a return eyeroll, acknowledging the utter stupidity of those idiots chasing a bear. Instead, they get out of the car and chase the bear as well! I figure, what the hell. You don't see a flock of idiots chasing after a baby predator every day. So I take a picture of them.


I never found out what happened to the herd. In fact, I didn't want to know what happened after the mob of tourons (Haha, I love that abbreviation. Picked it up on the board somewhere.) disappeared out of my range of sight. I like to imagine, though, that they met up with the mother bear. Or that they finally read the signs.

If I had the pictures, I would share them. But unfortunately, someone stole our film while we were still on vacation. But I guess I don't need the pictures--that scene, of at least fifty people chasing a baby bear, will be burned into my mind forever. I will recall this on my deathbed. I will grab my brothers arm as I am dying, and croak out: "Remember those stupid assholes who chased that baby bear?"

And I really, really hope that this remains the stupidest thing I ever see.
Because it's going to take hell of a lot to top it.

[Spiffy McMoron]

That story reminds me of some of the tourists that congregate in Banff and Jasper National Parks. Many of these tourists come from large cities in America, eastern Canada, Australia, Europe, and Asia. To them, nature is a potted tree in a mall somewhere.

So they come to the (MAJESTIC!!) Canadian Rocky Mountians, and they absolutely lose it. You'll see pack of tourists see a couple of squirrels chasing each other just off a walking trail, and they will freak out and snap a roll of film on these damn squirrels. Meanwhile, locals are wading through a herd of elk to take out the garbage and not even caring. (True story: when my sister lived in Banff, a couple of her roommates were from England and were scared to death of anything larger than a puppy. My sister--who is used to walking around cattle during chores--simply picks up the garbage bag, walks around the herd, dumps the trash, and walks back, just like she was walking around a parked car. )

[LizaMarie]

Stupidest thing ever


But a wonderful story, and nicely told, I definately lol-d!

[MadRocketScientist]

I grew up in Wisconsin.

I remember checking out a cave/old mine in Colorado Springs. People were going nuts over all the very tame chipmunks running all over. Folks were feeding the rodents popcorn and peanuts (no wonder the little things were tame) and just going bugnuts crazy over the fat little bastards.

[XCashier]

Holy moly! Some people are just amazingly stupid when it comes to wild animals. Hey, Potential Darwin Awards, the animals are WILD. That means they will attack you to protect themselves and their babies, and you are no match for a pissed-off mama bear!

Kind of reminds me of this story.

PS: SeeMe, I love your Red Dwarf avatar!

[freaktard]

Love the word "tourons!" I can't wait to have a chance to use it myself.

[ThePhoneGoddess]

I don't know how long ago this was, but I guarantee you if it was in the last 25 years or so everyone of those people would have been corraled by the park rangers (as soon as one of them saw it and radioed the others), and dumped on their asses just outside the park. In fact they'd be LUCKY if they were just attacked by the Momma bear. The rangers unfortunately see a lot of idiots do a lot of stupid things at Yellowstone and they are rather unforgiving. Cops would have been called and insulting diatribes would have commenced immediately. (What were you idiots thinking? You want your kids taken from you for reckless endangerment? SHUT UP AND SIT DOWN!)


I got lots of relatives who work in national parks. My grandpa was a park ranger for 50 years in California.

[hecubus]

I actually saw something even stupider at Yellowstone. When I was there with my family, we saw a guy who was trying to get a picture of his son with a full grown bear. The kid had a piece of bread in his hand and his dad was urging him to coax the bear closer. The topper is that, guess where the rest of the loaf of bread was. Believe it or not, the kid had the loaf [i]under his arm[i]!! All it would have taken was for the bear to decide he'd rather have the whole loaf than one small slice of bread and the kid would have had to be renamed "Lefty." If he survived.

[mariamousie1]

Wow, people are stupid. On that note, this year we went camping at Killbear provincial park. It was pretty cool, but the best (and stupidest part) was when a black bear would show up in the campgrounds, someone would yell "There's a bear!" and we would all run to look at it. It's like we were so eager to see a real bear in the wild we forgot an important rule of nature: Bears Ouch! We didn't chase it though. We just came close enough to see it and watched silently. It would just leave on it's own. Every once in a while I say to my mom "Remember when we saw those bears?" My mom would go "Yeah, that was really cool!"
Me: Yeah, it was awesome!
Mom: What were we thinking?
Me: I don't know!
Mom: It was a bear!
Me: I know! It was still cool though.
Mom: Yeah, it was.

[BlaqueKatt]

Wow, people are stupid. On that note, this year we went camping at Killbear provincial park. <snip>. It's like we<Snip> forgot an important rule of nature: Bears Ouch!

hmm maybe that's why the park has it's name?

[GoldFinch]

Reminds me of the time in my own neighborhood when two idiot kids were purposefully trying to get the attention of a large alligator that was hanging out in the retention pond. They were doing so by flinging rocks at it and trying to reach it with sticks.

Lucky for them the alligator simple sunk back into the murky depths and swam to a farther edge of the pond where it couldn't be reached by they're horrible missiles. These kids were of an age to know better then to provoke something that can easily come on land and drag you into the water at lightning speed.

[HawaiianShirts]

I've done the Yellowstone thing, too. Spent a summer working there. There was one bison who liked to doze just a few feet off the trail between the employee dorms and the employee cafeteria. It had grown accustomed to us and would lie there and grunt as we walked past. But take one extra step in its direction, the grunts would become angry snorts as it prepared to stand up and smash the offending human. Employees understood this. We had a nice arrangement with this bison. Guests were a different story. I lost count of the number of people I watched walk right up to the buffalo (usually the big males) to take pictures or try to feed or pet them. I watched several suddenly find themselves running for their lives from an angry, hairy, snorting steam locomotive.

And then there was the crowd who followed a big bull elk around the cabin grounds, snapping pictures and reaching out to touch it. It made several threatening gestures with its antlers, but that didn't deter the tourons (by the way, if I remember correctly, that's Jester's term). They finally scattered when this elk found it's rival (a slightly larger bull) and got into an antler fight with it.

Me? I walked quietly around the park during my time off. Watched (from a great distance) a bear drinking from a stream. Saw a couple of coyotes dart across the trail ahead of me. Grunted my greetings to the dozing bison near the trail. Silently cheered for the two chipmunks who were trying to fight off an angry squirrel. And, once, walking by myself, I stopped in the middle of a trail, so as not to startle a grazing fawn and its mother. They looked at me for a moment, grazed some more, then walked directly toward me on this narrow trail. In fact, they walked right past me as if I was one of them, pausing briefly for a sniff and a wary glance, close enough for me to have touched without completely straightening my arm.

Yes, tourists can be idiots. If they'd just calm down and stay still long enough, they'll see more fascinating stuff than if they go chasing every animal they see. Like Dad told me once, "Just because it's furry doesn't mean it's a good idea to pet it."

[SeeMe]

Wow. It always amazes me to read such... acts of utter stupidity. I don't know whether to feel glad that I'm not alone in seeing such idiotic things, or weep for the future of humanity.

But then again, I almost always feel like that.

I wish that there was a class, or hell, a series of classes, that people are FORCED to take before being allowed into the world. You know, sort of like an extreme Driver's Ed type thing, where instead of being shown cadavers in car crashes... I was actually shown a video like this. We were 'allowed to leave if it was too upsetting.' In my class, you would be strapped down in a style reminiscent of A Clockwork Orange. ... you'd be shown people getting attacked by animals.

Not just the big ones! No, all sorts of animals would be covered. From Aardvarks to Zebras. And plants.

And you'd have to learn how to treat Nature, too. (Like a computer pushing its warranty--vewwy vewwy gently.)

And then there would be tests. If you do not pass the tests, you get a tattoo on your forehead that reads "I AM NOT ALLOWED IN NATURE. IF YOU SEE ME OUTSIDE THE CONFINES OF A CITY, PLEASE CALL..." and you aren't allowed any pets, ever.

Because, knowing the sort that would fail my hypothetical tests, they're the kind who shouldn't have pets--the sort of person that returns a pet to the SPCA because they're feeling sickly, or they don't match the furniture anymore.

Blarh, people.

[Eireann]

My sister worked in Yellowstone one summer. She told me that some woman visiting the park tried to get up close and personal to take a photo of a buffalo.

The buffalo must have been pretty camera-shy, because it gored her.

In the butt.

I am MIGHTILY pleased at the thought of this woman having to explain, for the rest of her life, how and where she was injured at Yellowstone.

[ArenaBoy]

For those who worked at camp sites and the like you will definitely feel this guy's pain.

http://www.craigslist.org/about/best/slc/203274705.html

I also live near the woods, I see deer and rabbits out every morning. Furry doesn't always = cuteness. Sometimes that furry creature can be a raving mad bear that's going to castrate the idiot who wants a picture of the "cute little bear".