I used to believe that warning labels were pointless. A collection of words, carefully arranged to portray a sense of caution that saps all the excitement out of life. The most famous warning labels are the 10 commandments, used to brainwash unsuspecting god fearers into sitting at home wrapped in cotton wool. To me warning labels are just suggestions. 'Don't run with scissors', 'Don't put metal in a microwave oven', 'Pet food only' are examples of useless warnings that are begging to be ignored. I have broken all of the above with no adverse reactions (except for the metal in the microwave thing, but that wasn't so much adverse as mildly entertaining, and dog food is tasteless).
Well, all my thoughts about the uselessness of warning labels came to an abrupt and painful end today. My friend and I went to Wet and Wild today (its like the largest and best water park in Australia, but its not very large and it aint so great) and we decided to go on one of the tandem water slides. There was this big sign at the front saying "Warning: The combined weight of the slidees (not the correct word they used) MUST NOT exceed 160 kilograms". This was a problem, I am close to 120 kilos (all muscle of course) and my mate is about 100 kilos (he's just a fat ass). As you can see our combined weight far exceeded the maximum allowed, but because it was a warning label we decided that it didn't matter what it said and went on the slide anyway. All was going fine until the very end of the slide where there is a narrow trough of water used to stop the slidees before they hit the wall. Unfortunately because our combined weight far exceeded the maximum allowed we were travelling a little faster than the average slidee, so we didn't sink gracefully into the trough of water, we skipped right over it, like a stone gently skipping across a placid lake after being thrown by a happy little boy on a picnic with his parents and the sun is shining and birds are singing and little woodchucks are frolicking in the background. Yeah, it was like that, but instead of sunshine and picnics and frolicking woodchucks there was a giant wooden wall.
So we crashed into the wall, I hurt my wrist and my friend got a cut on his forehead.... we also got kicked out of Wet and Wild. So kids, while it is fun to run with scissors, remember one day you will crash into a wall. All good things must come to an end.... including warning labels.