I was making vases. Gluing magazine cutouts onto old wine bottles.

I don't know why, but I sometimes get really obsessive compulsive about some things. Like, whenever I wasn't wearing shoes, they ALWAYS had to be side by side lined up- NEVER separated from the other shoe. And I also had a compulsion about putting my fingers in bottles to see if they'd fit. One day I was working with some beer bottles. I was 17, but my parents had plenty. My friend was in my room watching me so I was being goofy and put a bottle on each finger waving them around. When I went to take them off, the Molson bottle on my middle finger was stuck. If you've ever seen the bottle, the neck is curved weird so it goes on very easily, but when you try to take it off, the knuckle gets stuck in the indentations. So I panicked.

We tried lotion, soap, warm water, cooking oil, and WD-40. My mother has sick humor and thought it'd be funnie to tell me my circulation was cut off and I'd lose my finger soon. I swear by this point I was imaging life with only 9 fingers, but also of getting out of homework that week for trauma.

So with my arm over my head and hyperventilating, we drove to the firestation. This was in VA, and they were all volunteer rednecks. They pulled for a while and then asked me to lay my hand on the table, pulling all other fingers as far back as I could. Then they got their hammer and began pounding away. It hurt so much I wanted to cry. They said it wasn't working so they were going to get the sledge hammer (morons!). At that point I was so scared that my adrenaline gave me the strength of a thousand men as I yanked my finger effortlessly from the bottle. I was in shock and looked at my friend as she screamed, "Run, Melida, Run!!!"

SO we ran to the car and hid as my parents apologized to the firemen for their trouble.

The next day, no one believed my friend and I until it was all over town because the firemen were joking about some loser who came in with a beer bottle on her finger.

Then my finger was all bruised and everyone wondered just why there was a bottle on my finger