When I was a little kid, we moved to a different house and all the loose household items had moving tags with copper wires attached. I gathered a bunch of the tags, stacked them in a pile, straightened the copper wires, then inserted them into a receptacle.
I quickly learned a little bit about grounding, resistance, voltage and amperes a few cycles into 60 Hz. Mom put cold mustard on the burns. It took me a while to delve into electrical work again.
Building a router table, I wanted a long cord on the outside, a receptacle inside and a switch mounted through the side of the router table carcase so I could turn it on and off with ease. First I read two electrical books, then I put the electrical setup together in the router table, not paying enough attention to proper terminations. Popped the circuit breaker, then looked into it - I found that I had run the hot and the neutral to the two terminals on the switch! Dumb novice mistake! That was a learning experience.
