Banana skins, more deadly than you think!

Up until last week I didn’t think it was possible.
I thought it was something out of a comic book, an act designed to make people laugh.
I am, of course, talking about slipping on a banana skin.
This act is famous in comic books, cartoons and sketch shows, where one character is sent flying by the deadly yellow skin, often with hilarious consequences.
However I was under the impression I was immune from the problem, not believing it could really cause people to fall.

How wrong I was.
Now, I am pretty accident prone, and have been known to fall over thin air.
So when, on my routine walk home from work, I slipped and landed on my bottom I thought I had been having one of those days.
Imagine my surprise when I looked down and saw the banana skin crushed beneath my shoe.
For me it dispelled the myth that stepping on a banana skin was safe, and for people around me it gave them a good laugh.

Interested to see if others had experienced the same thing as me I turned to the internet.
After some research I found that the  joke of slipping on a banana skin dates back to the turn of the century, when bananas were becoming popular as a snack for the working class.
Once the bananas were eaten, the peels were just discarded on the street.
Comic strips and artists drawings at that time showed naughty little boys throwing skins to trip up parents, teachers, police, and other people in authority.

So here is a warning from me to you.
When you are innocently walking along keep your eyes peeled (no pun intended) for the seemingly harmless banana skin.
It is not as harmless as you may have believed.