W. BRUCE CAMERON - The 5 Dumbest Things I’ve Done

I’ve often said that there’s no sense in dwelling on past mistakes because I’m just going to repeat them anyway. There are a couple, though, I can’t seem to forget — mistakes on the “hey, let’s steer the Titanic over to take a look at that iceberg” level. Here is a countdown of the five dumbest things I’ve done in my life — so far.

No. 5 concerns the very first time I came up with an “invention,” because I am an inventor the way Lehman Brothers is a “success.” My father claimed the coffeepot worked poorly because it was a wedding gift from a TV actor who had dated my mother in their teens. It...