Bo Jackson was sitting in his favorite chair, drinking a beer, and watching a football game. At halftime, a car commercial featured a few hundred helium balloons floating skyward. I could do that, Bo thought. I could strap a bunch of balloons to my lawn chair and float up into the sky.

He told his wife. She asked him how many beers he’d had. He told her that he wasn’t joking. What was the problem, he asked. Blow up a bunch of balloons, tie them to his chair, and away he goes. How was he going to steer, she asked. The wind would steer him, he said. How would he know where he was going to land? When he saw a nice landing spot, he’d just shoot holes in the balloons with his BB pistol, he said. He told her not to be so negative.

He went online and found out what wind patterns were in Oregon that time of the year. He called up his friend Duke, who was a pilot. In a few days, Bo had it all figured out. He called up a balloon store and ordered 50 balloons and a few helium tanks to fill up the balloons. His 6-year-old son asked if he could go with him. His wife promised to divorce him if he actually went through with this.