Quite possibly...

[Kos Mos]

...the most ludicrous question you've ever been asked.

 

How the heck do you peel a orange?

 

I've tried and I've like a million pieces of peel, segments exploding everywhere and I smell of citrus.

 

I have one more left so any advice is appreciated.

[Qazimod]

Hmm, I sort of delicately get one bit peeling off then try to control or guide where the peeling's going and hopefully get the whole lot off in one piece. That said, I sometimes feel like there needs to be an achievement noise in my head when I nail it.

 

For bonus points: how do people deal with the pith - the white thready stuff that's on the orange after peeling? I usually eat the whole thing like some kind of monster...

[Ran]

I prefer to just cut the sucker into 6 wedges and eat into /suck the flesh with the peel being a handy grip.

[MarkN]

I pick away at whichever end seems most likely to give easily with a thumbnail- often the bottom end, rather than the top where the little green hat was. Once I've got a thumb under the skin I start peeling off carefully in all directions, bit by bit. Got to be gentle here. If one direction gives easily I run with it until it gets a bit unwieldy and liable to break, then go back and start a new one The aim is to take it off in one piece, ending up with something that looks a bit like a flattened octopus. Success rate recently is about 75% (most failures happen early on - and it's usually just one bit due to carelessness). 

 

As to pith I tend to try to get as much off as I can before breaking it into segments - it's part of the ritual for me; I'll happily spend a good 6 or 7 minutes picking away at it if I'm still making progress. It helps if the pith is nice and stringy rather than the patchy stuff. Takes about 10 minutes to prep, and gets scoffed in 2. It's incredibly messy though, so I only ever eat them when I can wash my hands straight afterwards.

[stephen129]

You can use a knife to score from the top to the bottom working your way around the orange. This makes it much easier to peel.

 

I also like to cut it like this: