A Quart Low...

 

 

Bruised.  Bloody.  Burned.  There's a reason I haven't posted all week, though I don't have a clue how--or why--I was cursed with such a litany of afflictions...

Monday.  I'm having an impromptu mini-picnic for Labor Day, just me and the dogs.  I've made potato salad, have my Polish sausage under the broiler, hot dog bun ready to toast.  Opening the small can of pork & beans, the opener slips and the edge of the can slices through my thumb.  Blood spurts, my heart races.  Damnation.  I wrap the wound in a thick wad of paper towels.  Blood soaks through in seconds.  Shit.  I'm trying not to freak out.  I get the first aid kit out of the bathroom, wrap gauze around an inch-thick layer of pads and tape the whole mess tight.  Until I get the blood to stop, I can't really assess the damage.  And frankly?  I really don't want to look.

About this point I smell something burning.  My wonderful, mouth-watering sausage is on fire.  I grab a pot holder, reach in to yank the rack, and burn the back of my hand on the frigging broiler element.  The burn is about the thickness of a pencil and goes across my whole hand.  And hurts like hell.  I stick my hand in the freezer.  While I'm trying to cool the agony, I notice blood dripping from my thumb--through several layers of padding.  Crapcrapcrap.

Eventually I get a good look at the thumb.  The slice is deep, really deep, but I finally stop the blood flow, get it bandaged, put aloe on my burned hand, and throw away my dinner.  I had a lovely bowl of mango sorbet instead.

Tuesday.  I'm lifting the groceries out of the back of the Blazer and due to my heavily bandaged and throbbing thumb, I lose my grip on a bag, overcompensate, and crack my elbow against the pointy edge of the trunk lid.  By the time I get upstairs, blood is all down the side of my shirt and jeans, and I'm leaving a CSI crime scene trail of drops.  WTF??!! 

I go into the bathroom, look in the mirror and realize I have split my skin right on the elbow bone.  Even to me--the most doctor/hospital phobic creature on the planet--I can recognize this looks like at least two, possibly three stitches at the ER. 

Well, that isn't going to happen.

Digging through my Band-Aid container, I find some butterfly bandages.  I pull the two edges of the wound together and go back to unloading the car.

An hour or so later, the boys are playing and wrestling on my reading/lounge chair.  I really want to sit down with my glass of wine and read my book in an attempt to forget my throbbing thumb, the gnarly burn and the elbow split. I'm telling them it's time to move over and give me some room as I'm walking toward the chair.  Somehow I smash my big toe into the foot of the hassock.  Bloody hell!

I drop my book, barely hang on to the wine and stumble into the chair.  Blood is welling out of my toe.  Not the top, or the side, but the split right down the middle.  I hobble to the bathroom, stick my foot into the tub and try to understand what has just happened.  Bizarrely, I've apparently hit my toe in the perfect spot--dead center--and the impact has parted my frigging nail like the Red Sea.

More Band-Aids.

Wednesday.  It's hot, humid and the bird bath needs filling.  I drag the 300-lb hose up the slope, fill the bath, water a few plants and begin to make my way down the stone steps.  I get dive-bombed by a hornet, flail my arms around, miss a step, and land too close to the back of the riser on the next step, scraping my heel down the jagged rough stone.  Seriously.  This is totally fucked up.  And of course, I'm bleeding.  My heel looks like I've been attacked by a vicious cheese grater.  I hose myself off in the misguided hope that I can get upstairs to the damned Band-Aid box without leaving yet another blood trail.

The hose is heavy, unwieldy and difficult to maneuver even when I have all digits functioning.  It won't wrap around my holder, so I give it a tug, it begins to unfurl, I grab for it, hit the metal holder with my hand...and break off two fingernails at the quick.  Blood ensues.  I have a momentary surge of rage and shake my fist at the sky, yell several things that shall remain unwritten, toss down the hose in total disgust and hobble upstairs.

My Band-Aid supply is dwindling.  I don't have one big enough to cover my whole heel.  My finger tips begin to sting and throb from the ragged torn nails.  I might have shed a tear or two at this point because, hey, beyond ridiculous now, dear readers, and quickly moving toward total chaos.

Yesterday.  I'm not sleeping too well, what with all the throbbing and aching and such, but when I get up in the morning, it's cooler, there are thunderstorms and it might actually rain!  Course, it doesn't, but there's lots of lightning.  I stay off the computer, not only because I can't type with all the soreness and Band-Aids, but with the way things are going, I'll get struck by lightning.

I've made it to late afternoon, and after a multitude of errands and running all over town, I'm looking forward to a nice glass of vino and my book.  I sit in my reading/lounge chair, realize I don't have the remote for the television and slide out of the chair and across the hassock to get up.  I'm dropping my foot to the ground when I feel this sharp stab in my big toe--the other one--and look down in confusion as I see a long cut and...what else?...blood dripping onto the frigging carpet.

Off to the bathroom, open the Band-Aid container--I've just left it on the counter since Tuesday--and wash and bandage this odd papercut-type slice along the side of my toe.  Back at the chair, I can't for the life of me figure out what happened.  I've been sitting in this chair for over two years.  It's big and cushy and soft and wonderful.  There is nothing sharp anywhere.  I run my hand down the sides, along the seams, over and under the creases.

I find the tip of a nail sticking out between two folds in the base.  Of course I find it after I've cut myself.  I wrap my finger in a paper towel--second roll in less than a week--get the hammer, pound the weird nail into the chair and back I go to the bathroom for a bandage.

Today.  I've managed to make it all morning and into early afternoon without bleeding.  I've even gone on a nice limp hike down the valley to take some photos. It's still really difficult to type with most of my fingers wrapped, but I'm adjusting, and can only hope the curse is over now. 

Because I'm running out of Band-Aids...and blood.