Stories: Injuries
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I've been a dedicated cyclist for many years with no incidents, but last year I took a solid left-side fall and broke my collarbone. That is a very painful injury, which left me with a niggling shoulder ache that only 10 mins under a hot shower can relieve.
Then this year - a dive over a car bonnet, hand outstretched... and I drove my left ring finger straight into the road. That pushed the two end joints back past the first joint, which ripped open the flesh and popped out sideways. Seven weeks later and I still have no feeling up one side and on the tip of the finger, and I can't really make a fist.
Then there's 30 years of skiing - dislocated shoulders, sprained thumbs, and a really fun day side-slipping down the Fox Glacier with a big pack on, trying not to use a ruptured ankle.
Maybe I'm accident prone? Or are these just the price of being active?
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I can't even be bothered starting on my concussions, but just remembered another good one.
Home Knitting Machines. Which possess a really nifty thing that you slide across a row of sharp needles, making a cool sound. Well I fell of the cheer, and caught my ear on said row of sharp needles. Apparently it took both my parents to hold me down for the stitches.
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No offence Llew, but at the next Wellingtonista meet up I'm going to sit away from you, you sound like bad luck! :)
RE: Cats.
Just yesterday my cat Jedi (what!?) managed to slice me half a centimetre deep UNDER my thumbnail! -
I recall having had arthroscopic surgery on both knees at once following a series of sporting injuries.
Leaving the hospital, walking extremely stiff-legged with the aid of crutches, was just fine and dandy. Lying prone in the rear seat of the car while Pip drove me home was also without problem.
It was as we started descending the 74 steps to our then Northland flat that things started to get a bit wobbly.
An excruciatingly slow descent all turned to complete custard when our cat (Stanley RIP) darted out from behind a neighbours flat in full attack mode aiming at my crutches.
The shock made me miss the step with my crutch, and after what seemed like minutes of me stupidly windmilling my arms in a vain attempt to regain balance, I was forced to launch myself down the stairs stiff-legged and head first in an attempt to have the top half of my body break my fall rather than my poor old knees.
Some hours later, Pip described it, wiping tears of laughter from her eyes, as one of the funniest pieces of inadvertent physical comedy she had ever seen.
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Well, it's Mayday innit so a workplace story.
It happened in a winery before I started work there. They had large underground tanks that had concrete walls lined with candle type wax. Every so often they had to scrape off the wax using a blowtorch and one year the job went to the newest worker who was the nephew of the cellar supervisor thus fueling "he only got the job...etc" tales.
So this guy was in the underground tank with a gas cylinder and blowtorch when smoko time came around and off he went. Of course he didn't turn off the cylinder properly and the tank filled with gas whilst he was away.
He came back with a cigarette and climbed down into the tank. Apparently his flight out of the top of the tank was spectacular and scary, but doomed to obey gravity leaving him in a crumpled, singed heap.
He recovered quickly and was very little the worse for wear apparently but the bit of the story that always appeals to me is that as he was being loaded into the ambulance he looked at his fellow workers and said "I know which one of you bastards set me up and you'll pay for this". -
I realise this is a forum for personal stories, but I can't resist, having just read it myself, the fantastic story of Anatoli Bugorski's accident...
As a researcher at the Institute for High Energy Physics in Protvino, Bugorski used to work with the largest Soviet particle accelerator, the Synchrotron U-70. On July 13, 1978, Bugorski was checking a malfunctioning piece of equipment when an accident occurred due to failed safety mechanisms. Bugorski was leaning over the piece of equipment when he stuck his head in the part through which the proton beam was running. Reportedly, he saw a flash "brighter than a thousand suns", but did not feel any pain. The beam measured about 2000 gray when it entered Bugorski's skull, and about 3000 gray when it exited after colliding with the inside of his head.
Yes! He put his head into a functioning particle accelerator! Brilliant!
The left half of Bugorski's face swelled up beyond recognition, and over the next several days started peeling off, showing the path that the proton beam (moving near the speed of light) had burned through parts of his face, his bone, and the brain tissue underneath. As it was believed that about 5 to 6 grays is enough to kill a person, Bugorski was taken to a clinic in Moscow where the doctors could observe his expected demise. However, Bugorski survived and even completed his Ph.D.. There was virtually no damage to his intellectual capacity, but the fatigue of mental work increased markedly. Bugroski completely lost hearing in the left ear and only a constant, unpleasant internal noise remained. The left half of his face was frozen, due to the destruction of nerves, and does not age. He is able to function perfectly well, save the fact that he has occasional petit mal seizures and very occasional grand mal seizures.
Unfortunately, there was no hint of any superpowers. Which is a pity, because that's what I'd expect if I stuck my head in a particle accelerator.
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mmm, head in particle accelerator. that reminds of this example of high tech accidents.
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Unfortunately, there was no hint of any superpowers.
What??!! So we're being deceived about all this.
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What??!! So we're being deceived about all this.
Indeed. When I was reading the article, and it started to say "The left half of Bugorski's face swelled up beyond recognition..." I was thinking it's definitely Two-Face meets Radioactive Man time.
But no. Just deafness and epilepsy. What a gyp.
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Maybe one has to have an insect vector that gets the radiation and then bites one after the insect enzymes have modified the particle accelerator products. I'm just winging it here because I am as perplexed as anyone as to the lack of superpowers.
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What a gyp.
Well I suppose should a vacancy for Phantom of the Laboratory come up....
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My grandfather at 92 years old, determined to chainsaw an inconvenient branch from a tree.
My brother and I, sixty years his junior, attempting to convince a Hokitika born, WW2 veteran who had made a career designing dams, bridges and railways that it was a little dangerous for a man of his advanced years to perch on a ladder, revving said chainsaw.
The branch, well cut, falls onto the snarling chainsaw, which then opens a nice 8 inch gash on Grandad's forearm.
Our horror and guilt; his stoic bravery; masses of stitches and the wonder of the body's healing power.
He lived another 7 years, the finest man I have ever known. -
Heh, Okay, my partner may not thank me for this... He has a huge scar on his upper right arm where he put a concrete drill through it. He's right-handed, the drill was in his right hand.
Good news? He did it in a hospital. Bad news? He did it in the fertility dept.
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Or perhaps he could just get himself a shovel (that one's for Hadyn).
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Hah! I suddenly recollect that my best friend's older sister shot me with an airgun.
I was too shy at the time to appreciate that that probably meant she fancied me. :)
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"....where he put a concrete drill through it. He's right-handed, the drill was in his right hand. "
Emma - I'm still trying to work this one out :)
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I was too shy at the time to appreciate that that probably meant she fancied me. :)
That sort of attack the target of your affections is usually more of a guy thing innit?
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That sort of attack the target of your affections is usually more of a guy thing innit?
Maybe - she was a tomboy & showing off in this instance "Hold that lemon up, I bet I can shoot it without shooting you."
The "guy" thing came then... "OK".
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Besides, to doubt now that she fancied me then, would contradict several decades of delusion. She DID. OK?
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I normally just lurk around here, but this conversation is pretty inspiring, especially since I'm pretty sure they were going to name the new A&E wing at Wellington hospital after my brothers and I. Most ridiculous injury, of oh so many? At a friends birthday party I'd imbibed a little too much - so far so normal. Also, as per normal, I was busting some big old moves on the dance floor (yes, I'm one of those twits) to Aha. Unfortunately, I was wearing a pair of clod-hoppery like shoes that seemed cool at the time and added another inch or two to my height. What they also provided was that extra bit of leverage, so that when I went down on my knees during the "TAAAAAKE MEEEE OOOONNNNNNN" highlight, my knee wasn't up to the task.
POP.
Ow.
Quick trip down the 'ole After Hours where I as diagnosed as having pulled a muscle or something. Given some pain-killers and sent on my way. Turns out I'd actually torn the back off my kneecap and dislocated the damn thing.
I can never really listen to Aha anymore without wincing a little.
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Heh, Okay, my partner may not thank me for this... He has a huge scar on his upper right arm where he put a concrete drill through it. He's right-handed, the drill was in his right hand.
Good news? He did it in a hospital. Bad news? He did it in the fertility dept.
Reading this has given me cognitive dissonance. Help.
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Help
Sounds like the sort of sleight of hand that would be hard to explain without a slow motion replay.
But yes, I'm wondering if the fertility clininc is a red herring :)
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"....where he put a concrete drill through it. He's right-handed, the drill was in his right hand. "
Emma - I'm still trying to work this one out :)
Yeah, me too. And I wish I could say 'ha, it's because he is delightfully flexible'...
Apparently it involves sticking your arm up through a manhole into a ceiling, then drilling down through that ceiling towards your body. I STILL don't understand how it works.
Still, apparently watching chunks of your flesh twisted around a drill bit while you're in shock is fascinating.
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3410,
I can never really listen to Aha anymore without wincing a little.
Who can?
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OK, where to begin? I am the most accident prone person I know, but one early highlight involves my 2 year old self.
My parents were away overseas, leaving me in the care of my two lovely grandmothers, staying in the good'ol Waipu Cove camping ground. Whilst the nanas were busy shelling pipis, I was clambering around the place trying to get a better view. The deck chair I climbed onto was one of those old aluminium and netting jobs, and as I kneeled on the seat and leaned over the back of it, it gave out.
The deck chair collapsed, and I fell face first onto the fin of a large malibu surfboard protruding from under the caravan. My horrified grandmas tell of having to extract me from the wreckage of the deckchair, whilst symultaneously trying to extract the surfboard fin from my nose, which it had rather effectively pierced.
The scar is with me still, but it is only one of very many...
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