Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Physical Comedy or why I can't type with my right hand

During the World Cup continuous party one of my friends broke one of my window panes. Since I will be leaving town soon for a month, I wasn't able to procrastinate this anymore, and was today in the process of fixing it.

I was pulling out one of the last pieces of glass when the phone rang. Being right next to that window, it scared the shit out of me; my right hand jerked and I cut my middle finger. The knuckle was flapping around open, and I could see my bone. Being stupid like I am, I ran to my computer to google what to do. Would a bandaid work? The phone kept ringing, and I was bleeding all over the place (fingers bleed so much), so I forgot about by computer and decided to pick it up.

It was my advisor, who started talking about a meeting. I tried to explain how this was a bad moment, and he just kept going and going. I wrapped my bloody finger in paper towels and told him that I was bleeding and had to go to the doctor and this was a bad time for me to talk to him. I hung up, and decided that since this flappy knuckle would be hard to bandaid, and the bone caused me a bad impression, maybe I should go to the doc.

I ran (yes, ran) to the University Health Center, 5 minutes away from my house, where a nurse saw me sweaty, with a finger wrapped in bloody papertowels. They let me in, take my blood pressure and temperature.

"Your blood pressure its a bit high. Do you suffer from hypertension?"
"I just saw my middle finger's bone and then ran here while holding it up in the air."
"That might have something to do with it."


Before they look at my finger, Nurse1 explains how, since I'm not registered for the summer, it will cost me some money. Sure, whatever. Fine. And also this money here and there. Sure, fine. And also there might be some future visit charges so I should...

"Look, fine, I'll pay it all. Can we get to fixing my finger since I can't sign any of that with my bloody hand until you do anyway?"

They get a doctor to see me, she wants to stich me up, but I explain how I will be travelling soon, and I will not be here for she to take them out. She looks at the flap more carefully, and observes that there is probably part of it still hanging of the window. She proposes to use some super-glue like liquid stiches, and gets to it.

"You were lucky. The bone stopped it and you didn't cut any ligaments or muscles"

I am a lucky bastard.

Doctor leaves, and Nurse2 comes in. It turns out I haven't had a tetanus shot in 12 years, and I need one, so I need to fill out a questionare and sign some more waivers.

"Do I really need to fill up this questionare now?"
"Yes."
"Can it wait until the super-glue dries, so I can use my right hand?"
"I can't give you the shot until you fill out the questionare and sign it."


I fill out a whole questionare with my left hand, signature, signature, signature and I get the tetanus shot.

"It might hurt like you got kicked in the shoulder."

Then Nurse3 and Nurse4 come in to wrap my finger and make a little cast to immovilize the joint. They ask me about the cut, and laughed out loud at the picture of me talking on the phone while bleeding. Nurse4 leaves, and Nurse3 explains how this cast might come off, and how I should fix it if it happens.

"You can find the bandages you will need in the pharmacy." she says as she palms some bandages and says "hide this in your pocket."

What a nice lady.

I paid some money and went home. There I cleaned the blood, it wasn't too bad. I luckly bleed mostly on the junk mail.

The Doc was right. There was a little piece of knuckle in the last reminding piece of glass in the window.

No comments: