Panic stations

[shewhomust]

I wole up this morning feeling reasonably on top of the Christmas preparations: not ready, of course, never that, but we had done the food shopping (bar the turkey, which has to be collected tomorrow), we had written all the cards, and durham_rambler had delivered the local ones in person, there was a bowlful of dried fruit macerating for the cake, we were making progress. Today I would finish off a website task, clean the sitting room so that we could erect the tree and decorate it, and maybe make the beds for our Christmas Day guests, or wrap a last few gifts...

I wasn't even unduly fazed when durham_rambler announced that the car had a flat tyre, and while he took it to be repaired, would I look at this draft letter to a prospective client? It would be good to get that letter out before Christmas, wouldn't it?

But when I tidied away that site update, and went downstairs to start on the tidying up operations, I was interrupted by a cry from the kitchen, where durham_rambler was attempting to whittle down the trunk of the tree so it would fit the stand. I should have known better than to let him play with the stanley knife: he had cut his wrist, and there was blood all over the place. I'll say straight away that although we called the emergency services, it is not a large cut, he has not lost a significant amount of blood (from the questions we were asked repeatedly, I would define a significant amount as a teacup full) and no emergency vehicles were involved. A kind neighbour delivered him to A & E at the local hospital, where they put a stitch in the wound and a clean sticky plaster over it, and collected him afterwards. None of this was pleasant, but none of it is life-threatening.

Inconvenient, though, it's certainly that. Add to the tasks I didn't accomplish because of this distraction the clearing up the accident itself made necessary, and the things which durham_rambler won't feel able to do, and I now don't see how everything is to be done in the time available. No doubt there's something I could be doing, even at this hour, but I don't intend to. I'm going to bed.

Have a picture, as a counterpoint to sovay's lovely tree-trimming post:

Comments

[durham-rambler.livejournal.com]

Thank you everybody for your thoughts (except desperance who sees story opportunities in everything). I thought initially that I had cut a vein but from the questions from the emergency telephonist (Have you lost a cupful of blood?) it turned out not to be as serious. My own stupid fault: children, always cut away from yourself.

And my trip to A&E proved a lot less troublesome than it might have been: no discernible drunks and I was seen and stitched up in not much more than an hour. And all, I will add for the benefit of anybody who doubts the value of a National Health Service, at no cost at all, except a bottle of wine donated as a thank-you gift to the neighbour who ran me to the hospital and collected me when the work was done.

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

Thank you for that update. Saves me running about screaming 'and THEN what happened???'.

And now you can truly say that this was the Christmas that you had to get bloodstains out of the carpet. Assuming that this is the first time. ;-/

SO GLAD THAT YOU ARE OK.

[cellio]

Ouch. Glad it wasn't worse!