shewhomust | Panic stations

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: