Oct
10
Moral of the Story: Black Eye Edition
We interrupt this series on emotional marketing to tell you the story of why I have a black eye.
In our home, the child care responsibilities are fairly clearly divided. I won’t say they’re evenly divided — Jamie and the nanny do far more than I do — but the division is clear. I give him breakfast. Jamie gives him his nighttime snack. I do stories. Jamie does baths. Because we’re a little more right brain than most couples, it took us a few more years than most people to work this stuff out. But now that we’ve got it, it works pretty well.
Then there was yesterday.
In our house, Jamie gets up with the baby at night. Jack has allergies and skin problems, which means this happens several times a night. He goes in, they work their magic, they sing their songs or drink their beer or whatever, and they’re done. In the morning, I get Jack organized to go to the nanny while Jamie sleeps in. It is a good system. Everybody is pretty happy with it.
Last night, though, I went out for drinks with a local painter chick and got a painting in exchange for an hour of brainstorming, and since in this case “brainstorming” was actually a euphemism for “drinking wine and gossiping” I was feeling a little guilty. When I got home (around 10), Jamie said the baby had already been up three times, and the Bad Mama Juice was flowing.
(For those of you who don’t have children, Bad Mama Juice is a hormone like any other, and it’s release into your bloodstream is triggered by external events like crying babies and mothers who take their kids to Baby Music.)
He got the baby back down, but the seeds for BMJ meltdown had been sown.
Flash forward a couple of hours of messing around on Twitter and calling it “networking” and the baby’s up again. (Did I mention the wine? Because the wine is important to this story.)
This time, I’m going to help. I’m going to be a good mother and loving wife and deal with the baby myself.
I go in and murmur soothingly. I sing the 12 Days of Christmas. (This is because the only other lullaby I know is sung to the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic. It chronicles the tragic tale of an English gentleman who jumped out of a plane, having accidentally packed socks and underwear instead of a parachute. It replaces lines like “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord” with far more poignant ones like “They scraped him off the Tarmac like a lump of strawb’ry jam” and “Glory, glory what a hell of a way to die!” Jamie gives me a look when I sing that one, and remember, I’m trying to be a loving wife here.)
Anyway, Jack thinks it’s fucking Christmas because of a.) my choice of song and b.) the fact that I was the one to go and get him. I basically make a right bollocks of the whole proceeding and eventually and return him to bed, relatively unscathed.
Flash forward ten minutes and he’s up again. Why? Because I put him back to bed and as far as he’s concerned, he’s going to miss Santa.
Did I mention the wine?
Anyway, I do what any well adjusted young mother and businesswoman does. I burst into tears. I’ll spare you the details of exactly what was said, but Jamie said a bunch of very kind and sweet things which translate into, “Shut up and go to bed.”
I go back to bed, and bring the cat with me, because if they’re not with me they’ll scratch at the door and Jack will hear it and it will remind him that I exist and the whole thing will fall apart.
Good idea, except we have two cats.
I’m in bed with a pillow over my ears, Jamie’s trying to calm a crying baby, the other cat is scratching at the door. Jack hears, yells “Mama! Kittycat!” and that is enough for my poor wine-addled brain.
I get up. I’m not totally sure what I was planning to do in an upright position. It either involves waltzing in and taking over or kicking the cat until it dies.
I get up too fast.
I lose my balance. (Did I mention the wine?) I stand there with my arms stretched out in front of my, trying to find the door. I stumble towards where the door should be. I can’t find it, but I march on, undeterred. I am a woman with a mission!
And bam! I walk straight into the corner where the wall stops and the closet starts, leading with my eye. It starts to swell immediately. And I can’t even cry out because then Jack would really and truly know I was there, and I try not to scream “SHITASSMOTHERFUCKER GOOD GOD DAMN THAT HURTS!” when he’s around anyway. Because I’m classy like that.
And now I have a black eye. The first in my life. The kind you get when your husband has a mean right hook. And yes, I really did walk into a wall.
Moral of the Story: Trust the system.
If you have your own retarded story, feel free to stop by and leave it in the comments. I would like to spend some time thinking that other people are, in fact, just as dumb as I am. Oh, and happy Canadian Thanksgiving. I recommend giving thanks that you don’t have a black eye.
First, love the logo! Very cool. And hot…
Second, I don’t have any stories like that. I have never let the car down off of a jack onto my own leg. I have never looked the wrong way at the wrong moment, run into a curb and thrown myself over the handlebars of my motorcycle. And I certainly have never turned to watch a girl going down the stairs when I was in school, run into a part of the steel banister nearly knocking myself out and ended up in the emergency room
Nope, can’t say I have a story like that.
WTF! Comments!
I know from painful experience that if I go in at night, it’s, as you say, “fucking Christmas.” There is no way to explain to people under 4 the concept of “just this once.”
The black eye suits you, m’dear.
@ Michael — I’m so glad. Because somebody has to be the responsible grown up around here.
@ Sonia — Yes. I think it adds some credibility to my tough girl appeal.
So, this one time, at band camp…
Heh. Wasn’t in band, but I did have an encounter with a picnic table bench one dark, moonless night playing strip-tag (no, I don’t know whose idea it was) with some guys and gals back in high school.
That bench took a chunk out of my shin, including the tibia (fibula? the front bone anyway). Got infected. Bone-infected. Do you know how much THAT hurts? Wow, it twinges just thinking about it. Still have a scar 22 years later.
In junior high I flipped over one of those chairs with the desks attached while I was sitting in it. It was a shining moment in my tender developmental years. And I walk into door frames all the time. During the day.
OOH OOH! Table and chair and bench stories!! I love those. I stood up from my booth at a restaurant on homecoming weekend and my pants fell down in front of the whole football team. That was a fun one too.
First off, dood. Black eye sucks as much as christmas carols in october. Go to the health food/vitamin store and buy yourself a tube of Traumeel cream: homeopathic remedy that rocks for bruises (good for kid’s bruises and sprains too). Go. now. buy this cream. seriously.
When I was in grd 2 (age?) I was standing on the top of a picnic table, and my friend’s sister was going down a pulley that was rigged up to the house. She yelled she was coming down!! I saw her leap, clutching tightly to the pulley – and I froze solid. That is until she whizzed down and knocked me clear off the table.
After my brief moment of airtime, I landed in an awkward position, on my arm that was bent in at the wrist, thereby breaking it.
Best part was my friend begging me not to go tell my mom cause then we’d have to go home. Sigh. My stupid older brother had to walk me home and sympathy was not his strong suite. He just wanted me to stop bawling my eyes out.
In the end, a trip to the hospital, x-rays and a cast. I did something similar years later, but it involved a skateboard, my other wrist and this time, a blue cast. Sweet.
Traumeel. Go now. Bruise will heel in no time.
My retarded story?
9th grade, new town, new school, someone steals my bookbag as a prank and runs away with it, about 10 seconds ahead of me. I chase him down the halls and through the side doors until I meet him outside to put the beatdown on him.
Except the difference between us is that he opened the door before going through it. I neglected to notice the large glass door as I rounded the corner (new school and all) and went straight through the motherfucker.
He dropped the bookbag. I picked it up, tried to walk off like nothing happened, and got some stitches.
Pish. I can totally top a black eye.
Right now, as we speak, I have bruises up and down my biceps, a few green ones on my collarbones, some thumb-shaped ones on either side of my trachea, and a dandy little cut on my right nostril that curves out in an arc onto my cheek, making me look like I’m going to turn into a female version of Igor if I keep this shit up.
No, it’s not because my husband beats me, either. For one thing, I’d have to get me one of those. It’s because I willfully (and without booze to make me brave like Naomi needs) get my ass whomped twice a week at a Krav Maga class.
Only pansies need the wine, Naomi. Sack up.
Good God I don’t know why I fall for this whole “tell your story to make other people feel better” thing. At least it was dark and you had wine to blame. I got nadah.
I’m emptying the dishwash while spouse and off-spring are sitting at the bar in the kitchen. (Sidebar: Yeah, heaven forbid they be helping me empty the dishwasher.) You know how as you empty the dishwasher you just kinda start leaving cabinet doors open so you don’t have to open them again if you need to put something away…then you go through the kitchen when you’re done, shutting everything? Kinda like Vanna White on the Wheel of Fortune flipping the letters over (before the turned to digital tap screens!)? Well, half the uppers were all open and I put something away in a lower cabinet. When I stood I hit the corner of an open upper cabinet door with the crown of my head…insert *^&%#%@! into my vision and my mouth. Meanwhile, on the other side of the bar the entire family is getting a pretty good laugh. Goose eggs with dents in the middle are pretty cool – as long as you have hair to cover them. Can you put a hair piece over your eye!? :)
@Tei – I see your Krav Maga bruising and raise you performing live at an open air event in a park with double layering of blisters on both bare feet. ;)
As for retarded head injuries. I still have a ‘Harry Potter’ scar on my forehead from headbutting a bench when I was small enough for them to be head height! Blood everywhere so I’m told, personally I can’t remember a thing before I’m 4. Hmmm, wonder if they’re related…?
* start PC rant * Okay, we have to stop using the word retarded to mean stupid or unthinking. People with retardation actually think hard and thinking is hard for them. */end rant*
I hit myself in the head with my own laptop two days ago and gave myself a goose-egg. It shouldn’t be possible to do that, but I managed. I’d say I was spastic, except that people with spasmodic movements can’t help it and I don’t have that excuse.
@Lisa – oh! The shame! I didn’t catch myself that time. I will go and re-read http://thinkb4youspeak.com/ as penance.
When I was pregnant with the first set of boys, I was teaching full-time. I taught special ed: the “bad” kids were my specialty. Needless to say, the job required great amounts of energy, and being pregnant meant I was at a slight disadvantage on the energy scale. Ahem.
I got the inspired idea of making handmade gifts for all my friends and family at Christmas. This particular scheme involved a glue gun. I was up late at night trying to finish the gifts before school let out for the holidays. And I was tired. Did I mention that part?
Anyhow. I was working along just fine when I accidentally glued my own finger instead of the twig I was trying to attach to the floral arrangement. That was painful. Throwing down the glue gun, I brilliantly used my other hand to grab at the glue to get it off, successfully spreading super hot glue onto my other hand.
The glue on the first finger had already sealed itself to my skin, but I still managed to blister my other hand in the removal attempt. Hubby wanted to cut the glue off of me but I was not really impressed with that option. (It peeled off a day later after I slathered it with Neosporin and kept it bandaged.)
So there I was the next day, pathetically bandaged handing out my little offerings to friends. “Merry Christmas!”
Yeah. Haven’t used the glue gun much since then.
I gave *myself* whiplash once.
By drying my hair with a towel too fast (ever see that Sex in the City episode? Yeah, like that). I was naked, just out of the shower and could barely move. Then I had to wear one of those silly collars.
Very lame indeed.
I also whacked myself in the eye with a hot curling iron while doing my bangs (hey, it was the 80′s). My hair is trying to kill me.
Well, just last week, I was taking care of my sister’s kids and rushed out of bed when I realized I had overslept and smacked my foot into the bedframe, breaking my toe. That did not help me get the kids off to school in a timely manner.
And a real classic…the time in 7th grade that someone opened the big heavy soundproof band room door into my head. But the goose egg was hardly noticeable behind the fruit cup of ice that the school nurse taped to my head with masking tape. And I didn’t even really notice the melted water as it ran down my face because of the Tylenol 3s I took. When my friend offered them, I thought, Tylenol 3? Sure, I could use 3 times the normal amount of Tylenol. Didn’t know until later about the codeine part. ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzz. I think eventually my mom picked me up. I don’t remember much after that.
I used to run a bar, but quit about a year ago to go back to university. About three months after I quit, I met with the guy I used to run it with for a beer one afternoon, and about three hours (and four beers) later I found myself behind the bar, serving a room full of drunk students.
I fell on my ass twice, nearly broke my ankle, and made more tips in two hours than I did in any other bar shift I’d ever worked in that place.
Falling over can be profitable, you just need to do it with style.
“SHITASSMOTHERFUCKER” is my new favorite word (note to self… check domain availability…) We almost resorted to “just this once” last night when our 2 year old wouldn’t go to sleep in her own bed. Instead, all 3 of us had to climb into her toddler bed until she fell asleep. Did I mention I’m 6’2″ and her toddler bed is actually a crib with no rails? I’d gladly trade this neck pain for 2 black eyes at this point…
@Lisa
@James
But retarded actually means slowed-down, or delayed, so it kind of applies to these instances where our thought processes weren’t functioning at full speed…. (Not that I’m calling for lots of people to throw around a kind of ugly word… I’m just sayin’….)
@AmyL That’s why I only use a LOW-TEMP glue gun…. Ouch!
My stories:
Stupid head injury: I was eight or so, and excited that my cousins had come to visit. My dad said, “Go let them in!” so I turned to run to the front door, tripped over the phone cord, and fell face-first into my little sister’s rocking chair. The tip of the rocker hit at the corner of my eye; I’m just lucky I didn’t look to see what was happening! (Yes, I still have the scar.)
Baby-in-the-middle-of-the-night story: When I was 16, and my son was around 8 or 9 months old, I had a couple of friends over for a mini-sleepover. We stayed up too late, of course, and when he woke up in the wee hours, I was VERY groggy. He wouldn’t stop crying, and I was getting upset—until I finally woke up enough to realize that I’d picked him up upside-down! He quit crying almost immediately, once I turned him over. I’m 38 now, and I STILL feel terrible about it!
Well, at any given moment I have a bruise somewhere on my body from colliding with a wall/doorjam/piece of furniture. But it’s not particularly newsworthy. All of my interesting stories involve brawls.
ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Carole you win. I love that very much.
Naomi, you will now have the fun of everyone in grocery stores, the gym, etc. avoiding looking at you because they don’t want to deal with the fact that your husband is an evil brute who beats you. That happened to me when I got whacked in the eye with a baseball. (Memo to self, your depth perception blows, catch is not such a good idea.)
P.S. what is the DevilNaomi holding? Post-it? Condom? Handkerchief to let flutter at the feet of gallant Jamie?
@Sonia Do I win for my logic or my story? (Just wondering… either way is fine with me—I love winning!) :)
I’m a kid, playing hockey at on outdoor rink in a small town in Ontario. It was cold, really, really cold. There was a shack that we used as a drerssing / shivering room. It had a small wood stove.
In I come and the only seat is by the door. “I wonder why nobody is sitting there,” I thought to myself. “I guess it’s my lucky day.” And I sit down.
Well, the reason the space was empty became clear when the last shivering 12 year old came through and the door was allowed to close. The paint can filled with concrete used to keep the door shut decended wth some rapidity square onto the top of my head. Don’t recall much after that. Haven’t played much hockey since then either.
Moral of the story, if it’s too good to be true it probably is.
I have too many stories to choose from, so if this one doesn’t do it for ya’, let me know.
The one that comes to mind is my brother-in-law’s wedding. I spent weeks shopping for that perfect dress. My husband would be in a tux, as would my oldest son-I had to look good- for balance, definitely not for vanity. ;)
I ended up buying one of those “fit into a size smaller with spandex” thingies that sucks everything in and puts it all back where it belongs, and I topped it off with a cute little pair of strappy heels. BIG MISTAKE.
I was one of the last out of the church after the ceremony since I was videotaping. I got my heel stuck in the cobblestone at the TOP of the church steps and fell down 8 steps with the baby, camera, and my purse. I managed to protect the baby (and the camera) but I landed in front of my husband’s ENTIRE family with dress over boobs. They all saw my girls and my spandex covered derrière.
My husband came over to retrieve the baby and was laughing his head off. I got even with him by bleeding all over his truck on the way to the hospital to get my foot casted. I broke it in 4 places.
It was one of my finer moments
Ok, so…
A) It’s Thanksgiving in Canada? No wonder you’re singing Christmas carols already. Fuckin eh.
B) Don’t feel bad. My drunken father once left me in a bar and had no remorse about it the next day. Convincing a kid it’s Christmas and then abandoning him in his bad? Psht. That’s nothing. Tip: skip the wine, go straight to the vodka.
C) Baby wakes up at night? Drug him. Benadryl rules.
This message was not approved by the child welfare association. Please drive thru. Or, if you’re too drunk to drive, walk. Carefully.
Carole – You definitely win for the baby story.
This is why kids don’t remember much before 3 or 4. So they forget what we accidentally do to them. Not that I accidentally walked my sound a sleep baby directly into a closed door in a dark hall just last week. The nursery door is normally open but we started shutting it that night so our 3 year old wouldn’t walk in when trying to go potty at night. Thankfully I took most of the force.
Btw.. Naomi.. you aren’t the only one short on children’s songs. Shortly after my husband started doing bedtimes my 3 year old started singing:
98 bottles of beer on the wall
98 bottles of beer
Take one down, put it on the foot rest
98 bottles of beer on the wall
(And yes, It’s usually always 98 and we have no clue where the foot rest part came from… but she gets very upset if that’s not how it’s sung.)
Carole, it’s the baby story. Upside-down babies, always funny.
Jamie, you are reminding me of my friend Cruella, who was all dolled up in a latex dress one fine evening, only to have the dress simply explode. Turn into 1000 bits of balloon in an instant. I wish I had been there to see it, apparently it was quite an event.
@Sonia WHOA, an exploding dress is WAY better than running into things. You should have Cruella come in here and share that.
Last week I started working in a new department and during a fire drill on the first day of work I fell down the stairs in front of everyone.
PS. Work that black eye. Wear it like a “My name is Luka, I live on the second floor” badge.
About when I was 8, playing dodge ball, I had to chase a ball that whizzed passed everyone. My foot went in front of the ball when I caught up to it, and I managed to flip myself over to fall on my head. I remember learning the word “concussion” in the ER, but I don’t remember much else from that age or before.
I’ll spare all of the long details, but I once was so drunk, I fell asleep in a the bathroom at a clothing store to be woke up 2 hours after the store closed by a cop pointing a gun in my face….. LOTs and LOTs of southern comfort was involved :)
1, love the logo. 2. love the comments are back (for now). :)
Three hours or so after I say, “Oh my god, I’m so going to comment,” I realize that small children are the reason that I get nothing done on time in my life. Then, of course, I can’t remember a buggered thing by the time I get around to doing what I *wanted* to do.
Now I have something I *wanted* to do but *can’t* do because I have children, but I can’t blame the children, of course, so if the SPCA people don’t mind, I’m going to blame the cats.
Stupid moment in my life number one:
Getting up off the ground, dusting myself off, testing my wrist and saying, “Hm, no, doesn’t seem broken.” Then I get back up on the horse.
Stupid moment of my life number two:
Trying to drive a stick shift to the closest hospital (45 minutes) at midnight with a broken wrist. You can only do so much in a car trying to drive with your knees.
Stupid moment of my life number three:
Getting a call that my mother and my daughter have had a car accident, rushing out the door, hopping into my car, and proceeding exactly 35 feet before having my own car accident.
In college, drank too much (oh suprize)…somehow put my forefinger in the hole in the top of a pop can and it got stuck. Won’t come out and nobody can reason with the belligerant drunk to go to the ER to get it off. Eventually it did come off and I regained the full of my finger. No more Southern Comfort for me. Ever. Really.
It sounds like Southern Comfort is the reigning king of stupid shit here. I’ve never tried it. I probably should. You know. For research.
While I feel much, much better (about not being alone, not about the black eye, which is still black) I have to give an interim award to Carole the teenage mother with the upside down baby. We need prizes for this shit because honey, you win. That was absolutely delightful.
Thank you everyone else. If you hadn’t chimed in, I’d think it was only people who got pregnant in adolescence that did stupid shit in the middle of the night.
Uh, so I thought you weren’t accepting comments on this blog anymore…? Maybe there’s a deadline or maybe I’m not paying attention. Anyway, alcohol-story-wise, tonight I stopped by at a friend’s house in east Portland (I’m a west-sider, unlike your pal Havi) and surprise! Tequila night with his band buddies. So here I am at 1:45 AM, my wife and kids are long asleep, and I’m leaving my first comment on your blog. (And I’m typing pretty well , considering the tequilas.)
One thing: Life with kid(s) gets so much better for the next 10 years or so. I’ve got a 7-year-old daughter and 10-year-old son, and they’re both brilliant (how could they not be, genetics doing their thing?), considerate and cool, and yes, the first year or two were exhausting and tiring. But at 7 and 10 you have kids who have personalities of their own and they really have a feel for what their parent are all about, and they appreciate the differences. In other words, you will be a cool mother to them, just as you are, and their father will be cool in his own way, and it’s all beautiful. If one sings inappropriate song lyrics and one does dorky stuff that they love, they will understand that. It’s all good. They’ll even kiss your black eye when you do something human and stupid. And you’ll love them even more when that happens.
(Gotta go now and sleep off this tequila, which my friend informs me is the one alcoholic drink that acts as a stimulant and not a depressant. Point taken!)
@ Sonia, Guess you can’t cough or sneeze in a latex dress, huh? That’s too funny!
@ Carol I saw a baby t-shirt once that said, “This end up” with a big arrow, so you can’t be the only mom to hoist up the wrong end. :0
@ Naomi, I was just thinking, maybe you could get an eye patch and a wooden leg and just tell everyone you are a Halloween freak and like to celebrate all month long. You could dress Jack up as the parrot.
Sure beats wearing a steak on your head.
Naomi – OMG you had me on the floor also wondering if this was after you were on Ustream with MM the other night- lol
I can so relate to the Bad Mommy Hormone idea – took me back to my first child (I was so stressed trying to be perfect – my first mistake) When my son, ALex turns out to be a colic”y” baby and cries non-stop while we were all living in a hotel room while my husband was consulting – an obviously stressful situation to begin with. So I buy a baby swing and get him soothed with the rocking the first time and watch and see he’s going to fall asleep…feeling success is around the corner, I watch quietly,..when all of a sudden he does fall asleep and then BAM – he goes limp and his head slams into the tray in front of him on the swing. Now he is awake and screaming like crazy again. It seems comical now back then I wished someone would have warned me and told me to put a blanket or something soft on the tray. Why don’t the come with Ninja Parenting Instructions – I’d definitely buy the book :)
Hope you eye recovers soon!!
I love these stories, makes me not feel as much of a dufus as I really am. I have sooooo many but two that stick out in my mind.
I’m seven years old and think that it would be brilliant if I jump out of a 2nd story window with my bubble umbrella – because hey, Mary Poppins can fly….
2nd story – I auditioned for a lead in a musical and got it. Everyone hated me cuz I was the “new” girl and they were real shits to me so I thought I would go balls to the wall in rehearsals to “show them”. 2 nights before opening night I’m dancing my ass off while my understudy is glaring at me. I was paying a little too much attention to everyone else and danced right off the stage into the orchestra pit with everyone watching! Severly sprained my ankle but that bitchy understudy was not going to get my part so I went on anyway with support hose – lovely!
….don’t even get me started with my kids…my goal…is that they only need “minimal” therapy to deal with their parents!
You’re not alone. I am so proud of my new stylish wide-legged trousers which have sailed me blithely and professionally through 2 interviews in the last couple of weeks. What would stylishly offset them better than pointy-toed shoes? I feel like a foxy Marlene Dietrich style star trotting down the corridor in these. Until, that is, Fashion comes back and bites me, the pointy shoe catches the wide trouser leg and I go flying against the wall making the “yuuoink!” noise of astonishment usually only emitted by Ally McBeal or similar characters who act klutzy on screen. This was my real PROFESSIONAL life.
Good grief. In broad daylight I get ambushed my my own trousers. At least I wasn’t clutching a mug of tea at the time.
Sending sympathetic well wishes to all the other commenters…
Once, after a trip to the ER, I developed an infection in my arm where the IV had been. Red and hot, the crease of my arm swelled up so stiffly that I couldn’t bend my arm.
So, I went back to the ER and was sent home with antibiotics. The doctors told me to let the site stay uncovered and open to air to heal.
Only the infection was tenacious enough that it remained swollen-but-not-hot a day or so later, even after heavy-duty antibiotics.
I was bummed, so one of our cats, a 15lb Maine Coon, ambled up to comfort me.
I wondered if I should take a chance on kitty fur brushing the site. Surely, it was closed by now? So, I snuggled up with him and grooved on the “kitty love.”
Then he spotted the site on my arm. Before I could react, he sniffed at it and rocked back as if to say, “Aw, you’ve got a boo-boo.” And, before I could move away, he gave the wound a gentle lick.
I dumped him out of my lap to run for the Neosporin. I wondered how I would explain This One to my doctor? I hoped as I furiously dabbed the ointment that it would fight the kitty cooties certainly swimming through my bloodstream
The next day, the redness and swelling in my arm was gone. Did the antibiotic finally finish the job? Or did the kitty saliva have a natural antibiotic effect?
@Michael C – that’s why new schools are built on one level only. I was a freshman walking down the stairs, turned to look at couple of juniors having a lovers’ quarrel (living vicariously, I was), and slammed one of the heavy swinging doors into my eye. Had to get stitches – this was in the days before micro-surgery and rushing to a plastic surgeon for every injury. The colorless scar remains under my eyebrow today.
Bad part was, that evening I was the teen model in the Ladies Guild’s Fur Fashion Show, featuring makeup by Max Merrill, the town’s boutiquey make-up guy. My doctor would not allow eye makeup on that eye. Mr. Max had a hissy fit, and proceeded to heavily makeup the other eye anyway. Maybe THAT’S why I’ve been a bit unbalanced ever since . . .
(Heal quickly, Natalie!)
You really made me laugh. So you’ve learnt, being a mother is not as safe as we generally think. Happy Thanksgiving for all of you there. We don’t celebrate thanksgiving in Argentina that’s why we are looking forward to Christmas
Get well soon
Patricia
You really made me laugh. So you’ve learnt, being a mother is not as safe as we generally think. Happy Thanksgiving for all of you there. We don’t celebrate thanksgiving in Argentina that’s why we are looking forward to Christmas. Nice picture you have up there.
Get well soon
Patricia
Nice story! I won’t share my black eye stories……some things are better left unsaid, especially incriminating things….nevermind :)
Very funny! I too am a fan of late-night alcohol-induced mishaps….keep us posted on any new ones you may have!
This story was great for two reasons;
1. It reminded me of the first black eye that I’d received, mistakingly but funny nonetheless. Lets just say a healthy serving of spiked eggnog and shadowboxing trying to teach your nephew what NOT to do when boxing is a certain recipe for pain.
2. The 1st time firing a rifle with a scope/sight not properly adjusted. (And there was no alcohol to initially numb the pain so you know this one hurt, BAD!).
I believe being able to relate the a story makes it that much better especially it makes you relive something that you hadn’t thought about in years. Kinda nostalgic and magical all at the same time.
I’ll definitely be coming back for more of this great stuff.
Coolest Regards,
Idris
Happy Thanksgiving! So sorry to hear about your little adventure. I fell down the stairs a couple weeks ago being dumb and sprained my foot. No wine involved on my part, just morning sleepiness. We can compare our bruises!
I don’t have a black eye story but I have the story of how my partner got a black eye.
It starts with a dodgy can opener that left half the lid on so I had to bend it back to get the dog food out. I head downstairs and scoop out the dog food into the bowl then put the can down to pat the dog. So when the very large dog jumps up on me and I have to take a step to keep my balance it is perfectly placed to very neatly slice my big toe clean off at the joint as I step on the tin. (Don’t worry the black eye part is coming).
I yell up to my partner, that I’ve cut my toe off and all he can say is come on up so he can take a look at it. I manage to hop upstairs, toe in one hand blood spurting everywhere he takes one look at the mess and passes out hitting his head on the table. I finally managed to call my Father who has a lot of first aid knowledge and he drives around to find me sitting with my foot in the bath so I don’t stain the carpet with blood and my partner waking up groggily in the kitchen with an amazing black eye.
Morale of this story, buy a good tin opener and have small dogs and if your partner says they have cut off their toe. . chances are they have cut off their toe.
Oh and in case you are wondering I had some amazing doctors and they managed to sew the toe back on and it works just fine.
To Jack. I hear you kid. I was born with a milk allergy and (probably a bazillion other food allergies). I heard that I nearly killed my parents with crying…..but honestly, they never really fixed things for me….so they fucking deserved it. Blah, blah, Doctors, blah, blah – this cream, that cream, she’ll grow out of it. Yeah, right. Uh, let’s see, it wasn’t until I was 34, I finally figured it all out on my own – I could eat rice and beans and a few specific fruit and veg (none with a certain protein though, no avocados or bananas, but seaweed works, oh well….you get it) – that’s about it – every other food on the planet had it out for me and my skin. Scream away little dude – I hear your pain.
Just when I thought the comments were slowing down, the cut off toe story almost killed me. Here’s mine:
New job – new office – trying to look very important. Very Important People are In My New Office. Phone rings. I reach over and pick it up without breaking eye contact with the Very Important People. I bring the headset up to my face, again without looking and perhaps a tad too fast.
I pummeled myself in the face with the phone.
Not gently, mind you. I had to turn away from the Very Important People to hide the fact that I had teared up from the force of the strike to my face. And, of course, to allow them time to crack up as silently as possible.
Jesus, you poor thing. That sucks, but in fairness it was all in the interest of being a good Mom, right? That’s noble or something, right? :P I think most of us can relate to BMJ (love that term btw!) and have similar, albeit not quite so physically painful stories!
I had bruises all over me when I got my wisdom teeth out. I still lived in the US at the time and a large African-American woman started giving me shit at Walmart. “Honey, you need to leave that man” kind of stuff… didn’t believe me when I told her it was just wisdom teeth! *sigh*
New logo is brill! :)
@ Sundi- I’ve also done the bang-head-into-open-upper-cabinet-door-while-emptying-the-dishwasher thing. Sadly, I’ve done it more times than I’d like to admit. (Yeah, I have trouble learning from mistakes sometimes. I have very decorative dents on my hairline, though!)
I don’t have a black eye story, but I do have a pretty good “stupidly injured myself as a child” story. I was 11, and my dad and stepmom’s house had a wide stone porch railing. So wide you could stand on it, and as I was the tallest child at the time, I could stand on it and just barely reach the roof of the house. Dad saw me doing it one time and warned me not to grab the roof because I’d get hurt.
Fast forward a few weeks. My stepsister is on the sidewalk with her friend, playing with sidewalk chalk, when I come out and stand on the porch railing and reach up to touch the roof. My stepsister sees me and yells, “I triple-dog dare you to grab it!”
As you well know, you DO NOT turn down a triple-dog dare. I figured I could grab on, and if I fell, I’d just fall a couple of feet straight down. So, I jumped up and grabbed the side of the roof.
A few things I learned over the next 45 nanoseconds:
1) When a roof does not have a gutter attached, the shingles tend to curve under. Since the roof is already angled down, you actually have no handhold.
2) When you slip off something like that, you do not fall straight down. You fall backwards.
3) When you fall, your instinct is to break your fall with your hands. When your hands are above you and the ground is below you, that means that you must turn around in midair.
4) Nine feet is not enough time for you to turn completely around in midair.
5) When it comes to ribs vs. wrist vs. ground, your wrist will lose.
Hairline fracture, trip to the ER, splint for six weeks on my writing hand, and two morals to the story: 1) Never do anything your stepsister dares you to do, and 2) Father knows best.
Okay, I’ve have just tripped on my way to get tissues for the tears rolling down my cheeks (some from laughter, others from sympathy.) Sorry about your black eye, Naomi.
I can list a dozen similar injuries incurred while child-rearing, working from home and imbibing for sanity’s sake. (I use to lock myself in the kitchen to fix dinner “uninterrupted”, sit on the kitchen floor and drink wine straight from the bottle.) I didn’t think of the networking aspect or I would have invited friends over to join me. Ah, those were the days.
I was a single mother raising two small boys when our family motto emerged: “Well, when you’re dumb you gotta be tough”.
Obviously it still applies. Going to look for an ice pack for the throbbing toe now…
Age 6. Watched Daddy chopping wood with an axe. Decided that the little tomahawk-sized axe would work for me. Sliced half my left index finger off… Learned that chopping wood is nowhere near as easy as it seems from a distance.
Age about 9. Dared younger sister (7) to slide down the metal playground slide standing up on her bare feet. She does. She falls just near the bottom on to the concrete setting the slide into the playground sand and breaks her arm. I’m in deep do-do…
About 2 years ago. Taking escalator up to airline lounge in full view of those who don’t have access to the lounge. Toe of sandals trip on edge of a step. Fall UP the escalator trying to save laptop from damage and find that the escalator teeth dig really deep into bare shins. And it hurts. Bad. Nice airline attendant put oxygen on the wound to ‘help it heal quicker’. It worked too! Still have the scar.