On The Injured List

Saturday started off as a good day. After wishing the San Francisco dweling ex (Matt) a happy 31st birthday (you old man!), I showered up and headed over to my local spa to take them up on some of their services. In between my appointment and Desiree’s, I decided an iced coffee was in order.

Luckily there is a Dunkin’ Donuts three doors down from the day spa. I started making my way down the sidewalk, about to make my iced coffee dreams a reality, start crossing over an alley when I hear the brakes SCREEEEEEECH!

In the next 5 seconds, I looked up, triped forward, braced myself on the stopped car INCHES from my thigh. I had no idea what had just happened. I heard the woman driving yelling something at me, but the actual words were lost on me because it was that moment that I looked down. And saw my wound. The top layer of skin from the top of my left big tow had ripped and peeled back about an inch.

There was blood. And skin rippage. And grossness. And that’s the last thing that I remember. Because I have a weak stomach (understatement of the year) and because at that moment everything went bright white. and I stopped hearing things. I know I tried to call my mom, my sister, my dad on my cell to let someone – ANYONE – know where I was was so that I wouldn’t pass out and be left for dead in this alley.

About 15 minutes passed and I regained my composure .. enough to make it to the Dunkin Donuts and wipe the disgusting amounts of sweat off my body. And get my iced coffee.

I am nuts.

As soon as Des was done with her appointment, she took me home where her and our friend Ryan filled up the tub and so lovingly washed out my wound and even more loviningly poured Hydrogen Peroxide all over it.

My favorite part (you know, after all my screaming) was the fact that I noticed that someone had crossed out the “peroxide” and written “Ouch” in its place.

Yeah. That hurt.

But not as much as what I did later in the evening.

Oh yeah. Matt’s 31st birthday will go down as my unluckiest night of the year. Happy Birthday you old idiot.

Following in Hooker’s footsteps, my good pal Skip purchased a gorgeous motorcycle yesterday. He got home from work at about 10 last night so I ran out on the front lawn to see his new baby. He told me to get on and try her out.

Biggest mistake of the night.

I climbed on and FELT THE BURN.

My leg. Hit the HOT HOT HOT pipe on the side of the bike leaving a nice, pretty SECOND DEGREE BURN.

I iced and iced and iced. And then it blistered and the top layer of skin PEEEEELED OFF MY BODY.

Are you vomiting? Because I almost did. But I decided 5 beers and 3 shots of tequila were a better idea. (It really wasn’t).

The alcohol and ice somewhat numbed me of the pain. For a while. Until 4:07 am when all feeling came back and I ended up SOBBING uncontrollably at the horrible PAIN.

I took painkillers, slathered the wound in bacitracin, dressed it with gauze, and tried my best to go to sleep.

Walking hurt this morning. Showering was even less fun.

Now the pain is a little more under control (but uh, anyone got an vicodin for later?). But the burn area is probably the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Yes, worse than my disgusting big toe skin rippage.

The burn is about as wide as the bottom of a soda can and the center of it has all peeled off to the raw gross skin below it. And it’s all covered with a giant gauze bandage. I am so freaking hot right now.

The rest of the week I’ll get to show my wound off to all my fellow nerds at SIGGRAPH 2006. If you are going to be there and see me, come say hi – I’ll be the one toting the camera and press pass.