Burned out weekend

One of the many maintenance duties of a 100-year old house is taking care of the 60-year old boiler. That involves throwing a switch and emptying gallons upon gallons of steaming hot dirty water into buckets, walking them up from the basement and emptying them outside. This process usually repeats itself 10-12 times per cleaning.

This past Friday I was about halfway through the ritual when, as they say, disaster struck. I made it down the last step outside when the pendulous effect of the bucket kind of threw my equilibrium off. I lost my balance and hit the ground with nothing to break my fall but a bucket of 200 degree water.

Pain is not the word. First of all, it felt like I had broken every bone in my body. By the time I noticed my left hand, I was confused because there was smoke coming off of it. Pride kicked in and I got myself inside quickly. My right ankle felt as if it was connected to my body by fragile fibers of exploding of nerves. And my left hand was still smoldering. And now blistering and ballooning and turning black before my very eyes. It was then that I blacked out onto the kitchen floor.

I awoke in a pool of my own puke near my face and blood on my legs, and took what rudimentary first aid options I could. Finally the magic light bulb went off in my head and I called the two people closest to doctors/pharmacists I could think of: Chris and Jim. Jim was over within a half-an-hour with a few Vicodin. I should have gone to the emergency room, but readers of this blog know how I feel about hospitals.

I finally broke down and went to one of those doc-in-a-box places. After hearing the lecture about going to the hospital and the dangers of going into shock and choking to death on your own barf, the doc gave me an Rx for Silver Sulfadiazine. I went to the CVS to get it filled and was confronted with a line of about 10 people. I used my charm to cut right in front and had my silver stuff within 10 minutes. Now I have a Quasimodo hand, one Vicodin left and bragging rights on what is sure to be a wicked scar. Not bad for an otherwise boring weekend.