Knives Are Bad

This one is going to be decidedly un-food related. In fact, it might be plain disgusting. You've been warned.

Of course, now that you've been warned there is no way you are going to stop reading, is there?

Last Sunday my wife and I were busy all day long, so when dinner time came we decided to just throw a couple gardenburgers in the toaster oven and call it good. Nope, it's not all glitz and glamor in my diet - sometimes it's just about not being hungry, know what I mean?

Okay, so I suppose the premise for this piece is somewhat food-related.

So I grabbed the gardenburger box out of the freezer and opened it up, finding the two patties were frozen solid. Credit Boca for packaging their patties individually - might have avoided this whole thing if they didn't taste like crap.

I couldn't pry them apart with my fingers, so I looked around for something to use. Right next to me was a steak knife that had been used earlier in the day to cut something, no idea now what. So I pick up the knife and get ready to jam it between the patties.

It's very odd - I swear I was looking at this scene almost third person and thinking this is in no way a good idea, but at the same time I couldn't really stop myself. That ever happen to you?

So I jam the knife between the patties. Did it work? Oh yeah it did. Our knives are pretty much brand new - just like this, but black. Curse Sur La Table for having great sales and free shipping...I think I dropped about $200 to them because of that this spring, this steak knife set being one of them.

The knives are still really damn sharp, owing to the fact we don't actually eat a lot of steak.

So the burgers flew apart and the next thing I knew the knife was sticking into the pinkie of my left hand, on the ring finger side of the top digit. I don't necessarily remember pain, but the blossoming of blood made it quite evident what had happened. Apparently the burgers and knife ended up in the sink, although I don't remember dropping either one. I was working over the sink like a good boy not wanting to make a mess, so lucky me all the blood went down the drain too.

I knew it was bad, but I didn't really know how bad. Wifey is freaking out because she heard me swearing and came over. I'm starting to freak out because the blood isn't slowing down under the cold water. She started freaking out a bit more when I told here this seemed to me like a hospital thing, and of course since it's Sunday evening that means ER because none of the Urgent Care facilities are open.

At this point I'm still hoping it stops bleeding under the cold water, but that's not happening. In my infinite wisdom I decided to see if I could see how bad the wound was so I looked at it from different angles. In one of them I could see something white inside my finger...I'm guessing that was muscle, but I have no idea.

Right about this point I start getting all flushed and dizzy, although it must have been shock instead of blood loss because seriously, it was really only a half inch cut. Still, blood all over the place is not a pretty picture.

We got it wrapped up amateurly with some gauze and tape, got the dog put away, and then I told Wifey she had to drive. However, by the time I sat in the car I was clear headed enough, which was nice.

So we get to the ER, find a parking spot - who knew it would be full on a Sunday night after the 4th?! - and checked in. Since I wasn't obviously dying it took about two hours to actually see the doctor - yep, we made copious jokes about this. By that time the bleeding had stopped and they determined no stitches were necessary.

Obviously I was feeling better. I was really just hungry because, well, I never got my dinner.

The end result was a five minute iodine soak, some gauze and tape, and a tetanus/whooping cough booster shot because who knows when the last one was.

All of this has cost me at least my $75 co-pay and who knows however much else. Since they didn't do anything I'm hoping not much, but you never know.

A couple days of days later I was reflecting, and I realized that the only thing that must have stopped the razor sharp knife was the bone in my finger. If it hadn't of hit the bone, the mess might have been a whole heck of a lot worse. Yikes.

So why did I have to tell this story? Well, I was thinking it might make for good fodder for a future short story, or a scene in a novel, and I didn't want to lose the feelings or observations about it I was having.

I warned you. :)