Slow Motion

It snowed last night. When Attila left for work this morning, only a few inches of snow covered the end of the driveway. When I attempted to get out of the driveway, a few hours later, the plow had gone by and there was a two foot high, packed, snow bank at the end of the driveway.

It took me forty five minutes to clean the snow off Tank, and to shovel the driveway. I didn’t feel particularly tired, as I had not rushed through it, having only half loaded the snow shovel before lifting it to throw the snow to the side of the drive.

I got Tank out and did my errand. The errand did not go well, I had forgotten documents that were needed. I will say the clerk was amazing, patient, and she managed to find workarounds for some of the stuff, so that I didn’t have to go home again to look for documents. I will have to return again to complete the process though, with the proper documents.

When I arrived back home I decided to clear the snow off Iris the trailer, and shovel the rest of the driveway. That took another forty five minutes, lots of shoveling around tires and fiddly bits.

Back in the house, it was time to consider food. I decided on squash for dinner, and so needed to fetch some from the freezer in the basement. After getting down the stairs, my right foot dragged and caught a small rug on the floor. Down I went.

I experienced this fall in slow motion, falling to my bad knee before falling further, and skidding along the concrete floor on my face. My glasses took part of the impact, they went flying. I thought the fall was complete when I hit my knee, and was extremely surprised that my body just kept going, and was almost amused, but not quite, that I slid along on my face.

For a few moments I stayed down, taking in what had happened. Then I attempted to get up. After trying to brush the hair out of my eyes with my left hand, I reached for balance on the cooler, full of winter squash, that sat near me. My hand slid. My first thought was that the squash were going bad and were slimy. When I got to my feet something was dripping from my face, I was bleeding, my left hand was covered with blood.

I retrieved my glasses, put them on, walked over the freezer, leaving a trail of bloody drips, fetched my squash, and headed up the stairs.

After setting the squash on the counter, I got a paper towel from the rack and staunched the wound on my face. I am pretty scratched up just above my right eye and down a bit on the right side of my face. I put ice on it, and am hoping it doesn’t swell. It looks like it might go black and blue.

The right lens of my glasses are badly scratched, but I can still see out of them. It is another year before the health plan will fund a new pair of glasses, so I will be reminded of this fall for a while!

My knee is badly bruised, and “skinned”. At this point the only pain is from the “skinned” area of the knee. It seems to be functioning just fine.

I have applied hydrogen peroxide to all open wounds, and a bandage to my knee.

I guess I was more physically tired after snow shoveling than I realized.

This getting old stuff takes a little getting used to. If I don’t pay attention to it, it will pay attention to me.

I won’t be taking a nap today.

Worldly

Weather

-2°C
Date: 12:00 PM EST Thursday 3 January 2019
Condition: Mostly Cloudy
Pressure: 101.4 kPa
Tendency: Falling
Temperature: -2.2°C
Dew point: -4.6°C
Humidity: 84%
Wind: WSW 9 km/h
Wind Chill: -6
Visibility: 24 km

Quote

“The pride of youth is in strength and beauty, the pride of old age is in discretion.”
Democritus
460 BC – 370 BC