Some time ago I wrote about various accidental, "impossible" ways to injure myself.  Until the times at which they came to pass, none would have even occurred to me.  I had not given them any forethought, and if I had, I still would have believed them to be extremely low in their probability of occurrence.  I do not believe that I am accident prone.  That would imply that I had some character flaw or an unconscious need to punish myself for my past misdeeds.  I have no such need, as I usually get caught.  No, this is a stranger phenomenon.  Accidents actively pursue me, stealthily awaiting their chance for a sneak attack.  Although I am almost always on my guard, my finely attuned senses working overtime to ward off the inherent danger they pose, they sometimes slip past my carefully guarded perimeter and get me.

Such was the case as I gathered my bags of recyclables, garbage, and cat poop.  There seemed to be little danger in this act and it would be a good thing to have accomplished and done for the day.  The fact that I am a cheapskate thrifty, eco-conscious individual enters at this point.  I have almost never purchased garbage bags.  Why would one buy something with only the intent of throwing it away?  I re-use grocery bags as garbage bags.  Granted, they are somewhat smaller and not the most attractive waste containers available, but for the most part, they serve the purpose well.  I also fill Pepsi cartons with any paper to be recycled.  The point of all this explanation is that I end up carrying multiple small bags to the garbage receptacles rather than one or two, and that this is slightly more difficult to do.  I managed to get the majority of the bags, boxes, and contents to the proper receptacles, only losing a can or two along the way.  That was easy enough to correct.

OK.  We now have Doc at the scene of the great dumpster incident of the week.  There is one further element that needs to be known before this tale will make sense (this statement presumes that I ever make much sense, a possibly unjustified assumption on my part.)  I am very nearsighted and the eyeglasses I got about two years ago have gone through a slow but steady process of falling apart.  First the nose pads disintegrated and were replaced free by the unnamed eyeglass emporium.  Last year I was called by them to come in for my annual eye exam, which I did and to which I took the taped together pieces of their deluxe frames.  They repaired the right earpiece, which had simply fallen apart at the hinge, with a vaguely matching piece from the scrap bin.  It worked, but I was informed that I was not eligible for insurance benefits for frames or lenses until this summer.  OK, the sides didn't match, but they worked.  Since that time, the left side earpiece broke in exactly the same place and manner in which the right one had previously done.  My thought was that I could wait a month or so, while looking a bit foolish and nerdy, with the left earpiece simply taped together.  This worked to a less desirable degree than had the previous repair.  They are looser and have to be bent back into shape multiple times per day.  I let this go as I was awaiting an appointment with my ophthalmologic surgeon and felt it would be foolish to replace glasses which I would only have to re-replace in a month or so.

For some reason, unknown to me, I feel compelled to look into the dumpster to be certain that the recycling bags had landed in the general area toward which I had tossed them.  Large error in judgment there (or lack thereof.)  As I did this, the aforementioned loose, taped together, spectacles followed the bags into the dumpster.  As I contemplated this development I realized that the dumpster was too tall to simply step or reach into; that I couldn't see the very object that I needed to see to retrieve; and that there was absolutely no way to accomplish this without appearing to be as odd as I actually am to the neighbors.  The lowest point close to the search area was about 4.5 feet tall and I ended up (pun intended) bent over the side, feeling around for any item that might be eyeglasses.  The good news was that I found them in fairly short order.  The bad news was that the cracking noise I heard near my left shirt pocket, as I exited the green monster, was not the plastic pen that I had briefly hoped it might be.  It was some portion of my anatomy, presumably a rib, making the sound.  This guess was quickly confirmed as I engaged in one more foolish action.  I breathed. 

Anyway, the rib thing seems to be healing as long as I don't do anything to anger the offended skeletal member – like sneezing, coughing, or hiccupping.  The green beast needs to be taught a lesson, however, and I am contemplating something appropriately vengeful.  Three bags of cat poop just doesn't seem like enough.

Peace, Doc

Copyright © 2009, Thomas A. Blood, Ph.D.

“Sometimes accidents happen in life from which we have need of a little madness to extricate ourselves successfully” - François de la Rochefoucauld