No more unsupervised home improvements

This weekend there is a possible plan to proceed with some home improvements. Based on previous projects involving power tools, normal tools, and my skin...there is a very good chance of injury. Thinking about the possibility of another emergency room visit, I thought that I could detail my life and the injuries that I have inflicted upon myself.

As a child I was a tad top heavy...well...heavy all over during my toddler years. I tended to fall a lot. I have had quite an amount of needles sewing up gashes in my skull. One that I remember well was the "run home quickly" fall. I can still see the threshold of the door racing at my face immediately after tripping on the cement stair. I can call to mind the images of the needle approaching my forehead to sew up yet another open wound on my cranium.

There were plenty of other injuries. I have had a gravel pit worth of rocks embedded in my hands. I still have a black spot on my leg from another incident. I was in school and tossed my backpack on the desk. For some strange reason it stopped sliding across the desk. I decided that a forceful nudge with my leg would solve the issue. Sadly, the eraser on a pencil under a book was wedged against the edge of the desk. The other end of the pencil...the really pointy side...was at the bottom of the backpack patiently awaiting my leg. Not sure how far it embedded into my flesh, but far enough to leave a graphite tattoo.

Over the years I was able to smash my finger between a box of liquor travelling down some rollers and the steel beam they connected to. I ripped off a few finger and toe nails. I fell off a swing that unhooked at the top and opened a floodgate of blood on the back of my head. I can't count the amount of times that I sliced parts of my body with box cutters. I popped my knee out of the socket lifting a gallon of milk out of the back of my car. Five cracked ribs from snowboarding. Two cracked ribs caused by a bear hug from a giant Mexican.

Amazingly I have never actually broken a bone that required a cast.

So, fast forward to my years of home improvements. A while ago we decided to finally replace the stove/oven thing that was made in the 50s. This required me to put in a cupboard above the new stove. I bought the thing, cut a hole in it for the vent, got it on the wall, screwed it in, put on the doors, it was awesome. I then realized that it required knobs. I got my trusty drill and some knobs and went to work. I measured where the knobs would be put and proceeded to drill the hole. Now, when you are drilling a hole in a piece of wood, you should make sure that the hand you are holding the piece of wood is not located directly on the other side of the drill bit.

They said I didn't hit the bone in my finger.

This next one wasn't done at home, but I found I am able to injure myself with anything you find around the house and office. I was trying to shape some foam packing for a router I needed to ship. I almost had it cut to just the right size but still needed a little bit more taken off. I was slicing through the last part of the foam with the scissors. Now, when you are slicing through things with anything sharp, slice AWAY from your body.

After I squirted blood all over the office carpet and everyone in the office drove me to the emergency room, I ended up with five stitches in my wrist and some loss of feeling in my thumb.

One day I decided to replace the carpet in my basement and put in some wood laminate flooring. The install went well. I got all the flooring in and proceeded to work on the trim. I was working on the last piece which required some cuts that required the jigsaw. I got the first couple of cuts in just right and had one last one to go.

Remember the drillbit in the finger. Yeah...same finger. They said I missed the bone again.

Hopefully, for me, nothing will go wrong with the closet organizer and door install. Sadly, most people I know are looking forward to hearing about another emergency room visit.