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Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Pinky's Near Death Experience



I was unforeseeably attacked by a ferocious splinter of broken china in the staffroom at work today.

I know that’s not a particularly exhilarating way to start a blog post (with me using the passive voice and all), but that’s the way it played out. 


I couldn't really write, ‘A ferocious shard of china attacked me in the staff room’ because that wouldn't make sense since china is an inanimate object.

I suppose I could have written, ‘One of the ferocious school groundsmen, with whom we share the staff room, attacked me with a shard of broken china’ and I’d be closer to the truth, even though our groundsmen are quite lovely and not ferocious at all.

I was standing in the staff room inoffensively dipping my teabag in and out of a cup whilst at the same time opening a can of oily yellow fin tuna to pour over my salad when I heard the china mug smash dramatically on the tiles beside me. 


I didn't jump nor even bat a mascaraed eyelash, so intently was I focussed on my culinary employment.

But as I felt the sinister splinter drive itself into my left ankle I screamed out in shock and pain, “I’ve taken a hit!”

I bent down to inspect my ankle and noticed a deep 1mm slash… but as yet no blood. 

I’m a slow bleeder. 

I don’t know whether that implies I’m a dried up old prune or if I’m lizard skinned. 

I squeezed the wound with stubborn determination until a satisfactory stream of blood spurted out.

“Worker’s Compo!” I howled. “I have to go home.”

“Is the bone showing?” enquired my colleague, O’Reilly.

The guilty groundsman was most concerned and fussed around me like a nana.

“No, there’s no bone,” I whimpered. “But I’m losing a lot of blood here, people.”

“Get a tissue, Pinky!” yelled my friend Bec. “There’s blood dripping into your shoe.”

“We’ve got a bleeder!” shrieked O’Reilly.

I was balancing my tea and salad in both hands and was far more concerned with grabbing one of the comfy chairs before the other teachers nabbed them all. Limping like Quasimodo, I dragged myself as quickly as possible to the nearest lounge chair and soaked up the blood by stuffing a tissue from my pocket into the mortal gash.

“Do you think I should go home?” I pleaded with my co-workers. “I feel faint. I think my blood pressure’s dropping… It might get infected. Maybe I need stitches?”

They went on ignoring me and eating their microwaved leftover pizza.

I thought about lurching backwards and forwards in front of the Deputy Principal’s office dangling the bloodied tissue in the air and waving an accident report around my head while she chatted on the phone… but I knew that wouldn't work.

She’d just get up and shut the office door.


Next time I’ll pay that groundsman to drop a bread knife straight into my foot. Surely they’d send me home for that.