I just wanted spaghetti...

So I’m in the parking lot of the mart-that-must-not-be-named (always a good way to start a story). It being a bright day, I have my newer glasses on, since they have a magnetic clip on shade.

The shades were in my left slash pocket. This only adds to the humor, because while looking for them, I slid my hand into my right rear pocket.

Normally, I carry my Kershaw Leek toward the center, where accidental depression of the flipper will only open it as far as the seam. Unfortunately, on this particular day, I had slip it to the outside to avoid scratching a chair at home.  The result was that instead of finding my sunglasses, I found the open blade of my knife. This knife is carried strictly for emergency use, and as such has a brand new blade. Among other things I learned that day is Kershaw makes a good blade. I did not feel a thing until it hit muscle.

I quickly withdrew my hand, and found a 2 cm laceration more or less parallel to my fingernail, and approximately 0.5 cm below it. It was—quite predictably—gushing blood.

I immediately clamped pressure on the finger, picked up the groceries, and hurried to the car. Once there, I realized that I should probably check the extent to see if it would require stitches.

For the record, I no longer faint at the sight of blood. I do not faint at the sight of fat and muscle tissue. I spent an entire day in surgery with a gyno-onco-surgeon, including watching a TAHSO, aka field dressing a woman.

I do, apparently, have a problem with seeing my own fat and muscle tissue.

Having established that medical attention would, in fact, be required, I called the beloved to ask for a pick-up. While on the phone, I began to feel a bit woozy, and decided it was best to just sit down. Soon after, I decided it might be best to lie down.

At this point, things started to go a bit sideways.

When a bloody person is laying on the ground in the local aforementioned mart's parking lot, people notice. At least in the South. I have no idea what they do in New York. A passing woman, saw me laying on the ground and asked if I was okay. I hung up with the beloved and replied, “Yeah, I’m fine…well, maybe not…actually, probably not.”

When I awoke, the first thing I saw was a blue sky with several fluffy clouds. The second thing I saw was the nice woman…on a phone. I looked to the other end of the car and saw a man…on a phone. I surmised quickly that they weren’t talking to each other. Apparently, when you seize in the said mart's parking lot, people do more than just ask if you’re okay. Again, assuming you’re not in New York.

Around this time, a guy in a gray tee walked down the aisle with an armload of groceries. Seeing a bloody person on the ground two spaces away, he dropped off his groceries in his truck and pulled out a large black bag. Upon his approach, I noted that his gray tee had “Volunteer Fire Department” written on it. The EMT slapped an ABD pad on my finger and told me to hold pressure.

A young woman arrived, and announced loudly that she was CPR qualified and asked if anyone needed help. This while the efficient off duty EMT is examining me with a huge bag of obviously medical equipment open next to him. Being rather coherent for having just come to, I was able to note that chest compressions would not help me and that on a ten point scale where 1 is Rosie O’Donnell and 10 is Keira Knightley the beloved, this rather chipper young lady was about one to one-and-a-half integers too low for me to thoroughly enjoy conscious mouth-to-mouth.

At this time, I began to have some hope that we could keep this quiet. I was hoping the EMT could call in, cancel the emergency call-out and I could just wait for the beloved to arrive.

No such luck.

By the end of it, I had a large fire and rescue truck, an ambulance, and two patrol cars on the scene. The two medics in the ambulance, a cop in each car, the off-duty EMT, and four firefighters were on the scene. When the beloved called back to ask where I was parked, I replied, “Follow the flashing lights.”

After I turned down the offer to drive me to the hospital, the ambulance driver handed me a clipboard with a refusal of care form. My hand swathed in bandages and covered in blood, I gave him an exasperated look and replied, “You’re kidding me, right?” The beloved came to the rescue with her fully functional appendages.

In the distance I could hear one of the firefighters ask the off-duty EMT how bad the cut was. His response: “Oh, it’s a good one.” That made me feel better.

After returning the perishable food to the store, the beloved drove her injured husband to First Assist Urgent Care. There, I found out that iodine stings when it gets to subcutaneous levels, and that the end of your finger tip is the worst place to have lidocaine injected. Something about having to put a needle under your fingernail.

Then, it was back to the mart to get the beef and garlic bread. By then, it was 2100. Which leads me to the greatest insult of the evening: after all that, I had to go to bed without getting my spaghetti.