How bout posting your coleslaw recipe. Still searching for the perfect one.

I had a thumb that looked remarkably like that a while back...

Trying to cut a dog treat in to three reasonably equal pieces...just to be fair...

Ended up rolling the treat right out from under the 'miracle knife' and replacing it with my thumb.

You feel it roll. You watch it slip. You keep going.

You (well..'I'...) put everything down and proceed to do nothing but hold the wound. Very. Tightly. For the next hour or so until it stops oozing. Mostly.

Dumb dogs.

I did damned near the same thing, except for O'Reilly I was reaching looking for the damn phone and instead of Thumb I sliced into my middle finger.

The wife still won't let me live it down (it's been several years) and she refused to eat the slaw when I'd finished it (I swear I removed the bloody parts). Now, every time, every damned time, I'm fixing slaw its "watch out for your fingers".

I understand every bit of it. I understand wanting to "go Elvis" on the TV when O'Rielly is on. I have cut many a finger (BTW, the technical term for what you did was an "avulsion").

What I can't understand is why a sober physician put a suture through a nail. When I saw the picture, I said "nails grow".

What kind of tequila?

"I am someone who has a very high pain threshold . . ."

I know that painkiller injections are no fun, but if they cause you to want to die, then by definition you don't really have a very high pain threshold. On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd have to give you, at most, a 6.

6/10 - Sobbing while getting injections to numb fingertip
7/10 - Biting my lip as the doctor injects pain medicine into my thumb so that she can cut the wound open MORE and stitch my artery back together
13,947/10 - My wife trying to push a 10 pound, 5 ounce baby with a 6.5" diameter head out of a 4" opening in her hoohah and falling asleep between pushes

On the other hand, my wife stubbed her toe yesterday and I thought I was going to have to go upside her head with a frying pan to make her stop crying, so apparently it's a situational thing.

I'd like to take a moment and thank you for making me cringe dizzily at work. Nothing horrifies me more than finger injuries so on top of the intense pain I am psychologically a wreck as well.

I work as a bartender on weekends and one day while cutting fruit I really got myself on my middle finger. Cut right down to the finger nail from the side. I hate to admit but I very nearly passed out from the experience.

So, thanks for bringing all that mental trauma back. I'm sure everyone would be amused at my attempt to defend my fingers from the phantom blades.

Don't be so hard on yourself Rachel, I'm 31 and have gotten stitches 7 times in my life. You think that needle going into your thumb was rough, imagine getting stitches around your eye. Good times, good times.

The worst set of stitches I ever got was in my left leg, just to the right of the shin bone. It took 18 to close it up in addition to 3 more on the inside.

Originally I thought I had snapped my leg. I had dumped the dirt bike I was riding, and while the foot pegs dug into the dirt and stopped it, kinetics absolutely insisted I continue going forward. Problem was that my left leg happened to be wedged between the foot peg and the ground. I found found out why "bear trap" foot pegs are called that as I lifted the bike up with my leg under the spikes.

So I hopped around like an idiot thinking I was going to be looking for a new tibia. The pain abruptly subsided though, enough to make me very suspiscious, so I took a little peek. I was horrifiying; the perfect definition of a gaping wound.

As you found out, after the anesthetic wears off you're in for a brand new shiny world of hurt.

Unsurprisingly that's the last time I rode a dirt bike.

So, have you bought a mandoline yet?

It's probably bad that my very first thought was "Hm, bet that's a decent knife."

On pain threshold: it's definitely a situational thing. I could sit through three hours straight of having a tattoo artist carving up the inside of my arm no problem (and sit through a raging kidney infection without medical treatment until the fever went straight through to delirium- problem), but I turn into a giant jellified wuss whenever blades or needles come near the tips of my fingers.

OH MY GOSH! There should really be a warning before that photo...I hate cleaning barf off my keyboard. I'm so grossed out now.

But I love your blog. Laughing out loud at work is never a good idea...people KNOW you aren't working. Before they could only speculate!

You just made my testicle ache - and not in a good way.

Looks like you've met one of the qualifying requirements for the carpenters' union:
Sliced and diced at least one finger? Check!

I had a cousin, a shop teacher no less, get distracted while using the bandsaw on day. He was halfway to his wrist through the web between his middle and ring finger before he knew it. I, a former science teacher but woodworker by hobby, am missing the tip of my left index finger to a table saw. Ouch!

2 am, Baghdad. I'm running the perimeter of the Embassy (gotta get that PT in sometime). As I hold my badge up for the contract guard on the new checkpoint in the dark, I suddenly realize that the item in front of me is NOT a speedbump, but instead was a spike strip.

Much hilarity among the night watch when the boss calls to tell them he's being treated at the dispensary. No Purple Heart, just abuse.

I do that about once a week.

OUCH! I had something similar happen to me...the tip of my right index finger... 5 stitches and a hole bored into my fingernail to relieve the pressure... NOT FUN!

I thought the tequila would be the supreme anesthetic!

This didn't happen to me, but my son, about 3 years ago. He was maybe 5 at the time, and he was rocking in a chaise longue (interestingly, Firefox incorrectly flags that word as spelled wrong for some reason) and got his right pinky under the handle of the chair, and pinched the tip of it in the hinge. He wasn't strong enough to get himself out of the mess he'd put himself in and started screaming. I ran over, saw what had happened, and had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach--it looked like he'd crushed the tip of his finger to the midway point of his fingernail. In fact, the skin had torn in two places and pulled forward off the bone, like you'd remove a sock or glove. Gulp. I got him to the ER in record time and they bumped him to the head of the line. Doc said he'd probably lose the fingernail as it looked like he'd damaged the growth bed, but amazingly it completely healed. I was actually very proud of him. He moaned and fussed on and off until the anesthetic kicked in, which took a long time as they didn't give him any until the finger'd soaked in mercurochrome or something else equally nasty-looking for a while, but after I got him out of the chair he quit screaming right away. *That's* a high pain tolerance.

I was chopping green peppers and onions back in my su chef days when I lopped a goodly part of my left ring finger off. Hold out your hand and look at the point where your nail disappears into the skin. Now move about 1 millimeter away from the insertion point, towards the end of your finger. Now imagine a knife entering at that point, straight down, and slicing down until it encountered the bone, where the blade then decided to sliiidddee merrily down to the end of the metacarpal, removing everything in its path until, at last, there was nothing left.

The pain was awful. The worst part was the fact that the tip had fallen into the garbage can and I couldn't find it. So no sutures for me; there was nothing left to stitch. Simply pressure bandages and sleeping with my hand/arm elevated on two pillows at night so that the throbbing didn't keep me awake.

I'm sorry about your injury. Believe me when I saw that I know exactly what you felt.

Ow.

I've done things like that. I've seen my own tendons moving through holes in my skin before the blood had time to ooze in and block the view.

You always realize it's happening when you feel that unexpected texture like you mentioned... and you know it's going to happen, but you can't stop in the 0.00003 seconds it takes to make the difference between essentially a paper cut and stitches.

Ow.

But it was a hoot to read anyway. And it was a year ago, so we can laugh now :-)

Oh, I thought I'd add...

I know what you mean about O'Riley. I feel excactly the same way. I started watching Fox News after 9/11 because they were the only network that seemed not to be doing so much navel-gazing about what we did to deserve it.

On the other hand... I can't stand most of the "interview" shows on it any more than I can stand the ones on PBS, CNN, or anywhere else, and it's for precisely that reason. It's almost like they don't WANT anyone to express a complete thought. People apparently think they're hearing "both sides" of an argument, when in reality they're hearing no argument at all from either side, just the occasional snarky soundbyte -- if you're lucky. It annoys me to no end.

So I pretty much don't get any news from the TV anymore, and certainly no analysis. I can get a lot better news on the web, from a lot more points of view, and people actually get to complete an argument.

I have similar stories and some frightening finger-scars, but just thinking about it makes me cringe all over again...type them? Uh uh.

Pain is relative. Util it's yours, then it's immense. Heal quick.

Rachel, please stay away from chain saws. I watched my grandfather take off the first joint of four fingers on a wood joiner - pink mist. I drove a splinter into the middle joint of my middle finger and had to have it surgically removed. That sucked. Pain? Fingers have lots of nerves in them, as you discovered.

ouch

how about when you chop again you use this

http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/001697.php

These heavy-duty protective gloves are used in the restaurant industry for defense against knife and mandolin cuts and for handling trash, which often has glass and fish bones that stick through garbage bags.

I wondering why they didn't use Steri-Strips instead of sutures to close your wound. I manage to slice a finger — usually the right index — with a craft knife about every three or four years. (Occupational hazard: graphic designer.) I've only ever had Steri-Strips, and they're great.

They're thin strips of a polyester filament web (about 1/8" wide) backed with hypoallergenic adhesive so there's no numbing and no stitches to remove; they just wear off in about ten days. The injections into your thumb sound almost as bad as the cut.

When I dislocated my thumb, when the doctor was getting ready to inject the nerve block stuff into the palm of my hand he said "if you want to yell, then yell; if you want to scream, then scream, 'cause this is gonna hurt like a son of a bitch!"

When a doctor tells you something is "gonna hurt like a son of a bitch", believe it.

Rolled my Jeep, end over end. That's how I dislocated my thumb, if you were interested.

Just remember, all great cooks put a little of themselves in every dish they prepare.

At least, that's what I say when I do that. My family now knows to say "Hey, put down the knife a second..."

I consider anyone who uses "dumbass" a friend.

Hi Rachel...found your site through Bill Whittle's blog. Welcome back.

Reading your blog is a hoot! Found you via Eject!Eject!Eject!

So... what kind of liability does O'Reilly have, anyway?

In the 'no spin' zone, you start spinning propaganda you get stopped, and rudely as you deserve. Humiliation on national TV is something even dumb, most, democrats can understand.

I feel your pain; due to an ADD-enhanced meandering mind, my hands are a roadmap of scars and stitchmarks. However, the real point of my comment is: Oprah is not the rudest conversationalist on television. That honor belongs to Charlie Rose. Hands down. His well-versed, interesting and eloquent guests are forced to sit quietly and endure the bombardment of his endless, pompous mewling. In comparison to Rose, Oprah is a dilettante. I want to club him like a baby seal.

Ouch!!!!

REALLY good slaw sometimes requires sacrifice.

Found your site through Eject! Eject! Eject!. Welcome back to the fight!

Ow. I was trying to get candle wax out of a candle holder. Said candle holder was in right hand, knife in left. Being the graceful person that I am, knife ended up in right hand.

I drove myself to the emergency room, blood soaking through washcloth, where fellow rescue squad members who had just happened to bring in a patient saw me and stood around the bed making fun of me while the doctor stitched.

I feel your pain.

Elizabeth
Imperial Keeper

Back in the days when I did some pasteup and commercial artwork, I used to use X-acto knives. And since I'm right-handed, over the years I had managed to slice both sides of the fingertip of the left index finger (at different times).

Didn't have stitches either time. But both times I got somewhat grossed out by how much I bled... I actually got a coppery taste (sympathetic?) in my mouth, and my finger went nowhere near my mouth!

Fortunately I haven't done that in many years. The sides of that fingertip are still a little more sensitive than the right index fingertip.

BTW, would you please post your recipe for coleslaw (minus the blood)? I'll try to make up a batch. Thanks!

Rick C, that's officially called "degloving".

Shudder.

Useful habit to get into when handling knives and veggies: hold down the veg with fingertips curled under, so the most forward/knifeward part of the finger is the knuckle, about ½" above the surface. Helps in another way, too, 'cause the aligned knuckles make a good blade guide in many cases.

Over a dozen years ago, I was going to mow our lawn on the 4th of July. I decided that the blade needed sharpening, so I removed it and used my grinder to get it reeeaaallly sharp.

I put the blade back on, and THEN had the bright idea that I needed to remove the built-up grass from underneath the mower deck with an old screwdriver.

The screwdriver slipped, and the middle knuckle of my "bird finger" met my newly sharpened mower blade. I got a bit dizzy when I looked down and saw bone.

One of the ER nurses asked me if the mower was RUNNING when I did it... I must look stupid.

The worst part was the nurse SCRUBBING the CRAP out of it before they sewed it up.

Had similar experience...medical school...dissecting (slicing) my cadaver's liver, my hand slipped and the next thing I notice is a (small) piece of my thumb in the cadaver's body cavity. In retrospect I must have had a great deal of fortitude or something; I grabbed the piece, went to the student-health doc. He looked on it I think as his most interesting case of the day (beats runny noses) and proceeded to sew it back on.

Funny though, he got the piece backwards! It healed well, still a bit numb in the overlying skin...and the fingerprint is reversed!!!!

P.S. I finished med school but (surprise) did not go into surgery.

Keith,

yep, I remembered the term after making the post, and if you've ever seen it, you'd understand perfectly why it's called that.

As I said, it seems to have healed perfectly, without even a scar. Poor kid tore off a toenail (lesson: don't ride a razor scooter barefoot) and a thumbnail in two separate events within a month of that. He was having a rough patch. Like I said, really proud of him--he handled it very well.

I think he learned an important lesson, too, because he hasn't injured himself that badly since. :)

OMG! You're back!

And just in time to serve up some choice skewerings for a certain rotund filmmaker...

Worse I've done to myself would be the time I sunburned my eyes. Not my eyelids, mind you, but my eyes. Camping trip on cross-country skis in northern New Mexico out near Truchas Peaks, Easter weekend. Pristine white snow, clear blue New Mexico skies, 9,000'+ elevations, and my sunglasses broke on the van-ride to Truchas. No place to buy a replacement set within an hour's drive, and there's a cute chick along on the trip so there's no way in hell I'm going to use one of those goofy looking field expediants involving bark. I came back looking like a Fremen with a major hangover. To this day, I've got eyes that only Rand-McNally could love...

Great story.
Thanks Rachel.

Glad your back. I'd like to see the Cole Slaw recipe also. Minus the blood of course.

Rachel, my Great-Uncle Seldon cut the tip of my grandmother's thumb off. With an axe. While splitting firewood. Many years later, she didn't have much of a thumbnail but no stitches were needed.

Heh. You're not really stupid, Rachel (welcome back, btw) until you're number 1 in Google for "I bayoneted myself."

Really.

But I like your instincts. How could this *not* be good blogfodder?

8^ D