Joe works at a company that is very hot. With the weather itself being hot and humid, this makes his work place twice as hot as it is outside, even in the night. To top it off Joe works with steaming boiling hot water.
Early this morning while Joe was working with one of the fireman's hoses, it bursts from the seems and scorches Joe badly.
This morning he called me to say he would be late getting home. If he gives me no explaination I don't ask cause eventually he tells me what's up when he gets home. Well by 10:30 he still hasn't come home and I am getting kind of worried. So I give him a ring and I can hear the paging system in the ER sounding off so I ask if everything is alright. He then tells me what happened. So I find out which ER he is at, hop in the car and go there. Poor guy hasn't even been seen too and it's now 11 am and he's been sitting in there since 6 am with 3rd degree burns which haven't been attended too properly by his work. When we finally get in the spot (a bed with a curtain around it) we wait another hour for the attendant to see him. By this time Joe has nodding off cause he worked all night.
When the attendant sees him he gets mad at Joe for not being seen too earlier cause apparently burns should be seen to asap to reduce infection from the peeling skin and blisters. (Oh, I want to slap the attendant because it wasn't Joe's fault he had to sit there while the staff came and went having cigs, coffee and foods. He tells me later that he was outside chatting it up with the staff several times while he was waiting and had 4 coffee's himself.)
The attendant then starts peeling the skin of Joe's chest and neck and in one spot he takes off too much and it must have been good skin cause Joe yelped, pushed the attendant's hand away and asked him why was he trying to take off skin that wasn't damaged. Then the attendant just leaves and comes back 15 minutes later with this cream that Joe is to put on the burn daily. In the meantime he puts on a ton of this other type of ointment, bandages up the burn with this metal bandage and gauze and tons of tape and tosses the wrappers on the floor. When its all done Joe can't move that part of his body as the dressed up area is too tight for movement.
When we finally go to leave he tells Joe that he has to come back every day for 5 days and that he's not to touch the burn or bandages in any way. Lets just say we were confused when we left with this ointment in tow.
On the way home I stop at a red light and I read this ointments instructions: do not apply with metal bandages. Oh, isn't that what the attendant put on Joe? When we get home I tell Joe about the ointment and he reads the instructions. Then he asks me, "Did you see how filthy that spot was? Did you see the blood on the tables and floor? Did you see the attendant almost slip on that paper (probably a part of a bandage pack)? I am going to get a flesh eating disease and die like Randy?" Yes, Yes, Yes, No (I hope not).
I admit, our little family are kind of clean freaks. You can image how hard it was for Joe and I not to utter a word in that spot. We just wanted to get the heck out of there asap. Since our belated friend went into the ER for a popped knee and came out with flesh eating disease and died within a week, we have been terrified of hospitals. We seen him that very morning too, doing his landscaping in downtown Toronto and he was fine.
By 3 pm we were both exhausted and went to sleep. If I didn't wake up at 9:20 pm Joe would have been late for work. He just hopped out of bed, put his clothes on and out the door he went. Didn't even have a coffee or foods. What a guy. I would have at least taken the night off having spent the better part of a day in the ER and having little sleep thereafter. Now he's at work with no coffee, no food, no shower and tired.
Joe's work isn't going to be too thrilled either because he is a very important person at work and he has to do light duty till he heals, can't be around heat (LOL) and can't do his normal job. Now this would be okay if his team actually contributed to Team Work but they don't. Instead Joe will have more work when he gets back to his normal duties because no one will do his job properly. Mind you his team mates like to complain a lot about who isn't help them, all the time, like 50 times a day, but they won't help others. What a week they are going to have without Joe at there beckon call. He always helps them when he's done his work. Now he can't LOL. Oh the fun!
Well I best show you the pick, finish up online and get some sleep cause I feel a bit jet lagged, strange but true.
I took this picture after we ate brunch. Joe just ripped it all off because he couldn't move and it was a nuisance to him the way they dressed it. We have all the same stuff at home that they put on him in the ER so I just redressed it so he could move. Terrible looking isn't it? Can you believe he doesn't feel the burn at all. Weird LOL
That's it from me tonight. I totally missed a speed scrap I had planned for today but hey, what is a girl to do.
Enjoy your day.
Huggins
Pat
