Bodily Harm (Part Two)

I was in marching band for (thinking) eight years – three in high school, five in college – on top of fourteen-ish years of concert band, six years of jazz band, eight years of pep band, and a couple random little musical endeavors here and there. You know, your average “semester of oboe lessons when I meant to sign up for hobo lessons” – stuff like that.

But yeah. Eight years of marching band. And in those first seven years, I had my small share of injuries. By the time I hit my final year of marching band, however, my better-than-perfect hearing was still unscathed.

That’s the year that the director and assistant director decided to seat the sax section in the middle of the drumline while in the stands at football games.

It’s also the year I got a crippling case of costochondritis and ended up weeping with pain – after I’d “healed” – because of the physical soundwaves from the drums rattling my chest.

And it’s the year my ears got hurt. Since then, my right ear has had perceptively worse hearing than my left, and I’ve had much more trouble using a telephone. It has made me very angry. It seems to me very irresponsible to have anyone seated that close to a university-level drumline without hearing protection. Once you damage your hearing, you can never go back.

Fast forward to today, when my company started company-wide hearing tests. Our craft employees are exposed to very high levels of sound and are provided with hearing protection, which they are required to use. However, we know that some hearing damage is going to occur, so we monitor it annually. They set some time aside for admin folks who were out in the shops, and I took advantage of it. I was really dreading the results, so much so that I found myself a little shaky when I sat down in the testing booth. (That, and I stress out over the itty bitty beeps and the stupid buzzer. I feel like I’m on a sadistic game show.)

Three minuets later I had my results.

Zero is perfect hearing, I guess, and 25 is recordable hearing loss.

I’m so happy. Sure, my hearing isn’t as good as it once was – but it’s not bad. It’s very good. And yes, my right ear is worse off than the left, but it’s not majorly damaged. No hearing aids in my immediate future!

Although this just makes me all the more determined to buy a big old box of inexpensive earplugs and taking them to the band building.

Bodily Harm (Part One)

I’ve been wearing a sterling silver band on my right middle finger for the past several days. Last night I took it off to find a corresponding ring of bright red blisters. Whether this is indicative of my longstanding mild metal allergy or of the fact that I’m turning into a werewolf, they still itch.

At about 2 this morning I got up for a few minutes and was sitting down with my eyes closed when d’Artagnan decided (from across the room) that he wanted to be in my lap. Not only did he overshoot, but he scared the living daylights out of me. Trying to stabilize, he dug a few claws into me right above my right clavicle. Now, I’m a cat person, and I instinctively know how to deal with cats to avoid getting hurt even when claws are engaged – but not so much at 2 in the morning, when startled, with my eyes closed. My reflexes took over and I grabbed d’Art. This was a poor idea. He freaked out, tried to get away, and one claw (still inside my shoulder) twisted under the surface like a barbed fish hook. It took me about five minutes to unhook a panicky cat from my torso, which should have taken only a few seconds had I kept him calm. As a result, I look like I’ve been nipped by a one-toothed vampire. It’s bruised around the puncture site, and now I keep thinking about my first aid trainer guy going on about how cat bites and scratches were more dangerous than any other kind of (non-rabid) animal injury.

And finally, in what I hope is the final link of a trifecta and not simply the next in a long line of owies, I caught my little finger in the metal joint of the strap of my laptop bag this morning (not sure if that made sense) and like to took my fingernail off.

Something more interesting later, if I have time.

Bodily Harm (Part One)

I’ve been wearing a sterling silver band on my right middle finger for the past several days. Last night I took it off to find a corresponding ring of bright red blisters. Whether this is indicative of my longstanding mild metal allergy or of the fact that I’m turning into a werewolf, they still itch.

At about 2 this morning I got up for a few minutes and was sitting down with my eyes closed when d’Artagnan decided (from across the room) that he wanted to be in my lap. Not only did he overshoot, but he scared the living daylights out of me. Trying to stabilize, he dug a few claws into me right above my right clavicle. Now, I’m a cat person, and I instinctively know how to deal with cats to avoid getting hurt even when claws are engaged – but not so much at 2 in the morning, when startled, with my eyes closed. My reflexes took over and I grabbed d’Art. This was a poor idea. He freaked out, tried to get away, and one claw (still inside my shoulder) twisted under the surface like a barbed fish hook. It took me about five minutes to unhook a panicky cat from my torso, which should have taken only a few seconds had I kept him calm. As a result, I look like I’ve been nipped by a one-toothed vampire. It’s bruised around the puncture site, and now I keep thinking about my first aid trainer guy going on about how cat bites and scratches were more dangerous than any other kind of (non-rabid) animal injury.

And finally, in what I hope is the final link of a trifecta and not simply the next in a long line of owies, I caught my little finger in the metal joint of the strap of my laptop bag this morning (not sure if that made sense) and like to took my fingernail off.

Something more interesting later, if I have time.