I've just got back from mom's place, after going to the hospital and picking her up there and taking her home.

The good news is that the doctor at Emergency over at Ottawa General saw her in less than four hours. The wound was still bleeding somewhat badly by the time they saw her, which may have contributed to that. Even better news is that the injury was serious enough to require stitches, but that it's not a really bad injury although she did have a tetanus shot.

The bad news is that the wound was a large, widely open "V" shaped deep scrape about three inches below the elbow on the arm, and it required stitches. However, because of mom's age, and the way that skin is very thin in the aged on the arms, they had to insert the medical tape that dissolves below the skin so as to hold the stitches. She's got the arm somewhat frozen from the anaesthetic, and is back home now, relaxing. We'll have to wait and see how the arm feels when the anaesthetic wears off, but my mom is one of these lucky people with a high tolerance to pain.

In the meantime, mom's laundry is done, so I'm going to do the folding and pack it up so I can take it back to her place later tonight after supper.

Thanks to everyone who dropped me a line inquiring about her health, and all the friends who have called my place over the course of the afternoon to pass on their regards.

Anyway, heading upstairs for a nice hot cuppa, and a couple of crackers with cheese.

Came home from work to get a nasty shock.

I went downstairs to change into something comfortable and wash up a bit, when I realized that there had been someone in the house. There was laundry in the laundry room, that wasn't mine, and when I went into the lower level bathroom, the sink was full of blood!

The odd thing was there was no blood elsewhere, but I was more concerned immediately that I had somehow cut myself badly in the morning and didn't realize it. I went back into the laundry room, and found that the additional laundry there was my mother's. She must have come over while I was at work to do some of her laundry, as she lives in a high-rise condo where the laundry gets done at pay machines in the basement. But I couldn't figure out what the blood was from.

So, I go upstairs, and check, but her car is not in the parking lot. I went and checked the answering machine, and sure enough there's a message on there from her. The message said she had come by my place around 12:30 pm to have lunch and do laundry, and that she had badly cut the top of her arm on one of the knobs of the dryer. She had gone to Ottawa General to have the arm checked out, but the wait was about four to six hours. I called the hospital, and she was still there, waiting, but she told me not to come there until she called me back, as the parking at the hospital is just so expensive.

Anyway, I've gone back downstairs and have cleaned up the blood in the sink and on the counter and all, and will sit and worry while I wait for her to call to let me know how she is doing. I've eaten a spot of late lunch, and have also put mom's laundry on to wash.

On top of everything, I woke up this morning with a bit of a cough again. I really hope I haven't caught a bug again.

I knew that I had too good a weekend to last. I had really thought that my luck with taking a turn for the better. *sigh* What a week this is shaping up to be... *sigh*

The pain eventually got bad enough in my thigh today that I called the doctor just after 11:00 pm, and begged the receptionist to let me see him in the afternoon. She took pity on me, and set up an appointment at 2:10 pm.

The end result is that the doctor thinks I may have torn the muscle in the upper thigh, and has decided to send me for tests on Tuesday (the earliest he could get the appointment booked), and has told me to take it easy, and to walk as little as possible for the nonce.

In the meantime, spross dropped by this afternoon after work, ostensibly to drop some stuff off for me, and then helped me finish sorting through the boxes of books and then put all the boxes back in the storeroom for me. I'm more grateful to him for this than folks can possibly imagine.

I've spent the rest of the late afternoon lying down and napping after taking some Tylenol, and am about to go upstairs (ouch!) and make some supper. This evening will be spent on the telephone with Tammy Powers, talking to her about magic in Desolation, as she needs to get ready to play her spell caster on the weekend.

As I mentioned in a recent entry, I am quite sore from exercising a bit too much on the elliptical machine. Yesterday, I made a terrible mistake in that I needed to go through the boxes of books and rpgs in my storage cupboard, and was moving these boxes and all on my own. I knew I was in trouble after I had moved the boxes, because my body was aching and I was shaky. I didn't have the strength to move the boxes back into the cupboard, other than to clear a way into the bathroom and the bedroom, so now the whole damned lower level of the house has book boxes all over that I can't put back in the cupboard! :<

I woke up this morning, and can barely move my back. Add to this the fact that my legs are sore and aching as well still, and I'm quite miserable when it comes right down to it. And that's with the painkillers.

So here I am at work, in a state of agonizing pain at times, and have a workload of stuff here on my desk. Add to this the fact that I've just discovered that my personal e-mail server is down *again*, so I can't get any e-mail and, well...

It is not going to be a good day.

Hit another bump in the road today. Literally.

I was driving to work, and the roads were somewhat snow covered, with a light bit of ice. Hit a bump in the road as I was turning onto Bank Street from Heron Road, and the left front tire of the car blew. Fortunately, I was only moving about 15-20 kms per hour, so nothing bad happened, and I was able to pull the car over to the side of the road. I was a little shaken up, but that's all.

I managed to get the car off the road, as mentioned, and into the bus lane that was nearby, and switched the tire for the spare. It was cold, somewhat blowy, but I managed. Got to work about half an hour later than I planned, but things were cool.

What a week so far. And my arms are still sore from yesterday. *sigh*

Need to start thinking about supper.

...that just when I think that things are going well, I have some sort of accident. :(

I was making lunch this afternoon after having done a few game-related things this morning, and was cutting red pepper for my salad. Naturally, the knife slipped and took off a large chunk of the top of my left thumb. *sigh* I didn't notice it for a couple of moments, because the blood merged with the red pepper juices and all, but as the blood started to flow...freely...from the wound, well...

Suffice it to say I'm typing this one-handed right now, and it's not fun. The damn wound finally stopped bleeding about 2:00 pm, and to be honest, it stings a lot. I've got a bandaid on it with a decent amount of anti-biotic, and am doing most things one-handed. We are so dependent on the opposable thumb thing, but you don't notice it until times like this.

Anyway, off to try and read for a while. :)