Draino Oh

“Ah, hello again Mr. Crawford. We've got your usual table over here. Just sit down and we’ll take care of you.”

“Thanks, Doctor.”

“So – what happened this time?”

“Well it’s a long story Doctor…”

“It always is… Nurse? Sutures please…”

“Well it all started with a plugged bathtub drain…

We let the kids use our big soaker tub from time to time, and something like a toy or possibly something disgusting made its way into the drain.

To get at the plug, I needed to get my head right down to the level of the drain in order to find the little screw thingy that I undo to open it up. Makes sense so far, yes?

Now on this particular occasion I was wearing my big bathrobe, which can be constricting. Being in my own home and in my own bathroom, I decided to shed this garment, such that I was now bent over the tub, head just above the drain, buck naked. My behind, legs and other accessories were outside the tub, kneeling on the floor.

Flashlight in one hand, small screwdriver in the other, I leaned into my task.

“Lidocaine 20cc…you’ll feel this a little…Please continue.”

It was at this point our fine and curious dog entered the bathroom. Seeing her large master bent over and possibly in some sort of distress, she decided to inquire within the confines of the master’s hind quarters to see if there was some way she could assist.

Now, for those who are not dog owners, let me just take a moment to explain that dog noses are wet and cold.

Having anything cold or wet suddenly thrust into ones naked posterior region without warning can cause a certain involuntary muscular contraction, namely the immediate straightening up of the spine in a lurching spasm, evocative of electrocution.

This convulsion thrust my head upwards and into the underside of the spigot, causing intense pain and a nicely rounded cut, which gushed blood in some volume.

“Nurse, just shave this area here. Make this bald spot larger... Do continue Mr. Crawford…”

Meanwhile my thumb, which had been biding its time inside the drain hole, became a victim of its owner’s sudden paroxysm and got cut, scraped, swollen, and stuck – all at the same time.

Bleeding profusely, almost unconscious from pain, I proceeded to yell for help. Being in a remote corner of the house, not to mention having my head down in a bathtub, no one was able to hear me, so I was forced to self-rescue.

“More gauze please Nurse. Carry on… I’m enjoying this one.”

To get my thumb unstuck I thought I would run some cold water down the drain, in the hope that it would reduce the swelling and release me from its evil clutches.

Reaching over with my unstuck hand, I was just able to hit a tap and get some water to flow. Directly onto my throbbing and bleeding head, which was still beneath the spigot.

I coughed and cursed and shrieked anew. My wife finally heard me and rendered assistance with Vaseline (don’t go there), between helpless bouts of laughter, picture taking, and other acts of cruelty.

The bottom line is – I fixed the drain, which everyone seems to have forgotten in all their laughing and pointing behaviour.

“OK, we’re about finished here Mr. Crawford. Come back in a week and we’ll take out your stitches. Before you go let me take a picture to add to our collection. This is your wall over here. Very impressive. See you next week. Or sooner.”

The New Year

At my personal board meeting this year, I passed only a couple of resolutions. “Allinfavouropposedcarried!”

My first and most important plan is to arrange my business affairs such that I can spend more time away from my family.

I mainly work from home you see, and I frequently have important business calls interrupted by small children loudly announcing that “the dog is scooting her bum across the carpet right in front of the couch Dad! Oh – you’re on the phone. Sorry.”

Working from home does present challenges. I usually dial into our head office and have reception patch me through to my clients so that, based on call display information, they believe I’m actually at the office and not, in fact, sitting in my bathrobe, unshaven and scratching myself.

I sound like I’m at work until the dog barks, or I flush, or some other such announcement spoils my clever ruse.

I have even boldly made business calls while small children sit beside me, playing away on some website, only to have the mute button on their computer somehow un-mute and emit fart sounds, just as I’m discussing last quarter’s balance sheet with the CEO of a company I am courting.

“Excuse me!” I say as I launch into a spastic, thrashing-about dance to hit the mute button, shove a kid out of the office, mop up my spilled coffee, and try to make a prescient comment about cash flow.

This recovery procedure involves a certain amount of coordination, something which will come in handy for my second resolution - putting on footwear that will give me some grip in the snow when I let the dog out.

I currently just wear slippers, which do not provide claw-like traction, I beg to inform you.

Yesterday, in fact, I did a rather spectacular vertical hurtle, plummeting from my usual lofty 6 foot 3 inch height to a much lower and horizontal one, in a scant hundredth of a second. I departed from perpendicularity with such speed that I did not even have time to say to myself “Careful dude, this is slippery.” I only got as far as “Ca…”

I’m not sure if it was the sudden appearance of me laying beside her, or the loud “Oof!” sound I made upon doing so, but the dog bolted away with remarkable speed for her age, despite her overwhelming desire to eat and contaminate the fresh snow.

One second I was standing, slowly creeping down the little hill towards the gate, the next I was laid out, gasping, legs splayed, bath robe agape and over my head such that neighbours were getting a horrified eyeful of my corporate inner workings.

Given the frequency of my arm-waving lurches on our little path of late, I’m sure my spouse will emerge into the inky blackness of a winter’s night sometime, and observe her rotund husband laid out on the snow, gasping for breath, exposing himself, pointing at his slippers which have been catapulted onto the roof of the neighbour’s house.

It being well nigh impossible to get up from such a position, I’ll probably just lay back and relax, fatalistically enjoying my fading view of the stars in the chill night air, as my enormous body succumbs to hypothermia, frostbite, and little bits of gravel which have been violently embedded in the musculature of my backside.

As I contemplate this quite possible and embarrassing fate, I wonder if there are such things as Slip-On Crampons – mountaineering traction gear for the housebound slob.

God forbid I should actually break down and shovel. Or actually use the lock on my office door at home.

That would require more resolutions, which are not on the agenda.

Dog Training

Lucy our dog has been getting a little slack in the training department of late.

So what I've been doing is training her to bark outside when she wants in so that I instantly jump up from the couch and run out the door, scurry outside to open the gate, then run back and let her inside the house.

You've got to maintain discipline with your animals or they will just take over.