Aack. I missed two days. I did spend one of them in bed again, curled up next to the vaporizer. I did combine my words from May 6 & 7 into one story, but it’s on my iPhone, so I’ll upload it later today. Swear.
But, for now, you get today’s short story. Yes, it’s true. Yes, I am a klutz. If you hate the sight of wounds, even itty-bitty, minor ones, then don’t look at the second picture. Enjoy!
May 8, 2013
Prompts: lawnmower, elbow, marionette
Word Count: 581
The Idiots Guide To Breaking A Pane Of Glass
We came home from mowing the lawn at my mother-in-law’s house. I stood in the driveway, hosing off the bottom of the lawnmower, using the jet setting on the sprayer. After all the caked on grass was washed away, I moved to my vehicle. Hosing off something shouldn’t be as fun as it is, but I had a blast, (hahaha) doing it. My husband carried the lawnmower down the stairs to the basement.
Now, on a side note, we inherited a stupid lawnmower. It’s electric. And not cordless electric, either. Cutting the grass involves holding down a lever against the handle while pushing/pulling the mower, while trying to not run over the forty-foot orange extension cord. Stupid. I starred in the ‘hold the cord girl’ role while Tim mowed the grass. It shouldn’t take two people to cut the lawn.
Another ridiculous thing we inherited is the basement door that leads to the outside. The only doorknob is on the inside, and when we first moved in, the lock had been broken for so many millennia that a paint key shoved through what used to be some sort of lock and a long 2×4 propped up against the door kept it shut tight. A paint key. Who knew it was a multi-purpose tool?
My father installed a lock for us, but the damn door is so old that it doesn’t quite line up, so when we go to shut the door, you have the SLAM it to get the key to completely turn the bolt. Okay, Tim slams it. Repeatedly. Loudly. Annoyingly.
I, being a wimpy sort of girl, prefer to do the more painful and barely effective approach of shutting the door and slamming my hip against it until the door lines up the door frame enough for the bolt to click into place.
This works well enough. There is one thing to be mindful about. The upper part of the door has four panes of glass. Anytime I’m trying to close the door, I always think, “What if the glass breaks from us slamming the door?”
Okay—two things, really. The second is during demonstration of my crazy method of door locking, I put my elbow against the door. This morning, my elbow went through the pane of glass.
In the Hollywood version of this event, someone always takes a flimsy shirt and wraps it around their arm or hand, punches through a window or door to unlock said opening, and they are fine. In real life, you will cut yourself, even with a flimsy curtain between you and the glass.
Tim ushers me upstairs and into the bathroom, where he proceeds to clean my wound, and apply liquid bandage. If you’ve never used it, let me warn you – it stings. A. Whole. Freakin’. Lot.
I’m sitting on the toilet while he has my arm held up, bent at ninety degrees, and he’s holding onto my wrist and moving my arm back and forth to “Work the liquid stuff into the cut”. I told him that I felt like a marionette at the repair shop. A cursing marionette, whose arm stung like crazy.
The good part is I did not need stitches. It could have been much worse.
The best part is I got to do that Hollywood move without even meaning to, which is probably why I didn’t need to go to the ER. It was awesome, worth the bloody elbow, and I would totally do it again.
Basement Door Sans Glass.
- Stitches Not Included.
The Menagerie 
Leave a comment