On Sunday, I woke up and my eye was huge, I mean all swollen up, like I had been boxing last night, rather than just watching boxing on TV. It turned out to be an allergic reaction to a bug bite of some kind. What is the weirdest injury you've ever gotten?

-- Kymm Zuckert (hedgehog@hedgehog.net), August 14, 2000

Answers

When I was 19, I ran over my big toe with our vacuum cleaner, slicing the nail cleanly down the middle and spraining my toe. I was home alone at the time, so I ended up calling my best friend and had her and her mother drive me to the hospital to get it looked after. Worst part of the day was having to repeatedly answer the question "So, how did this happen?" Best part of the day was spending the afternoon with my best friend - we had a good day that day.

-- Ron Collings (collings@crescentschool.org), August 15, 2000.

last year i stepped backwards off a curb, put my foot down wrong, stumbled, and broke my ankle. thats all it took, just a misstep. couldn't believe that something so minor could do so much damage!

-- nicole (nicolemrw@go.com), August 15, 2000.

I once cut my hand just below the thumb with a broken martini glass I was washing. And just before guests were to arrive! How inconvenient.

/Robert

-- Robert (rbdimmick@earthlink.net), August 15, 2000.

I broke my coccyx (tailbone) once, falling into the orchestra pit during a theatre rehearsal. I embodied the phrase "busted her ass!" for weeks. You know they can't do anything for that? Just gotta sit carefully for six to eight weeks.

-- Saundra (headspace@anywherebeyond.com), August 15, 2000.

At summer stock last year, I woke up one morning to find thathalf my face had blown up to the size of a freaking watermelon because of a "blocked salivary gland." Isn't that disgusting?

I was in Maine, so I went to the hospital (where Stephen King was recuperating from his own tragedy) and the doctor prescribed Sour Patch Kids, lemon balls, and pickles.

It worked, but not before I had to go onstage looking like a sideshow freak. At one point during the play, another character described me as "lovely" and I swear I heard someone in the audience snicker.

-- anne (annegrrl@chickmail.com), August 15, 2000.

I got my hand stuck in my Christmas-Tree stand last year. I stuck my fingers in through the little holes in the base to check the water level, and the sharp metal flange from where they punched the holes in the base caught at my knuckles. I was, of course, on my way to bed when I did this so I was wearing next to nothing. Even if I had been capable of dragging myself AND the tree across the floor to where my backpack (and cellphone) was, I was too embarrassed to call 911 to explain that I was on my floor practically naked with my hand stuck in the christmas tree - this is a small town, and I figured that story would *never* stop being told. So after about a halfhour of panic I finally just pulled as hard as I could and completely tore the skin off the outsides of my fingers. It really hurt. And the tree had plenty of water.

'Course, I also got my head stuck in the Eiffel tower once. Just ask Lee.

- "Muppet Girl"

-- "Muppet Girl" (agastache@crosswinds.net), August 16, 2000.

Oh, yeah, and I forgot to mention, that was the same time I discovered that I was allergic (by touch) to that particular type of spruce.

-- "Muppet Girl" (agastache@crosswinds.net), August 16, 2000.

O my God, I cannot believe that MuppetGirl, THE MuppetGirl, posted to my forum! How totally cool.

-- Kymm Zuckert (kymmz1@yahoo.com), August 16, 2000.

I was walking along when I suddenly fell forward and busted my face open on the sidewalk.

Another time I was walking along when I suddenly fell backward onto my butt. The force of that fall was so strong that my shoes flew off and one went out into the street.

I could give you endless variations on these stories.

My only explanation is that I must have been too busy learning how to read to learn how to walk properly.

-- Catherine (catcoicrit@earthlink.net), August 16, 2000.

I dropped my keys on the stairs leading to my apartment last year, and managed to dislocate my knee bending down to pick them up. I stooped down, heard a "CRACK!" fell backwards down the stairs (luckily there was a wall a few feet behind me, which scraped all the skin off my back when I hit it and slid down), and passed out briefly. My neighbors heard the commotion (and my shrieking -- it REALLY hurt) and called an ambulance -- they showed up along with three police cars and a fire engine, and I had to be carried down three flights of stairs while a large crowd of gawkers looked on...

-- Mary Ellen (sarcasticah@yahoo.com), August 16, 2000.

Ourside in our front yard decorating for Halloween, I ended up being bitten by a poisonous brown recluse spider (get it, halloween, spiders, etc.), little did I know what an ordeal I had ahead of me for almost a year and a half trying to save my foot and clear the infection from this spider bite. Needless to say, my new motto is "The H with Decorating Outdoors".

-- a.j. quinn (quinn30290@aol.com), August 18, 2000.

When I was ten, I was running down the hallway. Someone had apparently spilled my mother's sewing basket, because I ended up with a crochet hook jammed securely between my big toe and my next biggest toe. About an inch of it poked out the end. And it didn't hurt at all. Went completely numb.

-- Andrea (andrea47@u.washington.edu), August 21, 2000.

Hehehehehee! I once went ta a movie theater(sp?)an' they were gitting some lampin' fixed. So, I went over and watch 'hem fer abit, then they went fer lunch, so I started ta leave, but me footpaw got tangle in un o' the wires attached ta the lampin' material. So, I tried ta pull meself outa that jam en upsetted the large spot light on the boardwalk. It went flying down lik, at a terrifying speed, and me flew up lik, real fast. Hehehehe! I was stuck there, dangling by me footpaw(which hurts lik hell!!) 'til those workers came back, and then there was alot o' commotion but they got me down. Hehehehe! There's still thy markings on me ankle, ya know. *walks away but gets tangled in some lampin' material and is stuck there again*

-- Wolf (Mix@aco.com), April 27, 2001.

I have an allergy to a laundry detergent called white king D. I once put on a shirt that had been washed in it and got terrible itching so immediately took it off and hand horrible little hives that were all over where the shirt had been but where it had not was completely unblemished

-- Ray Watkins (rayadj67@hotmail.com), January 16, 2002.

I broke my heel and fractured my ankle while sledding down an ice hill and crashing into a rock with my combat boots on during Super Bowl Sunday. Spent three hours in the E.R. because my doc was watching the game.

Oh and I had to get stitches in the back of my head when I was 7 from falling out of a tree and cracked my head on a sharp rock. I also got a bruised rib from a branch that fell on me while I was blacked out. (No comparison with my Eminem story)

Then, I was three and jammed a knife thru my hand while trying to cut open a juice carton at 6 AM. Boy, Mommy wasn't happy to wake up with blood dripping on her bedsheets.

In fourth grade, 911 had to come to my school because I fell backwards on a jungle gym and knocked my head on a metal bar. I woke up to guys putting that smelly crap under my nose and my teacher near tears yelling at me to never do it again. Even though I was pushed...

I cracked my kneecap skateboarding too. First time getting on the grind rail, and I turn to yell to my friends. I fall off and bang my knee on the rail, then my skateboard wheel hits it dead on and I hear a loud cccccrrrrraaaaaaaccccccckkkkkkk. Haven't done any ollies lately and the grind rail is outta the question from now on.

(I'm pretty accident-proned)

-- Sara Parks (xstatic4@sbcglobal.net), March 10, 2003.