I know this story is not going to come across as funny as it seemed when it was told to me. I just don’t think I can do it justice!
Have you ever had a friend tell you a story and they break down in tears of laughter to the extent that they find it hard to control themselves? You can barely make out what they are saying because they are giggling so much and their whole face and neck is crimsoning as the hilarity overwhelms them?
One of the wildest tales I remember is from a first aid refresher course. The instructor, Tina, was a friend of mine. She was teaching the class about various injuries and how to deal with them, and one of those was “impalement”. She asked if anyone could think of an example of how someone might be impaled. A young man in the class named Max started laughing. Max said to Tina, “do you remember what happened to Jim?”
Before long both Tina and Max were bent sideways laughing, both with crimson faces as they tried to tell the rest of us the story while they laughed uncontrollably. I did not know Jim well, but I knew he was the maintenance manager of the complex, within which the first aid course was being held. Max was a member of the maintenance team. It was an enormous property so there were a number of plumbers, electricians, joiners, decorators etc.
With beautiful timing, there was a knock on the door of the classroom and who should pop their head round the door but Jim! He needed some keys that Max had. As soon as they saw Jim, Tina and Max were in hysterics. Max told Jim that we were learning about impalement injuries.
“Oh you goon – you’re not telling them what happened to me in Russia are you?”
In the end it was Jim who told us the story, and even he was laughing. Between the three of them the information I managed to absorb was that Jim was on a construction project in Russia during the colder months. It was very cold, very very cold. Jim’s glove had become stuck to something, because of the freezing conditions. In the attempt to disconnect himself, which he managed to do, the force made him lose his balance and he toppled over and landed on a metal spike. The spike impaled him through the buttocks.
Later on in hospital, Jim was told the spike had narrowly avoided going through the essential passage, and he had got away with a rather deep gouge in the more padded part of his plumpish behind.
He had to have his dressings changed by a team of Russian nurses for some time before the wound had healed completely. He had some stories about a couple of the nurses too, but I will leave those out of this post.
It’s one of those wild tales when you kind of had to be there to appreciate Jim and his impaled buttocks.
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This was my post in response to the writing prompt from Sarah Elizabeth Moore:
Caramel 