Cold from fire, hot from ice

A week of extremes.

Cooking on Monday night, I should have paid more than passing notice to the slight whiff of burning-plastic-smell in the kitchen while I was cooking. I presumed it was something on the cooktop giving off fumes. When I picked up the two-handled saucepan in which I had been boiling the rice, however, I discovered that what had been heating up had been one of the handles. Hand burning. Let go of handle. Saucepan falls to stovetop water splashes boilingwaterfliesupintomyface. It is always particularly disturbing to hear the scream of a man when you realise it is your own voice.

Fortunately I was wearing glasses at the time, which prevented the boiling water getting in my eyes. My lower face however was scalded. Being well-educated kiwis who are taught to know such things, Bronwyn and my housemates made me follow good burn management procedures: 10 minutes of running (ice cold) tap water from our shower nozzle was directed at my face, till I was numb with cold. After that, a 10 minute break to prevent frostbite. Almost as soon as I stopped I could feel the sting of the burn again. Then back to another 10 minutes of running icy H-two-0h. Pause. (Rinse.) Repeat. In all, 30 minutes of running water were applied, hunched over the bath, over the next hour. After the final dose as the numbness cleared the stinging was noticeably reduced. A couple of days later, I'm still a little sensitive around the goatee, and my lips are dried out which I think is from the burns, but I'm fine and the numbness from my treatment is fading!

Last night I went out with my workmates from one of the teams I work in, 1.5 days a week. Our longest serving therapist, Kerryn, is leaving to go back to South Africa and this is her last week. For her send off, we went out for dinner and then headed down to Guildford to go ice skating! I'd been just once before, many years ago with friends Craig and Nigel in Christchurch. I was pretty pants (it's an English expression, live with it), but had a good time. I did manage to hit the ice, roll and hydroplane at one point, which was exciting, but otherwise had to content myself with wobbling round the rink. Surprising finding: you get really hot when you're ice skating. Who would have thought?

Kerryn's departure is sad and I will miss her, though it'll be nice for her to be home. She is the longest serving therapist in our team (she's an OT). She's in fact been filling her current position for 18 months now, as a locum because the hospital hasn't been able to recruit a permanent staff member in all that time! Even though I feel like a new arrival round here, with her departure I become the longest serving member of the therapy staff there. (Not so in my other team, which is much more stable.) Even worse, it is possible that I will be the only member of that current team that is still around by 1 June, with various other posts being currently filled by locums or being junior staff that rotate. Bizarre. The NHS is doing what they can to recruit new staff though, with a broad advertising campaign underway... This illuminated Bus Stop sign reminds us that, (as I'm sure you already know), “being a Maxillo-Facial Prosthetist is a fulfilling and rewarding career.” No doubt true. I am, however, pleased to have not required the services of one after my cooking incident on Monday. No doubt if I had seen one, she would have been a locum.