Excerpts from the Book "You Can't Make This Shit Up" Chapter "Strange Things That Happen Only to Katrina"

Yes, that's right. Strange things happen to me and only me. Things I don't think I deserve. I think they happen because there are many things I DO deserve that don't happen. An example would be that I should probably have been bitten or eaten by a six gill shark while chumming and photographing them in 100 feet of water at night in cold Puget Sound water an arm's length away. I probably should have been the one to fall off the rope in Cueva Cucaracha since I was the first one up. I probably should have been stuck in a crevice in a cave by now out of reach of other people since I do tend to go into those places. So what things have happened to me?

You may recall that when we first moved here I was smacked on the inner thigh (close to my lady parts) by a falling coconut just about as I was starting to dream in the nice, warm sun. The smack down happened at Crash Boat where I purposely put my chair NOT directly under a cluster of coconuts. I ended up with an interesting bruise and have since had two other close calls when coconuts have fallen and missed me by a couple inches. You may recall my whipping. The cats had enough good sense to stay away from the iguana but no, I had to photograph its evil looking leg....up close. I didn't even see it happen, I heard the crack of a whip and had a perfect slice mark around my entire calf. You may recall my cock fighting adventure. I was offering my rooster Big Red a treat when I was stabbed by his huge nail-of-a-back-claw and had blood dripping out of a hole in my shin. Apparently our other rooster is what "spurred" jaja the attack.

Well, today's installment occurred on July 4th at night. There weren't any fireworks at all except when I was shot by none other than my husband with the BB gun. Yup, shot in the upper thigh by my dear old spouse (yes it was an accident). We saw a pack of mean dogs coming toward our house and we weren't sure all the cats were inside the compound (dam cats). I have to say we are complete animal schmucks, total animal lovers, and animal rescuers. If you live in PR you do understand the roaming-mean-dog syndrome. Dogs kill cats here. That could be what happened to Bepo and Princess. Jeff was reaching for the BB gun to give the dogs a light pop (even just the sound spooks them) when something went wrong and he shot me instead. I was/am pretty pissed off about it. It really stung a bunch and then burned and bled and oozed all night. Then the spouse thinks it'll be ok just to put hydrogen peroxide on it. Yeah, right.

The next morning off he goes to work (the clod)) and I contemplate whether or not to get a tetanus shot. The last one I had was before our Papua New Guinea trip (where we got held up by men with all kinds of guns who approached us in a dugout canoe). With all the caving and diving and gardening and other opportunities we have for getting disgusting things ground into our skin I figure I should. At that point it was still oozing clear liquid so I got out the camera and photographed it and then zoomed in. What I saw was a shiny metal bit. I figured I better go somewhere because if it gets infected that means I am out of the caves and water even longer. First though I sterilized the tweezers and started digging in what was a pretty deep hole. I took out a couple pieces of aluminum screen! Now I have to figure out where to go. Our car window is still smashed out from the last caving adventure so I have to figure out where to go where I can park safely. I end up going conveniently to a Primary Care guy in the same building I get lab work done in. It is only 15 minutes from the house. He sees me right away, tells me he sees fibers (my sweat pants) in the hole and that it is deep. He gives me a shot and then in goes an instrument with a magnet, then some tweezers, then some little cutters. These suckers are at least a 1/2 inch in. He gets it cleaned out but now I have to go to the drugstore to get the vial of tetanus shot stuff, come back so he can administer it, then go back and get antibiotics and an anti bacterial cream. This involved 20 minutes of waiting, 45 minutes of cleaning/digging - all in all around 3 hours to get this little mishap taken care of. Yeah, just put hydrogen peroxide on it. So now I have a nice hole in my leg and can't do fun things until it heals. Thanks honey.

So this weekend we worked on covering an area for my "shade cloth covered garden" and continued working on clearing across the street to restore our awesome view. The next post will be more upbeat updates on projects! Guess I'll go lick my wounds until the next installment. Seriously, you can't make this shit up! Next day I see metal. The BB itself I smooched out with my thumb the night it happened. Hole and bruise with puffy red circle-o-skin then better looking but still a hole. Yes that's a bruise (not betadine). So don't play with guns or you'll get what's coming to ya!

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