Well, that has a whole new meaning for me after this week.
It all started when I agreed to sit in a dunk tank to raise money for the United Way.
Of course, me being me, I just had to raise more money than anyone else. The problem was that I am still a newcomer to Door County. When you consider that the other "dunkees" were folks like the Chief of Police, the Mayor, Miss Door County, etc. - I was at a distinct disadvantage. I'd only been working with the Door County Community Foundation for a five months and it normally takes at least six before folks want to stick my head under water.
So I figured if I was going to raise any money, I'd have to engage the crowd meandering down Third Avenue for the little bazaar on Thursday.
That started by dressing up a bit differently than most...
They told us dunkees to wear a suit - so I figured why go with the "swim" kind and picked a "three piece" type instead.
Then I did my best to playfully tease the little kids to get them to beg their parents for the money to dunk me, including my own...
Above is Nalani who ran up to press the target after she hit it, but not hard enough to drop me in.
Then Malia joined in and dropped me in the tank...
Eventually all my kids threw the balls, and that started a trend with lots of other kids.
We were raising some money!
Now before you get into this odd contraption, they give you a little safety briefing to keep you from doing something stupid.
The thing you are supposed to be most aware off is the little plank that you sit on. If you're sitting too far back on it you can hit your back or the back of your head on plank as you fall into the water. The trick is to slide yourself forward and sit on the very edge of the plank.
So each time I got out of the water and climbed back out on the plank, I would grab the safety bars that surrounded me (to keep me from getting hit by an errant throw of the ball) to pull myself to the very tip of the plank. Here I am getting myself reset...
So my fingers are between the bars, pulling myself forward - and unfortunately, one exuberant little boy who couldn't have been more than 8 years old decided to throw.
And wouldn't you know that he hit the bulleye and down I went.
Unfortunately, my left hand was still between the bars and as I dropped, my wedding ring got lodged between the bars in a freak accident.
So down went my body while my wedding ring tried to hold my finger behind.
But it was all for charity, so I guess I really did give 'til it hurt...
As I fell, the ring tried to slide off my finger - and while it normally slides off quite easy, the awkward angle made it impossible to do so easily. So the ring basically acted like the peeler and started to pull back the skin on my finger from the base up.
I wanted to scream, but all I could think of was the little kid who threw the ball, all the other kids in line, and my kids standing off to the side. So when I jumped out of the water to scream, it went something like, "AAAAAAAAhhhhhhhnice throw young maaaaaaaaaaaaaannnnnnn!"
Nobody seemed to notice I was in pain - probably becauase I had been acting like an idiot to raise money up until then - so I climbed out of the tank and jumped off the platform.
Since the city had shut down the street for the bazaar, the fireman were on the scene in case anyone did something stupid like try to peel the skin off their finger with their wedding ring.
The EMT thought the finger might be broken at the joint and it was all quite gross. He took me to the jewelry store next door to get the ring cut off immediately and here is all that's left of it (on my thumb below)...
So it was off to the hospital.
Of course, remember now, I'm wearing a dress suite completely soaked in water. I had been in the tank for about 20 minutes by the point of the accident, so the suit was really, really heavy.
And since my gruesome finger was excruciatingly painful, there was no way I was going to slide off that suit coat.
So it was with soaking wet clothes that I sat on the bed in the emergency room. Eventually, of course, everything got cleaned up, x-rayed, and bandaged. I have a really bad strain, but nothing is broken and the skin wasn't too bad. The doctor pointed out that I was actually rather lucky.
Cari brought me some dry clothes, but I couldn't help but think that everyone would look at the hospital bed and conclude that I peed in my pants...
My lovely wife being ever prepared, was sure to bring me a hanger for my soaking wet suit...
Of coure, I had my own ideas for the suit...
This is the best part of all the pain...
Gotta feel mellow filled with all those narcotics.
Malia and Nalani had completely worn themselves out over the adventure...
I just loved how Kekoa crossed his legs and just read in the backseat on the way home from the hospital.
David, ever the artist, captured the whole escapade with a little sketch...
Note the little ambulance at the bottom of his picture.
Kekoa said the lesson was that you should never get in a dunk tank.
Hmmm. That might not be bad advice.
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