Friday, December 09, 2005

bead & bandaid

Last year Maude stuck a bead up her nose. I tried to get it out with tweazers, but I couldn't. Gabby took her to the emergency room. The emergency room doctors couldn't get it out with their grab-nabber. They called in one of those, oh what's the word? That's right, autorhinolaryngologist, so he tried with the provided grab-nabber, but couldn't get it, Then, Oh Fortuna! he had his very own special custom made grab-nabber and he retracted the bead. Maude is much more cautious about sticking things up her nose now.

Olive isn't nearly as cautious. Why, just this last Tuesday, at Pre-school, she sneezed out a rolled up bandaid. She was super excited to show it to her pre-school teacher. She put it in her pocket so she could show us when she got home also. She had put the bandaid up there on Sunday. When we asked about how it got there, first she said that the wind blew it up into her nose. She did come clean a minute later and confessed to putting it up there herself. She thought she had swallowed it, so we didn't worry.

The difference between Olive and Maude in sticking things up their noses is really just a matter of degree of deliberation. Maude sticking a bead up her nose is a pretty deliberate act. It is (more or less) difficult to get a bead up your nose accidentally. But Olive had a rolled up bandaid up there, so she had to first scrunch up the bandaid into a little ball and then cram it up her nose. More deliberate. Of course the remaining question now is which is generally more enticing? Off hand you might say the bead--of course everyone wants to put a bead up his nose. But now that you know you can get a rolled up bandaid up there, keep it for two days then sneeze it out? It has its own appeal, doesn't it?

8 comments:

  1. All those who have put strange objects in their nose as a child raise your hand.

    That's what I thought. For me, it was a chewable vitamin C. Lucky for me, my mom was able to get it out. I was so scared and worried that she was going to have to take me to the hospital.

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  2. Anonymous3:58 PM

    Mine was a small plastic piece of something. Looked kinda like a chad from a hole punch, but it was plastic. I did have to go to the hospital, and they stuck a long plastic tube up my nose and all the way through my sinuses to push anything in it out into my throat. Hurt so bad.

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  3. Anonymous8:44 PM

    holy crap i laughed so hard at this post, so awesome.

    i'll let them confirm and clarify, but i believe my little sister jordan sneezed out a raisin or something in sunday school, and my little brother swallowed a penny or put it in his nose or something like that.

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  4. Anonymous5:59 AM

    The best part about Jordan's story is that she came running down the hallway at church screaming, "I sneezed that pea! I sneezed the pea!"

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  5. When I was four, I stuck a pencil up my nose and the eraser tip broke off. I still remember being strapped to the hospital bed while they extracted it.

    Now I only use pens.

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  6. Anonymous3:36 PM

    There are similarities between Olive's story and Jordan's: being thrilled with the removal and wanting to show it off.

    The difference I see between the two stories is that Gab and Ben took their daughter (Maude) to the hospital when there was a knowledge that something was lodged, while in Jordan's story the whole family knew about the raisin and we took her, not to the hospital but to nursery at church.

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  7. Jared is right, I swallowed a penny in first grade and it almost blocked my windpipe. I was watching a a show on the Disney Channel (this was when the cable company would give us the premium channels for a week, just to tempt us). I had lost both of my front teeth and had a penny vertically clenched between my teeth. The show was interactive, I forget what it was called, but you would do exercises with a parent, Jordan and I were following along and the penny slipped into my mouth and I swallowed it. I remember panicking and having to focus to breath. I also remember mom making me put on my khaki church pants before we went to the hospital. The put me to sleep and sucked the penny out with a vacuum. I can assure you my story was unintentional. I did not mean to swallow the penny. I was pretty proud of the extraction though. I brought the x-ray to Mrs. Perkins class for show-and-tell.

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  8. The comments really bum me out. I was hoping your post was a reflection of whacky Blair genes, but, apparently, no such luck. Go, Stanleys!

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