When A Man Shat On My Hand

I promised when I did the post 'Seven Things...' that I would explain how I once allowed a man to shit in the palm of my hand. It seems a good time to write about this sort of thing because it is pretty much the first anniversary of my blog and this sort of subject is pretty much where I started. I started writing my blog when I had time on my hands, having been in hospital for a while. One of my most popular early posts, The Fug and the Time had a particularly faecal theme.

Twenty six years ago I was a callow Student Nurse learning the rudiments of care: bed making with hospital corners, cleanliness, bed bathing and other basics. These were the days of starched sheets and patients who had to look tidy, I remember the protests of patients who liked to lounge in their beds, sheets askew, only to be told by Sister that they could not possibly be comfortable sat like that and made, at her insistence, to sit up straight.

Whilst bed bathing a man who had recently had both of his legs removed, we were in the process of changing his sheets. This was achieved by rolling him over to one side of the bed, changing the sheet on the other, bunching up the remainder of the clean sheet in the middle then rolling him over the lump onto the clean side whilst the other nurse changed the other half. We had just rolled him on to the clean side and I was smoothing the wrinkles out of the clean sheet when the movement must have taken its toll on his insides, "Nurse, I've got to go to the toilet...NOW". Before my colleague had returned at high speed with a commode he added with some urgency, "There's some coming..." and sure enough the evidence presented itself.

Here is where it becomes apparent to what extent the sanctity of clean sheets and orderliness had been impressed into us, because I instinctively grabbed a clean wipe from the trolley and, as if diving for the catch that would save the Ashes, allowed the offending item to land in my hand. Wanting to be sure that there was no more to come before we transferred him to the bedside commode, I asked "Have you done?..."
His reply indicated that he had misinterpreted my question and actually thought I was offering an even higher degree of service than that to which he had become accustomed:
"Ah, thanks lad, there's more where that came from, nnnnnnnhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh", and with that deposited a load that any man would have been proud of into my waiting hand.

So there you have it, a man shat in my hand. I often wonder whether his misunderstanding caused any future embarrassing moments for him or my colleagues during bed baths as he marvelled at the quality of service that allowed a man to shit without having to leave his pit.

Happy Birthday to my blog!

Seven Things You Didn't Know About Me and Probably Will Not Benefit From Having Learnt

Thanks to Tracey for tagging me with this meme. It is the sort of theme that runs the risk of revealing too much or of being completely inconsequential - I will do my best to strike a happy medium (I shuddered then as I recalled a Ken Dodd joke involving Doris Stokes).

Here are the seven things you didn't know about me:

1. It has at times been convenient to attribute the slightly broken appearance of the bridge of my nose, to a life of toughness and masculine pursuits. The truth is that it attained its slightly wobbly look during a mid-playground collision with Andrew McLung at Stansfield Rd. County Primary School, Failsworth around 1968.

2. Whilst at sixth form of Chadderton Grammar School I shaved a chunk out of my hairline to emulate my then hero Peter Gabriel. It did not have the effect I desired and considering that I had shoulder length hair at the time, the appearance of a tuft sprouting from my forehead, as it grew back, was definitely not a look I desired.

3. I once almost circumcised myself - accidentally. On a trip to the pantomime at Oldham Coliseum I found myself caught midst pee, when the warning bell sounded for the end of the interval. Being far from confident in my ability to relocate my seat in the dark I rushed the proceedings and caught my little foreskin in the zip of my trousers. Further panicked at the zip's refusal to budge either up or down I forced it - I draw a veil over the remainder of the proceedings for the sake of all men reading this post.

4. Having been invited to a Tarts and Vicars party at short notice and having already drunk a couple or so cans of Breaker, I searched for a suitable dress in my mum's wardrobe. Only many years later have I realised that there were two reasons for her displeasure, not simply the fact of my having stretched the waistband beyond its usable limit (she was a size 10 -12; I am more of a 16). It was also, I now realise, the fact of my having considered her best lacy black dress as being suitable for wearing by a tart that upset her.

5. I once allowed a man to shit in the palm of my hand. This is worth a blog post in itself. I say no more, for now.

6. When I was a student nurse we resented the prestige given to even the most junior house officer compared to the nurses who by and large were treated as skivvies despite the high level of skill and expertise they possessed; and, I must add, the amount of time they spent getting junior doctors out of the poop by telling them what they ought to do in certain circumstances. This prejudicial approach extended outside of hospital too; for example when we dined regularly in a long since gone Indian restaurant on King St in Oldham - I forget the name - the staff found it inconceivable that I was a nurse and not a doctor. Clearly a young man surrounded by a bevy of young attractive nurses must be a doctor. I am ashamed to say that we hammed it up to the extent that Doctor Steve and his harem were treated like royalty and afforded many privileges well beyond the odd free pappadum or two.

7. I am fond of saying to people, whilst adopting a tough, manly expression and glowering from beneath my life furrowed brow, "The last bloke that assaulted me is dead." Combined with the wonky nose I mentioned earlier you can imagine the intended effect. What I habitually fail to mention is that although the expression is in all ways true, the poor sod who hit me died of a heroin overdose 2 years after his encounter with me.

That's your lot; all that remains is for me to tag five more people. I am going to cheat a little as you shall see -

1. Mr Woppit: if you haven't read his excellent blog, you should.

2. Bill Blunt: we haven't heard from him for a while and I would like to hear things we didn't know about the ageing hack.

3. Mystic Veg: It would be good to hear seven unknown vegetable vignettes from the allotment plot doc.

4. (here starts the cheating) The Fuel My Blog Blog writers - I want to know seven things about the excellent FMB website that we didn't know

5. (and here is the other cheaty bit) Lisa - who doesn't write a blog. I challenge Lisa to add seven pictures to her excellent Flickr site that tell us things about her we didn't know.

P.S. the hits I get based on the labels I've added to this post should be interesting - I'll let you know.