Dismemberment Insurance and Other Mishaps
Iqaluit Aquatic Centre. The king of overkill on useless things and bottom of the barrel trash equipment for the important things. This pool owns six boxes of splint padding (enough for probably 400 splints) and exactly four pocket masks. Three automatic vacuums and one industrial manual vacuum, but only one roll of waterproof tape. Enough water features to rival a big city pool, but no washing machine. A nearly perfect automated chemical system, but shockingly poor quality and delicate lane ropes and flag lines. A floor scrubbing machine, but a hot tub with capacity for only seven people. About 300 ice packs, and ONE box of 100 regular-sized bandaids. The pool owns one box of nitrile gloves. The things that the recreation department chooses to spend money on are beyond strange, and yet another proof of that is the kinds of insurance that its workers need to have. Life insurance. Health Insurance. Dental insurance. Accidental Death and Dismemberment insurance. How could one possibly experience dismemberment in a pool? I encounter no sharp objects at work aside from keys and the occasional scissors.
As it turns out, scissors could probably cause dismemberment if handled correctly (or incorrectly enough). My left hand index finger can attest to that today. If I put a band-aid on my finger most days, underneath it would be skin, blood, muscle, and bone, in that order. Today, the order is band-aid, blood, bone. Marcus (the chemical and maintenance guy here) has been on vacation for just over a week, leaving me to do the chemicals and let the rest of the building fall to disrepair (I can do an oil change, but not much else to do with maintenance of any sort). On Saturday morning, while cutting open a bag of chemicals with one side of a broken pair of scissors as a knife, my hand slipped and I chopped into my finger. The bone stopped the knife, keeping me from complete dismemberment. I ran upstairs (again with the confusing recreation spending- the chemical room doesn't have a first aid kit. I intend to change that this week), attempting to control the bleeding, left a trail of blood all up the stairs and across the deck to the guard office, and wrapped up my finger in paper to towel to catch the blood (easier to get with blood everywhere than gauze). When the bleeding slowed down, I cleaned the cut and applied a band-aid, then went downstairs and cut open another bag of chemicals more carefully.
Other mishaps occurred yesterday, but none as dramatic as my near-dismemberment. I've used that word a lot this post, and I refuse to stop. It is a good word, that makes an injury involving scissors sound much more life-threatening.
Should probably refuse to use scissors at work now, under my right to refuse dangerous work.
- Aliya
As it turns out, scissors could probably cause dismemberment if handled correctly (or incorrectly enough). My left hand index finger can attest to that today. If I put a band-aid on my finger most days, underneath it would be skin, blood, muscle, and bone, in that order. Today, the order is band-aid, blood, bone. Marcus (the chemical and maintenance guy here) has been on vacation for just over a week, leaving me to do the chemicals and let the rest of the building fall to disrepair (I can do an oil change, but not much else to do with maintenance of any sort). On Saturday morning, while cutting open a bag of chemicals with one side of a broken pair of scissors as a knife, my hand slipped and I chopped into my finger. The bone stopped the knife, keeping me from complete dismemberment. I ran upstairs (again with the confusing recreation spending- the chemical room doesn't have a first aid kit. I intend to change that this week), attempting to control the bleeding, left a trail of blood all up the stairs and across the deck to the guard office, and wrapped up my finger in paper to towel to catch the blood (easier to get with blood everywhere than gauze). When the bleeding slowed down, I cleaned the cut and applied a band-aid, then went downstairs and cut open another bag of chemicals more carefully.
Other mishaps occurred yesterday, but none as dramatic as my near-dismemberment. I've used that word a lot this post, and I refuse to stop. It is a good word, that makes an injury involving scissors sound much more life-threatening.
Should probably refuse to use scissors at work now, under my right to refuse dangerous work.
- Aliya
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