Safety First
You know all of those safety warnings? Those reminders to put safety first? The ones we tell our family and friends that we sometimes ignore, putting hubris above common sense? Well….K8’s window washing technique is now a cautionary tale.
Dining room bay window after exterior, dated storm window was removed.
Taking advantage of a sunny Sunday in September, K8 decided to wash the grime off of the exterior windows. The day prior, CP was able to remove all of the dated (1970s? 1980s?) exterior storms. Apparently, the installers of the newer replacement windows for previous home owners left the exterior storms alone. Some of these storms had one window remaining while others had both upper and lower windows as well as screens. Washing the windows on that sunny Sunday seemed like a great idea.
Here’s everything K8 got right:
bucket of water with a few drops of Dawn dishwashing soap
squeegee
rags
… and here’s everything K8 got wrong:
https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/reviews/best-ladders/
used the wrong ladder (step ladder like the one on the far right)
worked solo
placed ladder on uneven surface
didn’t use her brain
Rather than an extension ladder or a step ladder with a reinforced base, K8 used a standard 12’ step ladder. It seemed pretty simple at the time. Why not get something done while CP took a well-deserved nap on the front porch with Bailey?
Washing the first two side-by-side kitchen windows was a breeze, and pretty gross. These windows had not been washed for ten years at least. No wonder the kitchen seemed so dark!
Things went wrong when K8 moved on to the dining room’s exterior three bay windows: the concrete pad between the rows was uneven, debris from the reno didn’t help, and the three foot space between the houses at the bays was narrow— the neighboring window air conditioner reduced space between the bays to about three feet. Did K8 stop her mission or ask for help at this point? No. She remained committed to the mission.
https://ladderassociation.org.uk/guidance/using-a-ladder/
Had K8 taken one minute, just a single minute, to google the right and wrong ways to use ladders, she would have found great graphics like the one above online. Instead, standing on the ladder about five feet above the ground to wash the first bay, K8 leaned too far over for the already jeopardized position of the ladder and fell to the ground onto concrete and demo debris. The left heel took the brunt of the fall and then the damage followed up the left side of her body to knee, hip, elbow, shoulder and head.
K8’s hollered profanities and CP came running. Several passersby expressed concern and willingness to help, too. Way to go West Philadelphians! After K8 was able to catch her breath and to fight back nausea, CP and sixteen-year-old Theo put K8’s arms around their shoulders to carry her to the car and to take her to the ER at HUP.
And then the second mistake of the day happened: we went to the wrong University of Pennsylvania ER. We went to the general ER at the Hospital of University of Pennsylvania (HUP) at 1 Convention Avenue rather than the trauma ER at Penn Presbyterian Medical Center Emergency Room (Presby) at 51 N. 39th Street. It ended up taking six hours to get K8 admitted and into a bed at HUP where she could be horizontal instead of upright in a wheelchair. She was transferred to Penn Presby the next morning via ambulance—her first ambulance ride!—for trauma care.
Sunday was mostly spent in the ER. The fall occurred at 12:30, ER checkin at 1:30, xrays at 3:30, and hospitalization around 6:30. At some points along the way, an orthopedist wrapped K8’s broken heel bone (calcaneous) in a Bulky Jones splint (upper right image) and K8 wore a neck brace until a concussion could be ruled out (upper left image).
Over the next days many xrays, an MRI, a CAT scan, and blood tests were taken and provide pretty extensive health baseline. On Wednesday 09.21, K8 was discharged with a bag of medicines, a porta-toilet, and walker and stopped on the way home to borrow a knee scooter from a friend. Those Philly disintegrating streets with pot holes made for a rough ride home. The next tasks:
See orthopedics to look at K8’s left heel next week and to replace the Bulky Jones splint with something smaller and lighter
See neurosurgery to look at K8’s broken L1 vertebrae in a week or two
Remain horizontal in bed or wear back brace while active or sitting for the next six weeks
Short term: CP got to work on installing a toilet on the first floor last night (Wednesday, September 21)!
Long term: K8 will have time to update cpk8renovate chronicles.
We are so grateful to the staffs at HUP and Presby for their extraordinary care and kindness. If everyone had the same dispositions as medical personnel—doctors, nurses, PAs, social workers, transit operators, food servers, …—we’d all live in a gentler world. These people are amazing.