Everything was Going Well...Until I Fell

I was doing the field work for the kind of blog that my readers like - taking a tour of individual home gardens.  I was having a wonderful time making new friends, casually interviewing home owners, and snapping a zillion flower pix for my flower lover readers.  As we left one house, the local postman was raving about this old house on Crockett (one of the few named streets in Logan) which had a marvelous garden.  My friends and I found ourselves driving by Crockett Street and decided to find the house.  It was everything the postman said, so Joyce and I hopped out to take a few quick pictures while Connie waited in car. It's been unseasonably warm here, and she was hot. 

Walking up to the curb, my bifocals saw one curb when there were actually two.  My clutczy self took over, and I tripped.  I didn't fall immediately; instead, I took two or three off balanced running steps trying to get rebalanced.  It didn't work.  Clutching my camera in one hand, I hit the pavement - hard - face first.  Joyce, standing right next to me at the time, said my head bounced off the pavement like a golf ball. 

My face above my eye had an instant goose egg.  In five seconds time, I went from a smooth countenance to a 2" bump popping out of my face.  My glasses, my new $500 pair of glasses, had smashed into my face.  Laying on the sidewalk, I was stunned.  Then, the pain started, and the blood started.  Fortunately, there wasn't too much blood.  Unbelieveably, my lens only cut a couple of small slices in my eyebrow.  Above my kneecaps were burned and slightly abraded, but my knee caps seemed OK.  Elbows fine.  I started to breathe a little easier, and my friends went into action.  Joyce obtained ice and a cloth from a lady across the street, and Connie started mopping up the blood with Kleenexes.  We all agreed that I need to get HOME.  

I was back home within 15 minutes of falling; and then the adrenaline wore off.  I really hate that feeling, all nauseated and shaky.  I began to notice that perhaps I hadn't gotten off scot free after all.......  Within 30 minutes we were at the hospital to make sure I hadn't broken any bones in my face or my hand which had belatedly began hurting even through ice packs.  But the worst of all, my bad foot with it's artificial joint was screaming at me.  Too late, I began to ice it, but it continued to swell.

I was pretty miserable most of the night.  This morning I have a deluxe shiner, my hand is swollen, my shoulder joint is hurting, and my foot is screaming with pain when I try to walk.  Of course, I'm borrowing trouble, and worrying that I've damaged that artificial joint, but in truth, the swelling is making the damaged nerves hurt in a way they haven't hurt for more than five years.  I can barely walk, but my typing ability has returned.  I'm icing and icing and icing.  Drake isn't letting me walk any more than I have to.  

Other bad news, my camera is toast.  It hit the ground when I did, and it's mortally wounded.  The good news is that the flower pictures were already saved.  I'm not putting up any pictures of myself because I really look battered.  I don't want to scare any little children.  This all just really sucks.

On the positive note:  Here are the flowers.     https://picasaweb.google.com/jalyss1/2012UtahFlowers?authkey=Gv1sRgCJbc44Xtj8m_pAE#5757763928024853794