Thwarted twice over

I got up early to run this morning, but when I realized that the garden didn't get watered last night, I ended up taking care of that.  More than an hour later, my running time was gone and I found myself rushing to get to work by 8 AM.

This afternoon, things were going pretty well. We were allowed to leave a little early today, and when I got home, I found myself adjusting to the fact that I don't have any homework to do.  I had started soup when I was home over lunch, so I decided to make some bread. Of course, in our house, making bread is more than baking a loaf.  When all was done, we had three large whole wheat sandwich loaves, a wheat batard, and four French baguettes.  In addition, I reserved half a batch of wheat dough to retard in the refrigerator, and used the other to grill up some flat bread to eat with the soup.  My formulation came out far better than I expected--the flat bread puffed perfectly, making them wonderful, homemade pocket-style pita bread.  All seemed wonderful, and all was wonderful.

Then, it happened.  As we sat down for dinner and Mrs. F served bowls of extremely hot Cajun-seasoned soup, our four year old daughter tipped her bowl out onto her belly.  Her wail made it clear it was no push from a brother or a minor injury.  We rushed her into the bathroom, and I had her lay down in the bathtub.  We got her shirt off, and immediately started applying cold water.  Given the location, the upper part of her abdomen, it would have been tough to immerse the burned area.  We took a wet rag, laid it across the burn (about 2" by 8"), and kept pouring cold water on the rag.  Her screaming and wailing was... She was inconsolable.  In time, she said her fingers hurt, too, so we soaked them in a cup.  We let the tub fill part way with cold water, and kept her in as long as she could stand it.  Then, getting her out of the tub, I loosely wrapped a cold, wet triangular bandage around her trunk. [Thanks, Mrs. F--They were a great birthday gift, and they've proven useful, too.]  It was clear that some blisters were developing, so we headed in to the emergency room.

To make a long story short, our daughter is okay and I didn't get my run.  Because we cooled the wound so quickly (and for so long), by the time the ER doctor took a look, she was left with a line of relatively mild second degree burns.  The rest of the 2"x8" area looked like normal skin again.  Had we not cooled her so soon and so long, she likely would have blistered over a larger area.

She's in bed now, with a bit of medicated ointment and a fresh bandage on.  I'm trying to wind down, and wondering how cool it will be in the morning.  My plans to run today were thwarted twice, but tomorrow dawns a new day.