BLOOPER AWARD

I'll admit that most of the stuff I write is supposed to be just a little bit serious.  It may not turn out that way, but it's supposed to be.

That will not be the case here.

Over the desk in my office I have hung a few awards that I have been given over the years.  There is the plaque that I got from the Calera Eagles Football team back in 1980 for "service" given to the Eagles as Athletic Trainer. 

There is one there from the Clanton Jaycees from 1986  which calls me an "Outstanding young man".  I really didn't think I was young back then, but from this vantage point I think they were right, at least I was a young man, not sure how "outstanding I was.

One plaque that always gets attention is a plaque from the Clanton Fire Department.  It is simple enough, just like most plaques.  It says "Presented to Bill Collum 2000, Blooper award.  But on the plaque beside the wording is the gold plated depiction of a donkey's butt.

I've always said that if one could write a book about the funny stuff that happened in emergency services that it would be a best seller.  I know that emergency's are not supposed to be funny...but quite often the things that happen are very funny!  The story of how I received this award is one of those times.

It was mid-winter.  The fire department was accustomed to getting heart attack, stroke, wreck and fire calls during the night.  We were also often awaken from out sleep to "assist a person".  This could be anything from taking a blood pressure, comforting someone who is afraid or picking up someone out of the floor.  That was what this call was all about. 

It seems that an elderly couple had gone to sleep in their separate beds that night.  The tiny little man, we'll call him Pop, slept in his twin bed on one side of the little room.  His, shall we say, "plus -sized" wife, we will call her Mom, slept in her bed across from him.  This arrangement of the beds left a small space between the beds.  It was into this small space that Mom, rolling off of the bed, had fallen into. 

When we arrived, we found her, still face down, clad only in her thin night gown, groaning and complaining. 

"I've been laying here 3 hours", she mumbled.  "He couldn't figure out how to call 911"! It was difficult to hear her clearly because she lay face down in her house shoes her arms at her side pinned between the two beds.

The poor little husband just stood there at the foot of the bed, hands folded looking more like a little boy being scolded by the teacher.

I took a sheet from the bed and covered her.  I knew she must be cold.  It was about that time that the ambulance crew came in.  They always respond to assist.  Charlie, one of the attendants walked into the room, moved toward the lady and promptly stepped on her toe which was now warmly snuggled under the sheet. 

"AW"!, she yelled, "Are you trying to kill me"?

We tried to refrain from laughing at her for her blood curdling yell and at Charlie for dancing around trying not to get on her toes.

This was not my first rodeo.  I had often been called upon to picked up over-weight people.  So quickly I moved into position at the head of the patient telling several of the other guys to fall in along side so we could "hopefully" lift big "Mom" back onto the bed. 

When we were all in place, because I was at the head of the patient and in command of the move, I said, "Ok men, we will lift on three".  I begin to count. "One", the guys were in position.  "Two", they braced for the big lift..."Three" we moved as a well oiled machine.....except.

As I begin my movement to lift "Mom's" head, my left elbow hit a glass of water which had been sitting on the night stand between the beds.  If you have ever watched the old TV show, Six Million Dollar Man you may remember when the hero was supposed to be doing something really fast, the scene would go into slow motion.  There would be a little beeping sound and then the task would be accomplished.

Well, it was sort of like that.  The water glass started to fall, we all stopped lifting and tried to catch it, we moved in slow motion.  The glass hit the top of the night stand and the cold water poured out onto the back of "Mom's" head and ran down into her slippers. 

"Help, I'm drowning", Mom screamed out.  It was over.  No one could lift at all.  We were doubled over laughing at the over sized lady, face down in her slippers, now "drowning" in the ice water.

No, we didn't leave her there.  We regained our professionalism and lifted her back onto her bed.  As we left she was still going on about her stupid little husband, the clumsy ambulance driver and the ......well, you get the idea of the donkey's butt on the plaque now don't you?