Damn Kenya Airways!

Last night Ann and I had to miss dinner with another local couple and old friends from Laguna Woods.  It was all Kenya Airways’ fault.

At 4:30, I showered and shaved to go downtown to meet, dine and then attend the Summer Chamber Festival recital and concert.  I noted my nose hairs needed a trim – yes, those obnoxious nose hairs old guys grow.  I clipped away and then . . . I nipped soft flesh on the inside of my nostril.  In 70 years of clipping hairs, I had never before clipped myself.

Since I am on Warfarin, the blood thinner, for A-fib you understand, I bleed.  Boy, do I bleed!  Rich, red, wholesome drops steadily dripped into the sink.  I couldn’t staunch the flow.  Kleenex and TP soaked up blood; drops got away onto an old t-shirt I donned with Ann’s help while I held tissues to the Red River of Mercer Island.   I lay down on the floor but the blood simply drained down my throat.  It’s very salty, by the way; a good protein source; I drink the blood of my enemy.

I pinched my nose where the septum and cartilage meet, as advised by my anti-coagulation nurse.  I pinched it low, as nurse Ann counseled.  A later call to Dr. Hello, How Are You (after 26 years, our doctor still won’t greet us by name) prescribed 20 minutes of pinching (high) followed by 10 minutes off, then repeat.  If that didn’t stop the flow, go to the emergency room; there they will cauterize it.  I sat in a chair, head back, TP up nose, pinching two-handed high and low.  20 on, 10 off; 20 on, 10 off.

It didn’t stop.  We had been at it for over an hour by this point, missing our dinner both out and at home.  Off to the ER we went, Ann driving, I with my roll of TP in lap, holding a wad of paper up my nose. Into Overlake's ER I lurch and am immediately whisked out of the lobby and into an exam room (if you want to avoid waits in ERs, arrive blood-spotted, clutching your own roll of TP as if you doubted their supply, holding a bloody wad and shouting "where can I get rid of this?")

This was all caused, you see, by those idiots at Kenya Airways.

 

In February of 1968, I attended my first of eleven annual Toy Fairs in New York.  I stayed at the old Hampshire House, on Central Park South, between the Essex House (which I would later market when at Marriott) and the St. Moritz.  In my bathroom medicine cabinet, I found a pair of trim scissors left by an earlier guest and either missed by a careless housekeeper or left by a gracious one – blunt nosed, curved of blade, stainless steel, made in Switzerland.  Wonderful scissors, that I subsequently carried on every overnight trip all over the globe, in first class and in coach, in lax times and TSA times. I’d had them inspected on occasion, but their diminutive size and rounded tips always reassured the most intrepid gate minder.  Until Kenya Airways . . .

Sunday, August 23^rd, 2015, Kilimanyaro Airport (that’s right: . . . yaro), Arusha, Tanzania.  Short hop to Nairobi.  No visible security to speak of.  Casual, casual . . . until search of carry-on and out comes the Hampshire House scissors.  Nope.  What?!  Nope.  Wait – the’re blunt nosed.  Nope.  Let me talk to your supervisor, please, with a smile.  She comes.  He hands her the scissors.  I explain these have traveled over five continents, cleared innumerable security screenings, been with me for nearly 50 years – half a century of examinations and never found threatening to pilot, cabin attendant or fellow passenger.  Why?  Are these scissors?  Yes.  Scissors are forbidden.  No, sharp scissors are forbidden.  Are these scissors?  Yes, but . . . .  Scissors are forbidden . . . and into the trash she dropped them – my Hampshire House surprise, my boon travel companion of near half a century. Gone. . .  Confiscated. . .  Trashed in front of my eyes.

A Year of Trimming Dangerously (apologies to Christopher Koch) with sharp-pointed, straight-bladed Swiss Army Knife dreadnought scissors.  Careful. Should get another blunt-nose pair, but always forgetting in haste to leave the drug store; Walgreens are so depressing. Until . . .

Monday, October 3^rd, 2016, Perugia, Italy.  Ann and I are prowling through the Rocca Paolina; into a nick-knack shop we wander, full of pottery, tourist coffee mugs, cheap sun glasses and . . . blunt nosed trim scissors.  But not curved; it's hard to nip oneself with curved scissors. But very small and very keen.  Made in Perugia we are assured.  Of Swedish steel, as Michelangelo used to make his stone chisels.  My Souvenir de Perugia.  Safety in nose hair trimming.   What a deal.  

Not so, after all.

Overlake's ER team was successful. Vaso-constrictor; pinch low, as close to the open artery as possible; cauterize chemically.  To add insult to injury, the buggers drew off three samples of blood for themselves.  Finally, home we went for a 9:30pm supper and washing out spots as best I could.

So it’s all Kenya Airways fault that we missed dinner with friends, a recital, a concert.  It’s all Kenya Airways fault that I spent yet another evening in the company of doctors and nurses, all fine and friendly to be sure, but still . . .

Damn Kenya Airways!