I'm sure the CDC has a link on how these can kill you, but I don't know want to know.
Don’t ask me why — because I have no idea how these ideas come to me — but I recently found myself looking at the website for the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
After poking around, I have now decided that the CDC should really be called the Center for Disease Control and Prevention and All the Other Freaky Ways You Can Get Sick, Be Injured, Get Maimed, and/or Die because there are a lot of health hazards out there that never once occurred to me.
This is a fascinating website. One that I’m sure took a ton of time and man/woman hours to put together. Which means that someone was sitting around thinking of all the ways you can get sick, injured, or die and then researching all those ways and then writing about them. You have to wonder how many of them are steady as a rock and how many now flinch whenever they hear someone drop a mug of hot coffee in the employee lunch room.
The CDC website is wonderfully and thoroughly organized in such a way that you can research by categories, such as Injury, Violence, and Safety or Environmental Health. Then, once you figure out what kind of general thing you want to freak yourself out over, you can dig deeper into some truly specific accidents and illnesses. And there are some incredibly specific ways you can lose life or limb in this world of ours.
For example, there’s a page on how you can prevent chain saw injuries after disasters. Not just chain saw injuries, but those injuries that occur after a tree falls on your house during a hurricane. Luckily, while everyone else is wringing their hands and going all woe is me, there are tree branches poking holes in my mattress, the CDC has already figured everything out.
This reminds me, I need to see if there’s a CDC app that be downloaded to phones, because if I ever find myself in a post-disaster situation, such as millions of rodents spilling out of a New York City subway after the tunnels flood, I’m going to want to know if I should run away or try to climb as high as I can. Oh, who are we kidding? We all know I’m going to run around in little circles, wringing my hands, and saying, “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit.” Articulate in crisis moments, I am not.
In another example of CDC foresight, it would never have occurred to me that dogs should be on my list of concerns after a disaster, but someone over there was way ahead of me. I was already wary of dogs, having been jumped on during runs more times than I can remember, but now I feel like I’m going to need a chair and a whip after the next hurricane.
Now I’m trying to imagine how a job interview at the CDC goes. After they read through your CV and verify your Ph.D. credentials, do they give you 60 seconds to imagine a bizarre disaster and how you would deal with it?
“Quick, Jen, tell us what you should do if a tractor-trailer offloads seven tons of coconuts on the road while you’re running by.”
“Run faster. I mean — pfft — duh.”
Getting back to the website: In the section that should be called Mother Nature Acting All Pissy you can read about a variety of natural disasters including everything you might possibly need to know about protecting yourself from a volcanic eruption. I went ahead and skipped this one, because while Virginia does get hurricanes and occasional earthquakes, I’m going to tell myself that volcanoes are totally off the table, lest I end up in the fetal position under my desk. There’s only so much disaster I can take.
So here’s what I want to know today: What kind of situation have you found yourself in that has probably been covered by the CDC’s website?
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They even discuss zombie preparedness!
Normally when I’m in a crisis situation, I tend to remain calm and I spring into action to deal with it, making some sarcastic comments along the way. There is humor in every situation as I see it.
Although when our kitchen ceiling fell in one fine day a few years ago for seemingly no reason? I stood there yelling “OH SHIT” over and over until a neighbor came over to see what the fuss was. And then she joined in on “OH SHIT”. Sometimes yelling OH SHIT is the best thing to do in a crisis.
Not at all natural disasters, but if they’ve covered “what to do when the 4-year-old gets flung from a moving taxi in NYC” or the “6-year-old in the back seat of the car driving through northern VA traffic “returns” the big, red Slurpy she just gulped,” then they have truly thought of everything. Of course these things happened well before the CDC had a website and somehow we survived.
I’m pretty sure I needed the CDC in New York last week. Yes, for the germs. But also how to survive a maniac cab driver. I was pretty sure they were going to find that I ate ice cream and potatoes in my last meal and I would be outed as a fitness faker. I ate better in New York after that.
Always be prepared for the autopsy is pretty much my new rule to live by.
Aimee – I love your rule and I am totally stealing that as my new motto!
The CDC website sounds like WEBMD–not healthy for certain types of people to read. Once I did flip over while driving a 4-wheeler, though, and I imagine they have insight on how I ought to have handled that accident.
Lost power for 5 days during an ice storm. Must be some good advice on how not
to freeze?
When I was a kid, I stupidly allowed a younger kid to sit on the front fender of my bike while I biked her home. One of her feet wandered a bit too close to the spokes, and the next thing I knew her panicked parents are holding a bloody toe-top in a container of ice and screeching out of their driveway on the way to the ER. I’m sure the CDC addresses that situation.
The only other accident I’ve been in was when we canoed in a flooded river, and tipped our canoe over. Nothing quite like gripping the paddle between your legs (because the guy who rented them said “whatever you do, don’t lose the paddles!“) and holding onto the branches along the bank to keep from being swept downstream. Fun stuff.
This is why I hate it when my husband insists on going kayaking in the flooded river!
Wow. My life is boring compared to that website. The “worsts” I can think of:
1) Being thrown from a horse in a rather unusual and complicated manner, including being drug along the ground a good 10 feet. (Which my mother STILL doesn’t know about. I was maybe 14?)
2) Hitting a deer, then black ice, losing control, and putting the car in the ditch backwards. When we finally came to a stop, 3 of the doors were pinned by trees…but the only damage to the vehicle was caused by the deer. As an added plus – I was driving a university vehicle.
That’s it, that’s all I’ve got beyond the standard “OMG what has my kid done this time” experiences. Off to go have more fun with the CDC…
OMG this is hilarious – if a bit scary. My life has been blissfully boring and not needing of the CDC. The ER? Yes, my son had his own private staff there, but just stupid kid stuff. And yeah, that’s not a website I should probably read anyway….
Almost getting swept downstream by the Mississippi River’s current after foolishly deciding to swim in said river.
A side note: They don’t call it “The Big Muddy” for nothing. My swimsuit went in black and white and came out black and brown-black.
I might have needed the CDC today when I saw the allergic reaction my son had to amoxicillin. You know it’s bad when you go to the Minute Clinic and they say “OH MAN you need to see a REAL DOCTOR” and they call an actual REAL DOCTOR and make an appointment for you.
You should have read the part about volvanic eruptions. I’m sure your family will have future adventures in a country with active volcanoes.
My son recently thought he had mono…nope, just the flu.
I live in Washington State, where we have real volcanoes. I might need to read up on surviving an eruption.
I’ve also run over the electric lawnmower cord with the lawnmower… once while wearing a 2-month-old baby in a Snuggli, another time when the kids were napping in their beds. My husband questions my ability to safely mow the lawn, and the CDC probably agrees with them! (In my defense, no one was electrocuted.)
Strangely (ha!), I can understand the reason behind needing to be careful with a chain saw after a storm… we had some real doozies when we lived in NoVA and downed trees can hide downed power lines.
So . . . . does your husband now mow the lawn? I’m thinking that was a good plan . . .
Indeed!
I live in CA where we have earthquakes – so I am sure they have all kinds of advice which most of us just ignore…