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Thread: Am I more clumsy than average?

  1. #31
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Koepke View Post
    The tool most likely to release a bit of my blood is a rabbet or shoulder plane. It is a lot of work to break my habit of slapping the bottom of a plane to dislodge shavings. Recently my attempt at breaking that habit has me using a small paint brush to dislodge shavings.
    My favorite example of an "unfortunate safety habit" was a fellow who liked to allow his circular saw to swing down against his thigh at the end of every cut (don't ask, it sounds as insane to me as to you). This was all fine and well until the day he needed to make a cut with the guard locked up such that it didn't rotate to cover the blade at the end of the cut. It took a *lot* of sutures and stitches to put his quadriceps and miscellaneous blood vessels and connective tissues back together.

    If people are stupid enough to ask me for safety advice it usually comes down to "think carefully about everything that you're doing". You can give people specific advice about riving guards and push sticks all day long, but if they're not attentive to what their bodies and tools are doing they're probably going to come up with some novel and gruesome way to mess up anyway.

    Of course it's not just woodworking. I had a coworker (actually a fairly senior engineering architect) who literally amputated his own foot with a shotgun. I tried very hard to incorporate some variation of "we should be careful not to shoot our feet off here" into every subsequent engineering discussion in which he participated.
    Last edited by Steve Schlumpf; 01-26-2018 at 6:34 PM.

  2. #32
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    It seems to me Marshall that is especially true for those of us that worked out in the sun most of our lives. I'm followed the easy-bleeding pattern as I got older that my farmer/rancher grandfather and father both went through. My forearms cannot withstand the slightest bump or scratch without bleeding or at least showing those ugly blood-below-the-skin bruises.
    David

  3. #33
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    Try adding Coumadin or Plavix to the mix....

  4. #34
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    May 2015
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    We are getting way off topic but I'm on rivaroxaban now. Interestingly the little paper cuts don't seem to bleed as much, if at all. Low dose Aspirin was the worst culprit for increasing skin bleeds for me.

  5. #35
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    Quote Originally Posted by David Eisenhauer View Post
    3M Nexcare Active - Waterproof Bandages. I have a pack of the flesh colored ones in the shop, but I believe they may also come in transparent. Wife says the transparent ones are better. They stick to your fingers and can withstand some light hand washing.
    Thank you David, I went out and bought some today.

  6. #36
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    My worst cuts come from my wife. No blood drawn, but sometimes they hurt . . . .

  7. #37
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    Hi Steven,

    The last two times I cut myself was on the freshly sharpened iron of my moving filister plane and the other was with a handsaw. I have cut myself with a sharp hand saw more than any other way, I think. The only time I had to go to the emergency room was a cut with a utility knife.

    That is one thing about getting better at sharpening, once sharp, the stuff cuts you easier.

    My pocket knife, on the other hand almost never gets sharpened, because I don't use it much on things where "sharp" matters much. If I need a sharp knife it is usually for something where I am going to use some force, and for that I almost always go get a utility knife. I have heard it said about a dull pocket knife (if you don't force it of course) that "I don't want to get cut, but am not afraid of getting bruised."

    I know, a dull knife is usually more dangerous than a sharp one because you have to force a dull knife, but I don't use one for that kind of work. I use a utility knife for that kind of work, and normally only carry a fairly small pocket knife anyway.

    Stew
    Last edited by Stew Denton; 01-27-2018 at 3:36 PM.

  8. #38
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    One of my fellow farmer's market vendors was impressed by my being able to easily being able to slice through rope in one pass with my pocket knife. Right after sharpening it was my most recent "major OOPS" cut a few years ago. It was an unthinking mistake.

    jtk
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
    - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

  9. #39
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    When using a Veritas marking gauge I usually manage to knick my thumb. Someday I will learn to keep my thumb below the boards edge.

  10. #40
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gary Cunningham View Post
    When using a Veritas marking gauge I usually manage to knick my thumb. Someday I will learn to keep my thumb below the boards edge.
    This sounds like it could still be a recipe for laceration. My thumb is kept on the non-cutting side of the fence.

    When striking a line, before moving the knife my fingers are all checked to make sure they are out of the way of the knife's path.

    Checking before any cutting stroke to make sure fingers or any other flesh is out of the way becomes a habit. Checking and acknowledging to yourself of the checking may reduce the amount of blood one needs to remove from their work. It seems to have helped me.

    jtk
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
    - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

  11. #41
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    One of my mantras is "where will it go when it slips?" and try and have no bodily parts in that path.

  12. #42
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    Quote Originally Posted by Franklin Ferrier View Post
    One of my mantras is "where will it go when it slips?" and try and have no bodily parts in that path.
    Yes sir!

    Good one.

    jtk
    "A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
    - Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

  13. #43
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    Yes, it is a regular occurrence for me...I usually discover it later or after I've unintentionally stained the wood ...
    Jerry

  14. #44
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Koepke View Post
    One of my fellow farmer's market vendors was impressed by my being able to easily being able to slice through rope in one pass with my pocket knife. Right after sharpening it was my most recent "major OOPS" cut a few years ago. It was an unthinking mistake.
    We've all done stuff like that. My only woodworking-induced ER visit was due to trying to pare a workpiece that I was holding in my other hand with a chisel. When the inevitable happened I nailed my knuckle, which meant I couldn't make do with self-applied tissue adhesive and surgical strips.

  15. #45
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    Last summer i was doing some simple work in my room with a narex 1" chisel, the end caught on something flipping it up and over towards me. I could see it going up and over and down towards my lap, all i was thinking was the obvious lol, i realized whew that was close it missed my groin and legs then realized my knee was warm looking down there was blood spurting up and onto my knee. It hit just above the ankle bone and went down ripping right thru socks and shoes. Its the only trip i had to ER from my little work room.

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