Hi, I’m Eileen. I’m a spaz.

There, I’ve admitted it. I have been clumsy from birth as far as I know (apochryphal family stories have me tripping on the umbilical cord on the way out of my mother’s womb onto the floor. But there’s no proof this actually occurred). I have been walking into walls, doors and people, tripping over furniture, assorted pets, and objects, many almost invisible to the human eye for as long as I can remember. I have broken: one arm, one wrist, a thumb, a couple of toes, and an elbow all due to falling down, over, and into a variety of small and large things. On a semi-related remarkable note, I have also been hit by cars four times, and lived to tell the tale (which I guess makes me very lucky or very cursed, depending on your point of view – is that glass half full or half empty? you decide).

As I have been describing in long-winded detail, we recently finished landscaping our backyard. One of the fnal touches was the laying of some very nice, smooth tile. Did I mention it was smooth tile? And that the tile is right next to the hot tub? And that when the tile gets wet, it gets really slippery? Well, it does. So about two weeks ago we were in the hot tub, relaxing after a nice run, and the phone rang. As neither Chuck nor our friend Bev showed no great inclination to get the phone, I hopped out of the hot tub and ran to answer it before it went to voicemail. You can probably see where this is going, huh? I did a classic banana peel – my feet slid out from under me and I went kersplat! down on the REALLY HARD tile. And of course, I defensively stuck out my left hand to break my fall. My left hand and wrist that were recently surgically repaired after suffering a serious fall and break many years ago doing something not so different from this (okay, so I’m a slow learner). Things were feeling just about 100% when I went down on it. I hopped right up (because I felt like a total nitwit) and made like all was well. My wrist and hand were killing me, though, and as the day progressed, started to swell and turn black and blue. Luckily it was just a sprain, and after the first week things returned mostly to normal with few residual effects, other than my hand turning all the colors of the rainbow before returning to normal.

This event did get us thinking about the deck and its slippery-when-wet issues, so when we were at the poppy festival we both perked right uo when we saw a booth for a company called Slip Resistant Technologies. They use some stuff called PosiGrip, and darned if it doesn’t work like a charm! they coat the tile surface with it, and hey presto! no more slipping and sliding, even when it’s wet or you’re wet. Tey came out today and did the deed, as we are having a party on May 20, and were more than a little concerned that one of our guests would hit the deck, so to speak.