Can we just talk about how amazing last night was!?

We've had WMI (Wildreness Medical Institue) students up here for the last month. They are all super cool and I'll miss them tons when they have to go home. So, they're training for wilderness EMT courses and over the past weeks, they've been doing senarios. You know, thorwing fellow classmates in the lake and the pretending they're hyperthermic and rescuing them... putting fake blood on themselves and making others fix them. Well, last night, the staff up here.. so Common Fire, and even a few full time staffers and their kids got in on a secret senario.

The 3 EMT instructors had us dressed up in these old clothes, that could be cut away, if necessary. Then they gave us all injuries. You see, we'd been a plane crash, and we'd fallen from a burning plane and had an assortment of injuries from bumps, bruises and scratches, to sticks through the arm, to head injuries, to burns, to abdominals falling out and missing arms! So, they used make-up just like in the movies and told us how to act according to our injuries... It was gross and totally cool at the same time!! Very realistic! After we were all decked out in fake blood and bones and wounds, they took us down the main road, off the property and set us out in the dark forest. They then added more blood, so that it could run down and look more realistic. They also lighted some cans of gasoline on fire so that it looked like a plane had actually crashed. And then we were left to wait by ourselves in the snowy forest wearing very little clothing and drenched in blood.

I sat near Kelsey Davis, as she was afraid of the dark (which was fine by me.. the middle of the dark forest isn't exactly a place I'd chose to be on my own either.) Kelsey and I talked until we were told to be quiet and about half an hour later we started hearing voices and seeing flashlights. At which point Kelsey began screaming, "Daddy! Daddy, where are you!?" at the top of her lungs. (she had a broken wrist, a bloody nose and a good scrape on her cheek) It took them a while to find us as we were the furthest down the hill from the others (I now see they had us placed well, the less hurt at the top of the hill so that the EMTs would get caught up in caring for them instead of the more injured down the hill. Kelsey was also put with me so that she could help them to find me.) Leslie Mitchel was the one to find Kelsey first... and she was placed just about 5 feet up the hill from where I was, though I was concealed behind a log. I made a slight noise when Leslie asked Kelsey (who had made herself fake cry) if anyone else was down there. Leslie called to another EMT (Jessie) who made her way toward me.

Now, when they had put injuries on me and told me what my main complaint was supposed to be, it worked out well due to the fact that it happened to be a bigger real complaint than my fake wound. I was supposed to be cold. Because you see, my abdominals were coming out of my stomache (sick, huh?) so, they tell me that when you're stomache is open in such a way, you're basically just letting heat out inot the environment. But, since I was also wearing a T-shirt and jeans and had been lying out in the cold wet snow spotted forest for the last half hour I was literally shaking. Jessie asked me my name and all the rutine things she was supposed to ask me and then started doing an assesment of my situation... of course, I was kind of flighty in my responses and a bit spacy in my few words, but I held character all the while saying how cold I was (at which she took her coat off and put it on me). I couldn't tell her if anything else hurt but when she startedassessing me she pushed on my stomache and I let out a yell of pain, at which she pulled up my shirt and sort of gasped (Heavens, how I wish I could have seen her face, but it was dark and her flashlight was bright).

After a moment of me moaning she said, "Yea, I bet that hurts" and then continued assessing me and soon Brenden (from Alaska) joined her. he held my head stationary for her and asked me questions and soon more people had joined them... all the while I continued shaking from cold and telling them I was cold... they found a sleeping bag for me and wrapped me in it, even elevated my legs. They tried to take my blood pressure but it wasn't possible due to my shaking (which after being covered in a down sleeping bag was harder to do and I had to force the shakes.) They once asked if there was anything they could get me, like a drink of water or some food, but I just told them I was cold... Then I was left with Brenden and Jessie again and everyone went off to find a carrier and another sleeping bag and a neck brace. So far, only Jessie had seen my abdominals hanging out and she lifted my shirt to show Brenden as they continued writting down my symptoms and other such things. She said, "Wow... that's quite a... uh... booboo." And that was the first and only time I smiled or broke Character the entire time. Where's my Emmy!? Then Brenden responded with, "She's got a nice little black eye here too." I HAD A BLACK EYE! YAY!

Soon, I was wrapped in another sleeping bag and not long later was given an oxygen mask. Meanwhile, I'm still shaking to the best of my abilities as I was getting nice and warm now and was being showered with attention as many of the other victims had been taken care of by this point. They soon found a third sleeping bag and were transfering me to a "basket" in which to carry me up to the road. it was 7:45, when we'd first gotten settled in, 8:25 or so when they first arrived, and about 10:30 when I arrived at the road. Upon arrival at the road the instructor walks by to see the dressing of my stomache. And Poor Jessie who had wrapped me! Had I really been hurt, I would have died the way I was wrapped up. She was supposed to wrap me with a wet cloth, but had forgotten and had wrapped me in a dry cloth... I would have dried out and died! But I didn't, so life is okay.

As that is only my side of the story, I'm sure you can imagine all the other stories from the other 13 people on the hill side! Andrew had a serious head wound and had only gotten to telling the EMTs his name and that he couldn't recall what had happened before passing out. So, the EMTs, not knowing what to do, and obviously not looking at his head, cut off his pants. Yep, just straight up cut off his pants. Like up the legs and accross the abdomin... so, there's Andrew with a HEAD injury and no pants. Poor Andrew... oh, and just for your information, they were his pants. Ellie, who'd lost her arm was left alone the longest amount of time, just screaming and yelling for help.. oh, her's was cool! They gave her a blood pump to pump fake blood out of her missing arm. So neat! Janice screamed every tiem someone touched her arms! Oh man! For that half hour of cold, it was totally worth everything else!

This morning at breakfast and lunch there was no other talk but of the senario! Who hadn't broken character, what went wrong, what went well, how they never ever wanted to see a person with their abdominals hanging out of them in real life... how Andrew had no pants and Jeremy had no shirt. Leslie commented on how pale I looked and how I played that part well, considering I never broke character really, except for my one smile, which was hidden by my convulsive breathing and shaking, anyway... so I doubt the two EMTs noticed. But really, it was so much fun! I was very neat to discuss what happened to all of us back at the Ranch House and cooler still to hear the EMT side of everything... So cool. I really wish we could all help out in another senario... I'd do it again in a heart beat!!