The Nose Bleed

The first thing I did when I got into work this morning was have a ten-minute nose bleed. It wasn't planned; it was a completely spontaneous thing. I walked into the lobby, said hello to the receptionist (whose name I can never quite remember) and went upstairs to my desk. I felt my nose starting to run - at least I thought it was running. I wasn't too worried. I'd just been off work for a week with a cold. I got to my desk and decided to blow my nose before I took my coat and scarf off. That was when I realised my nose was bleeding, and bleeding quite entheusastically too. I was already half out of my jacket, but I'm quite well organised, nasally speaking, and always have a box of Kleenex sitting on my desk. Of course, during my week-long absence, my colleagues had used all but one of my tissues. The one tissue was almost enough to catch the blood as I wiggled out of my coat, but it wasn't quite enough and by the time I had my scarf off my desk looked like something out of a Stephen King novel. I had two options: find a colleague with an ample supply of Kleenex, or go to the bathroom. I decided that if there was another supply of Kleenex, then my own wouldn't have been so depleted, so I went to the bathroom trying not to leave too many bloody finger and foot prints. In the bathroom I stood next to the toilet, pulling out lengths of toilet roll form the holder, wadging it up and holding it under my nose and then discarding it into the toilet. After a few minutes, the toilet was filled to the brim with blood-stained toilet paper. I briefly considered leaving the toilet unflushed and starting the rumour that someone was really ill, but I decided against it and went back to mop up the dried blood on my desk. All in all, the nosebleed was a pleasant way to start the day. Not really too stressful, and nobody could look at me and decide I should be doing something else.