Re: Good stuff!
Here's to being prepared...
One of our performers choked on her lunch yesterday, upstairs in the dressing rooms, while the rest of us were down on the stage, talking. She started beating her hand on the stair rail to get someone's attention...and someone noticed, and yelled, "She's choking!"
It's been thirty years and change since I was taught the Heimlich maneuver (First Aid training in the Boy Scouts), and in all that time, I've never needed to use it...never even seen it used, except as a gag bit in comedy movies. But I remembered it well enough that I went into auto-pilot the moment I realized nobody else was moving. And it worked, and someone is still alive because I paid attention in Boy Scouts a LONG time ago.
I don't share this because I find myself heroic. I share it because it's really easy to tell ourselves, "I'll never need to know that," or, "Someone else will know what to do if that's ever needed." But sometimes, YOU are that 'someone else'. We can't be prepared for everything...but there are a lot of situations we can be prepared for. Learn what you can. It's not just an advertising cliche when they say you migyt save someone's life.