Nerve Damage!
I hacked up my left pinky last Saturday cutting an apple. Basically I did what you're never supposed to do: I was cutting the food while it wasn't flat on the board. Instead, I was holding it up while cutting downward and discovered only too late that YIKES OW my little finger was underneath! Kids, don't try this at home. The situation wasn't helped by the fact that the knife in question is a giant Chinese cleaver which, while normally a magnificent tool for vegetable chopping, presents a whole lot of cutting surface when things go wrong:
So anyway, after realizing how deep the cut was and wrapping a towel around my finger, I get Alison to drive me to the hospital where they stitch me up. There were a few lessons here: first, sutures work really, really well -- much better than band-aids. After only a week of healing, everything is sealed up so well that the only visible evidence of the cut is some residual redness and inflammation and a cut-shaped gap in the outer skin layer (and it still hurts a little when I squeeze it). Second, modern hospitals apparently use shrink-wrapped disposable suture kits, and if you ask nicely, they will give you the tools. So now we have a nice set of forceps, tweezers, and scissors, which Alison plans on putting to use with craft and knitting projects. No, they don't make up for the $100 co-pay my insurance exacted for the emergency room visit, but they're a nice consolation prize.
But the best part is that I actually managed to hit a nerve with that cleaver. As I've since learned, the finger has nerves running laterally on each side, and once the stitches came out it became apparent that I had severed the inner one. Because the cut was so close to the tip, I ended up with only a tiny patch of numbness on the inside edge of my finger.
So far as I can tell, this handicap is irrelevant. I use that finger extensively for typing (I map the control key the the caps lock location where it belongs!), but only need sensation in the opposite side. So I get all the perks of being a grizzled veteran with none of the downsides. Sounds cool to me.