She’s a grandma. She got run over. By a reindeer.
Well, it was a regular deer, but it really happened to Marlene Halt of Town of Tonawanda, and she lived to tell the tale.
“It was kind of freaky,” the 66-year-old grandmother said Wednesday, a day after coming home from the hospital where she’d been since becoming the real-life victim of a corny Christmas carol.
Cue the banjo.
It was just after dinner on Dec. 10, when Halt and her neighbor were out on their nightly walk on Heritage Road across from Brighton Park Golf Course.
It was already dark out and they were on the sidewalk, just a few houses down from Halt’s home on Heritage.
Halt felt something slam into her right side.
“It just came out of nowhere,” she said.
Her friend turned to her and gasped: “Did you feel that brush past?”
At first she didn’t see Halt, she later told her. Then she looked down and saw Halt on the ground.
A deer, possibly spooked by a dog, had crashed into Halt and run away, probably back to the golf course, where deer are often seen.
“It sideswiped me. I could feel the pain. It was so quick. I fell on the right side,” Halt said.
The impact knocked her sneaker off her foot.
She didn’t know it yet, but the fall shattered Halt’s hip and ball joint.
“I can’t stand,” she remembered saying.
Her neighbor went for help, and Halt’s husband pulled his car up next to her. They drove her to DeGraff Memorial Hospital.
In the meantime, Halt’s grandson, Jared, 16, was trying to contact his mother – Halt’s daughter – to tell her about the bizarre incident.
The daughter, Jackie Pickard, was driving at the time with her 7-year-old son, Preston, in the backseat. Someone was repeatedly calling and texting her, so she tossed her cellphone to her son and asked him to read the message.
“Who keeps calling? What are they saying?” she asked.
Preston read the message: “Noni was in accident. Noni was run over by a reindeer.”
“What are you talking about?” she barked back.
She didn’t know if it was a prank or a misunderstanding or what, but soon learned what had happened.
It was no joke.
The doctors scheduled Halt for an emergency hip replacement the next day.
Well, it was a regular deer, but it really happened to Marlene Halt of Town of Tonawanda, and she lived to tell the tale.
“It was kind of freaky,” the 66-year-old grandmother said Wednesday, a day after coming home from the hospital where she’d been since becoming the real-life victim of a corny Christmas carol.
Cue the banjo.
It was just after dinner on Dec. 10, when Halt and her neighbor were out on their nightly walk on Heritage Road across from Brighton Park Golf Course.
It was already dark out and they were on the sidewalk, just a few houses down from Halt’s home on Heritage.
Halt felt something slam into her right side.
“It just came out of nowhere,” she said.
Her friend turned to her and gasped: “Did you feel that brush past?”
At first she didn’t see Halt, she later told her. Then she looked down and saw Halt on the ground.
A deer, possibly spooked by a dog, had crashed into Halt and run away, probably back to the golf course, where deer are often seen.
“It sideswiped me. I could feel the pain. It was so quick. I fell on the right side,” Halt said.
The impact knocked her sneaker off her foot.
She didn’t know it yet, but the fall shattered Halt’s hip and ball joint.
“I can’t stand,” she remembered saying.
Her neighbor went for help, and Halt’s husband pulled his car up next to her. They drove her to DeGraff Memorial Hospital.
In the meantime, Halt’s grandson, Jared, 16, was trying to contact his mother – Halt’s daughter – to tell her about the bizarre incident.
The daughter, Jackie Pickard, was driving at the time with her 7-year-old son, Preston, in the backseat. Someone was repeatedly calling and texting her, so she tossed her cellphone to her son and asked him to read the message.
“Who keeps calling? What are they saying?” she asked.
Preston read the message: “Noni was in accident. Noni was run over by a reindeer.”
“What are you talking about?” she barked back.
She didn’t know if it was a prank or a misunderstanding or what, but soon learned what had happened.
It was no joke.
The doctors scheduled Halt for an emergency hip replacement the next day.