I think you might have missed an opportunity to milk your affliction for the sympathy and coddling you so richly deserved. If your eyes were really that bad, you could have just walked into a door or something while taking the bins out, then after you got back from having stitches at the hospital, the good lady and daughter would have fixed you soup or something nice.
I am quite certain they would have. Or maybe they would have asked me to put the coffee on and make dinner :0)
Well whatever they did, I'm sure you would have found some humor in the situation :)