Do I need a tetanus shot?

I spent part of this holiday weekend at a friend's house, where I knit upon the couch, bag of yarns and sticks at my side.  One of the sticks in the bag was a US3 13-inch straight that I planned to use to cast on a baby hat.  While uncrossing and recrossing my legs, I managed to impale my right calf on said needle, which was poking (ha) out of the bag, point up.  And by "impale" I mean the needle was stuck far enough into my leg to hang there by itself.  Too embarrassed to admit what I had done, I surreptitiously pulled the needle out and slunk off to the bathroom to cleanse the wound, which fortunately did not bleed much.  Remember this story if the TSA confiscates your knitting needles next time you fly; they really can be lethal.

Now, a pet peeve:  splices.  For one baby blanket, I purchased four skeins of Lorna's Laces, two of which were perfect.  While winding the other two into balls, I came across splice after splice after splice.  Some of the splices were across all three plies, but some were in just one ply.  Either way, I snipped them out and restarted winding.  By the time I finished, instead of two balls of yarn, I had eight.

I don't know much about the economies of waste in the yarn business, but when I am paying $20 per skein, I really, really, really would like there to be a minimum number of splices.  Like zero.