Woman Shot in Berkeley Siege Recalls Ordeal : Recuperation: Karen Grundhofer, 22, of Newport Beach says she feels lucky to be alive and plans to return to school Monday.

Karen Grundhofer isn’t spending much time thinking about what might have been.

The Newport Beach woman, pulled to safety after being shot several times by a crazed gunman early Thursday morning near the campus of UC Berkeley, is “pretty psyched just to be alive.”

“It’s one of those situations where one minute I’m happy and people are making me laugh,” Grundhofer said in a telephone interview Saturday from her San Francisco hospital bed, “and then I’ll get real upset. I kind of put off thinking about it. I can’t believe someone shot me. I feel lucky; it makes me want to live every moment to its fullest.”

The 22-year-old UC Berkeley sociology student was one of six people wounded when Mehrdad Dashti, 30, opened fire in the bar of the Durant Hotel. The bar was a favorite hangout for Grundhofer and her friends. One man, John Sheehy, 22, of Lafayette, was killed during what became a seven-hour standoff that ended when police shot and killed Dashti.

Grundhofer said she and her friends were ending what had been a quiet and enjoyable night at Henry’s Publick House & Grille when gunfire transformed the calm into chaos.

“He was on the west end of the bar; we were on the east, near the doorway,” she said, describing the scene. “He was standing on top of a chair, and all of the sudden he started shooting.

“I hit the floor and looked down at my chest. I saw I had been shot, but I guess my adrenaline was running so high I didn’t feel any pain. I was in shock.”

Moments later, she said, a woman she knows only as Gayla pulled her by the legs through the door to the hotel lobby, where they took cover behind a couch. There, she “saw the actual hole in my chest” and at least one other wound in her stomach.

She said police then moved into the lobby and asked if they could run to safety.

Gayla “was holding my arm, and we ran out the front door of the hotel and up Durant Avenue,” Grundhofer said. Once out of danger, Gayla and a friend applied pressure to her wounds with their hands until an ambulance arrived.

“I was getting mad,” Grundhofer said about waiting for help and watching others run hysterically from the scene.

At Highland General Hospital in Oakland, she learned that she had suffered seven wounds, one through her right hip, three through the right side of her torso, two through the right side of her chest and one through her buttocks. All were flesh wounds, and none damaged internal organs.

Grundhofer said she will frame the jeans she wore that night, the ones that now bear a hole in the right rear pocket. She also plans to return to school Monday.

Thursday afternoon, she was transfered to Pacific Presbyterian Hospital in San Francisco. Since her arrival, she said, she has hardly had a free moment.

She said her father, John F. Grundhofer, a former Southern California bank executive, has since returned to Minneapolis, where he heads the First Bank System. However, her mother, Lynda, and sister, Kathryn, who live in Newport Beach, have continued to be with her.

“They were pretty worried,” Grundhofer said. “My whole family has been great.”

Saturday afternoon, Grundhofer was giddy with the visits of her former Newport Harbor High School classmates Tina Royce and Julie Jacqueline Evans, who have also been her college roommates. They spent part of the day delivering flower arrangements, which have filled Grundhofer’s hospital room, to other patients on the floor.

Grundhofer said that on Friday there were at least five visitors in her room at all times throughout the day, causing hospital officials to consider restricting the number of visitors.

Aside from family and friends, she said, some of her visitors have included university officials who dropped by to wish her well.

“I am excited to get back,” Grundhofer said, referring to her plans to return to school. “I don’t let this get me down.”