Well, "toe." The piggy that is supposed to go whee whee whee all the way home is essentially a large skin tag with some bone powder inside it. Has been for many years.
This has to be at least a dozen times I've broken it in the last two decades.
The toe specialist (to whom I was referred by the foot specialist) at Shadyside Hospital says there is nothing to be done short of amputating it. No pins or epoxy or anything will make it not snap like a saltine when I lightly tap it onto Barry White's leg while reaching for the patio door.
Yesterday I noted that there were definite signs of Zombification spreading from the defective digit. Should have amputated when it was still contained in just one toe.
I was weighing the options of chainsaw v. ax v. mower deck for the now much-more-severe anti-zombie firebreak action when I saw that I am already hosed.
Yep, it has metastasized.By next week I should be watching Fox News, buying a premium membership on Classmates. com, and demanding to see the President's birth certificate.
You have been warned.
Life with animals is always a bruise-fest. I once interviewed a large-animal veterinarian who opened his shirt to show me the perfect horse-shoe shaped bruise on his chest. He was a pretty experienced vet, so a clean shot like that wasn't that common. (A few inches over, it also could have been fatal.)
ReplyDeleteAnd my "Birds For Dummies" co-author, avian specialist Dr. Brian Speer, has so many scars from parrots nailing him I don't think he has any unbitten skin left from the shoulders down.
Not the only profession with scar potential, of course: My brother the firefighter has burn scars -- imagine without protective gear what a mess he'd be!
I had a girlfriend who always said that if your middle toe was longer than your big toe it meant that you were bossy. Any truth to that old wives' tale? I'm just sayin'... and just repeating what my friend said.
ReplyDeleteSue
Helen reminds me that she met Jonathan Coulton a couple years ago. So far as I know, she still seems to have all her brains.
ReplyDeleteAnd of course -- yow. One ugly mofo of a toe there.
ReplyDeleteNot that it's anything like comparable, one morning a number of years ago I woke up with the most astounding pain in my foot, for no apparent reason. This continued and intensified over a period of about a week, at which point I went to see a podiatrist; he assured me I didn't have neuropathy, but x-rays proved inconclusive. (I may have had a hairline fracture of one of the bones of the foot, but they were unable to identify it if that was the case.) They gave me a special sandal to wear for a couple weeks and it cleared up on its own after taking pressure off it from everyday walking.
Ah, feet.
ReplyDeleteI've had plantar fascitis, neuromas, and this blasted defective toe. Have broken the right first metatarsal as a kid, and have a weak ankle on that side as a result.
So naturally my life's passion consists of crashing around the woods on foot with a backpack for extra weight.
It was various serial foot problems that kept me inactive and bored some years back and set the stage for a creeping weight gain that took some discipline to correct.
I'm getting a periodic stabbing pain in the metatarsals of the LEFT foot now -- maybe due to limping on the right?
Does Helen still have her original eyes, or did she lose them in the robot wars?
Coulton is worshipped as a Geek God here.
Sue, I dunno about your "friend's" theory, but the long second toe allows two more chances to flip off The Man.
ReplyDeleteThe prospect of solid things suddenly getting loose and then getting carried around like so many Huck Finns in your circulatory system is concerning. One day in February, 2009, we woke up to the rhythmic thrupp-thrupp-thrupp-thrupp of Hannah's convulsing feet scraping the carpet as the tumor that had spread to her lungs started to break up and enter her bloodstream.
ReplyDeleteWe put her down hours later.
So do be careful.
Poking about on teh Googles, I find that causality is surprisingly reversed: stroke patients tend to lose bone density afterwards.
"Going Rogue" and "The Manchurian President" are on their way - enjoy!
ReplyDeleteAnd now the video's gone. Pity.
ReplyDeleteI have replaced it with another version, whose creator swears he will never delete it.
ReplyDeleteSo, zombie story.
Just before we closed on our farm, I was sitting at the counter reading the newspaper in my favorite greasy spoon in Zelienople. (Well, my favorite greasy spoon anywhere, which just happens to be in Zelie.) The Kountry Kitchen is the kind of place where politicians would go to photo-op with "real Americans" if they found out it was there, which I hope they don't.
Behind me in a booth were two forty-something hipsters, which is somewhat unusual for the venue, but hey, everybody likes a really good, really cheap grilled cheese sammitch and some home-made pie, right?
I was probably wearing jeans, hiking boots, Carhartt jacket -- and not in an ironic way.
The hipsters were having a spirited discussion about zombies. At one point I chuckled at something one of them said, and the other apologized -- "I guess other people don't talk about zombies usually."
Oh no, I sez, my friends and I constantly discuss zombie security precautions and zombie-fighting weapons. (PC has a great short story about zombie-tracking cadaver dogs.) And then I shared my concerns about the inferior zombie-resistance of the isolated farmhouse I was about to buy, which given the local geography, seems to be asking for it, you know? We had a great chat about ground-floor windows and doors with glass and blind spots, and also the effectiveness of shotgun v. edged weapons v. blunt objects.
Turns out they were in town to promote a Night of the Living Dead festival. They even invited me to a private party associated with the fest, but alas, we had a non-negotiable prior commitment.