feren

When leaving

roho and

genet's place yesterday I managed to give my ankle a pretty sound beating, the result of which seems to be a mild sprain. It was remarkably easy... I was walking along their front sidewalk, which leads from the porch to the driveway. I absentmindedly stepped off the edge of the sidewalk with my left foot, thinking there was solid ground where I was putting my foot down at. Unfortunately for me there wasn't any solid ground there -- just a big hole that grass had grown up in. So, down came my foot with the very inner edge of my boot sole on the sidewalk's lip and the rest (unbeknownst to me) hanging off into space. The rest of my weight came down, my foot snapped down and into the hole and **WRENCH-O**. Why hello, searing pain! It's been a while since you and I talked!

Of course

lady_curmudgeon, Roho and Genet were pretty concerned. I am told that at the time it looked like I was going to go completely ass-over-teakettle, but somehow I pulled off a miraculous recovery. It took me a minute or two of balancing on my right foot before I was able to stand again. I gave assurances that it was just a light twist and that I'd be able to walk it off in no time. Clearly I underestimated things. By the time we got home last night the entire left ankle was aching and when I took my boot off I could feel how swollen and sore everything was. In retrospect I am stupid-lucky that I was wearing my much-beloved Stanley boots, because they are workbooks with lace-up tops that are very good at supporting your ankle. I think that had I been wearing regular tennis shoes I would have fractured the ankle instead of just giving it a really good spraining. Joy.

So anyway, this morning I got out of bed... put some weight on my left foot... and nearly demonstrated my impression of a tumbling clown of some sort. A naked one, who without his glasses is blind as a bat. A naked, blind, cursing-like-a-sailor tumbling clown. I downed some aspirin and told Curmudgeon that we needed to go get an ankle brace from the local Walgreens, because there was no way I was going out and doing anything today with just my boot's uppers to support me. Luckily the Walgreens was having a 50% off sale on Ace bandages, so I got a one-size-fits-all ankle brace for $5.49 instead of the $12 and change they wanted for it normally. I strapped that on and, when augmenting it with my boot, was almost able to hobble around at a pretty decent clip. With the brace and boot on I have the full range of motion my ankle is supposed to have, I just can't put weight on it at certain angles without feeling a very sharp pain through the base of my joint.

I'm here to tell you folks: There is no single better way to make yourself feel like a complete failure as a human being. When you sprain your ankle you end up walking like you've got something seriously wrong with your foot, but you've got not splint, no cast, no cane or crutch. People look at you funny because you end up doing this weird sorta hop-shuffle-drag thing for no discernable reason, and occasionally you hiss in a bit of breath if you end up twinging something just the wrong way. And all because you didn't look where you were putting your foot... I mean, how much more demeaning can it get? You got hurt while you were walking... something even a three year old can master! Durr. Still, as humiliating as that is I still got a better deal than

tarinfirepelt, who ended up getting scorched by some hot asphault. That's way, way worse. And since I had spent part of the afternoon lighting denatured alcohol on fire with Roho in a vain attempt to make his pressurized kerosene lamps go, I definately got off light with a sprained ankle.

You haven't seen the worst of it yet