PAIN!

I've been pretty successful at putting myself in pain these last couple of weeks. First off, I did something to wrench my left knee. That knee does give me problems off-and-on so there is nothing too surprising here. I had been doing my ordinary stuff--bike rides, a bit of jogging, and some wood splitting. I probably strained the knee splitting wood, but who knows? Anyway, when I started to sit down on the couch a week ago, it became so intensely painful that I had to lie back gasping. After about a half-hour it was merely sore and weak; two days after that it was just tender; now it is more-or-less OK.

No sooner was my knee starting to mend than on Tuesday I reached over to plump a  pillow and somehow jabbed a splinter deep under the nail of the middle finger of my right hand. By Tuesday evening the finger was throbbing painfully and had swelled up to twice its normal size. Even the fingers next to it were becoming a little difficult to bend. I did all the right things--soaking, disinfecting, treating with antibiotic ointment--but I still had a largely sleepless night. Fortunately, I have been reading a book entitled The Hangman's Daughter in which thumbscrews play an ample role so I did feel pleased that I was attaining a more vivid reading experience.

On Wednesday morning the finger was a little better; by lunchtime it was healed enough to allow me to ride my bike and after that it became only a trivial disability--no worse than the lower back pains that seem a  nearly permanent part of existence. . . . Such is life at 62.

Then today I noticed a little oozing from the bruised portion of the fingernail. Naturally, I began to torture myself by squeezing more and more pus out and then digging around under the nails with the pointy file on a nail clipper. The result was the fine specimen of a splinter photographed below! I do think, however, that it is time for me to end my masochistic torture. I have put The Hangman's Daughter back into my Kindle archive for now.