The Damn Dog, The Fan And Me Foot!

14 June 2015

Story #776

R. Linda:

In the scheme of things, when one needs to slow down and does not, the Fates take over and ensure that one is slowed to a standstill when needed. This was my experience recently when I was running all over the place without taking a breath. I was out in the garden helping the wife with the new garden, and if you think making a new garden is a joy, you are looking at the wrong guy. This new garden is five times the size of the one Tonya lovingly had at the old abode. Because there is more cleared land, that makes for a bigger garden - that's her logic! Oh yeah.

Meanwhile, work had picked up, and I was busier than ever, so the wife begrudgingly informed me she would make the new garden herself. Of course, not to be outdone for making me feel more guilty than I already did, her MOTHER (the Dragon), said she'd help. If you remember, I found a guy on that Internet list who roto-tillered his toes. However, as it turned out, I did it all meself.

I'd come home from work and find dinner was not on the table because now I had two resident cooks on me hands (her mother, my mother) who argued over what to serve and how to prepare it. That only left me to get out of the line of fire by making the garden. This went on for a week and a half of me at work, home to create a garden, feeling exhausted, and then in for a dinner that was always weird because the two resident cooks insisted on adding salt where there wasn't any called for or sugar where you'd least expect it. The arguing needed an arbitrator (me), and by the time things were settled in the kitchen, the two oldsters moved it to the living room to argue over the remote. Then it was time to help Tonya get the kids bathed and in bed, read stories, and get me off to me home office to finish some work. Finally, I went to bed; the next day, it was the same old same old. Take a breath, Gabe, I tell ya!

I wasn't gaining weight from the meals being conglomerated on me plate at night, and any calories I did gain went with the garden work. To say I was on the run-down side would be a great way of putting it. I knew I had to stop, to take a day off, but because the two old ladies were in me abode, I knew that was not a good idea. I couldn't go on holiday and leave the wife and kiddos, so what did I do? I continued on as before, running myself ragged.

Then it happened. Everything came together like a car crash. I came home, went to the garden, then to the table, wondering what the hell I was being served. After bathing the kiddos and getting them in pajamas, the doorbell rang and who was on me doorstep but Robbie Kincaid, the better half of the Weasil/Kincaid Side Show. After getting meself worked up that the Weasil was somewhere about, I finally believed the big Scot that he was alone. He needed a place to crash, he said.

I asked him how he had found me. I did not forward my new address, but after five times of begging to know how he knew, he told me that Weasil had told him. Of course! That's how knackered I was because ordinarily, I'd have surmised that on my own. I had no place to put his fat arse, but I needn't worry, Dragon gave him her room and she would sleep with Tonya, leaving me to sleep on the floor somewhere. I was pissed off I was but made the best of a bad situation by waiting until nearly 2 a.m. for everyone to go to bed so I could camp out on the living room sofa. Tonya had wanted to buy a sleeper sofa way back when, and I said no because I didn't want an extra bed for unwanted guests. Well, I ended up being a guest in me own abode!

Finally, I got as comfy as possible. I laid on the sofa and tried to sleep. It was not warm enough for the house AC but warm enough for a fan to do the trick. I got one, one of those stander ones. Oh, here, let me take a photo of me nemesis.

The culprit lying in wait for the unsuspecting sleeper

After I had set up the fan, I took a sleeping draught because I KNEW I'd get no sleep on that couch. The dog thought I was a great dog bed, and she'd be on top of me or next to me, and we knew sleep would be elusive! As to the coon hound THAT was ensconced next to its mistress's bed. Or so I thought.

The hum of the fan and the sleep medicine lulled me to sleep as uncomfortable as I was, with me feet hanging off the end of the sofa, dog on top, followed by the cat sometime during the night on my head. And how did I know the cat was there? She was grooming my hair with her claws; that's how I knew! It was about 3:00 in the morning that damnable coon hound let out three loud woofs by me head. This had me nearly jumping out of my skin; it did. I got up and looked around in the dark, unsure where I was, and stupid me moved around as if looking for an intruder. When I was mostly asleep, I walked smack into the fan, which . . . I did hear humming, but being not awake was unmindful to its whereabouts or mine, whichever the case might have been. And when I did walk into that fan, I walked into it! I walked into it like there was nothing there. I broke me little toe, I did. And fractured the one next to it and a whole lot of little bones in me foot. The ball of my foot under the big toe was swollen, and I couldn't put on a shoe. Here, look at this!

The little swollen toe attached to the swollen foot was initially sticking out at a right and painful angle,

Yes, I did a number on meself. Being not quite awake I knew if I woke any further up I'd be feeling pain, so I did the unthinkable I made me way to the powder room, dragging my injured foot, and in the dark found a washcloth, ran it under cold water (because I was too lazy to go to the kitchen for ice and I didn't want to wake up any more than I was for the shock). I limped back to the sofa, this time mindful of the fan, and as I put the cold cloth to me tootsies, I realised one of them was sticking out at a right angle. That got me to turn on the light, and what I saw had me swooning. The little toe was sticking straight out to the right of me foot, and the toe next to it was leaning in the same direction but not so violently. I quickly turned the light out, threw the wet cloth over the smarting members and went back to sleep.

The next day, me foot was yellow, green, blue, purple, black and very swollen. I, of course, could not step on it, let alone walk. I was given a crutch by the Dragon, who comes prepared because of her knees. The crutch was too short, so I used it like a cane to hobble around. She made me put a sock on the foot to keep the little toe in place, but in reality, it was so she didn't have to look at it.

I ended up at doctors who told me I dislocated me toes, fractured small bones in the foot and broke the pinkie toe. He did not recommend surgery but told me to ice, ice, ice and keep the foot elevated, and he told me to buy a special kind of elastic support sock to keep the toe in place. He didn't think it was severe enough to split, operate on, or put a metal rod in it. OUCH!

So, a few days go by, and I can step on it, but I still can't walk without howling in pain. The veins are still popped way out. It now looks like this:

The colours are not as dark, and the swelling is still prominent, but hey, at least the toes are in place

I blame it on the coon hound. Yes, I do. He had no clue I was sleeping on the sofa, and when he came upon me he thought me an intruder and thus the eardrum-shattering barking in me face that woke me up with a start and had me standing up in a dither, and slamming me foot into the fan I forgot was there. Yes, it was all his fault!

Gabe
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