Turf schmoe.

We had about five days of rain, and Tuesday it finally started to taper off. I got to take the big dog for a longer walk than we'd been able to accomplish -- neither of us are big fans of schlepping through the rain. But it led to my latest dog-related injury. 

I've gotten tennis elbow from playing tug with Tralfaz, and have slipped on the ice while walking Tralfaz at least twice, but this is the first time I had a mud-related injury. We weren't even off-roading it. We were going along the sidewalk, la-dee-da, me thinking casually of my neighbor who will die in jail one day, and down I went like a sack of stones. Tralfaz, my own personal Lassie, did his usual panicky strut around while I writhed in pain. 

What happened was: A dip in the sidewalk caused by a tree root or something had resulted in a collection of dirt, which in the precipitation turned into a patch of slippery mud. My foot hadn't come flying out from under me forward, sending me on my back; rather, it hyperextended my toes on the push-back. I started to fall backward, but had enough of my leg behind me to right myself -- so I went straight down and then on my butt. 

Courtesy American Academy of Orthopedic
Surgeons, who would know.

It didn't hurt much at first, but by the time I got home -- and tossed my mud-caked ol' shoes -- I felt the pain and numbness associated with turf toe.

This is all pretty exciting. As a nonathletic kid who went to a nonathletic college (as I mentioned a couple months ago, we were NCAA Division 😜), injuries like tennis elbow and turf toe were unknown to me. Not since Hank Hill thought Bobby had the injury has anyone been so happy about turf toe. Manly!

Alas, once the excitement wore off it was ice and rest for me, and not much of either. This appears to be a mild case, almost entirely gone now. No tread badge of courage for me.

At least it's not gout. That stuff could make a man cry.