Perpetual Ruminations

Friday

I better get this done now, just in case I have trouble typing later. It's early evening, or maybe late afternoon, one or the other, maybe even both; depends on the person I suppose. Anyway, I'm home from work, home from fishing, and spending a little time online before Rhonda gets home.

I was up at three again this morning, so I'm pretty tired. I also did not take a nap, which is something I have become accustomed to. I did get a little more sleep last night, but not much. Maybe about seven hours the last two nights combined, which is why I'm so tired tonight.

Also, I went out fishing after work, and spent a few hours in the boat, getting lots of fresh air, some sunshine, some rain, some ice pellets, and lots of cold blustery wind. That really added to how tired I am. It was cold and wet most of the time we were out, and we didn't catch any fish, but I still enjoyed myself.

Normally we end up staying out later, too. This would be alright if I didn't have to get up super early the next morning, but when you don't get off the lake until eight o'clock at night, have to come home and clean fish, and then be back up by three o'clock the next morning, it's kind of pain. With the weather so miserable, though, and no fish biting, we came in plenty early tonight, and I can come in here instead of cleaning fish.

On the down side, however, I did have a slight mishap when we landed the boat. The wind made getting it on the trailer kind of difficult, especially since we are fishing a flooded lake. the actual landing is unavailable, but the water is over the road in places, so we just back the boat down the road to the water, then crank it into the ditch.

Normally it works pretty good, but today the wind was working against us. The boat didn't line up on the trailer correctly, so I unlocked the winch and gave the boat a good hard shove to get it back off the trailer. The winch spun wildly in reverse as the strap pulled off drum and the boat sailed backward off the trailer.

All was good until I slipped on the wet metal and whacked my hand with the rapidly spinning handle of the winch. It hit right were my thumb and hand join, and I knew instantly that I had done more than just bruised it. I couldn't see the damage, since I still had gloves on, but I could feel the numbness spreading into my thumb even as my hand and palm began to throb. Slowly the numbness spread down my thumb as the pain radiated up my wrist and arm. I also felt a bit queasy.

I didn't yell out or cuss or anything, just cradled the aching limb and worked to get the boat on the trailer. Once this was done, I told my brother what had happened and pulled the glove off. The base of the thumb and the area of the hand where the thumb joins was purple, and shaped weird. It would not move when I tried to move my thumb, and it was swelling up very rapidly.

I helped him stow the gear and then I drove home and he took the boat home. Once I got here, I took a couple of Ibuprofen and grasp it in my good hand. With a little effort I was able to pull and twist my thumb back into it's normal position, and could once again flex it and move it around normally.

It's sore as hell, but the purple has lightened, the weird shape is corrected, and now there is just a funky looking ridge about two inches long on the back of my hand just below where the thumb attaches. I'm pretty sure it's re-seated properly, but it's difficult to tell for sure with the swelling and that raised up ridge. There's a very real possibility that I may have busted my hand as well as dislocating my thumb.

I hope not, I can't afford to go in to the emergency room, and the clinic is closed until Monday. By then, they likely won't be able to do anything for me. I will have to monitor it over the weekend, and if it's not looking any better by Monday, I'll have to go get it checked. For now, it's going to be tough trying to type and do things with the limited use I have in my hand. By later, it will likely be even worse, so like I stated in the beginning, I better type this now, while I can.