Sidelined

It happens eventually to everyone who swings a hammer. Finger, meet hammer... WHAM!!

We've been spending the last couple of nice weekends working on the new deck and there are always some scrapes and bruises, but Saturday I had a really misplaced swing of the hammer. I have to say the photo doesn't necessarily do justice to the swelling and underlying blue tinge. But, surprisingly, other than the initial hopping around and the expected throbbing, it hasn't been too painful since I've mostly avoided even attempting to use that finger since... and a lot of it has been pretty numb thanks to the swelling. I'm also incredibly thankful that I just clobbered the meaty part of the tip and didn't give myself a blackened fingernail as that would have been much more painful.

Of course, not using an index finger means my typing is slow and sloppy. And I didn't even attempt to hold my knitting needles until last night, which also didn't go so well. Too painful to even think about holding a needle with that finger and gripping with my thumb and middle finger causes some interesting hand cramps pretty quickly. I made it across one row and then called it quits.

So I think my first Sock Wars attempt is likely to be a suicide mission. I've debated contacting the organizer to have myself removed from the competition, but I haven't done it yet. After 3 days my finger is still swollen, but parts of it have more feeling now and the start of the war is still a little over a week away. I guess I probably have a day or two left to bow out, so we'll see. But, suffice it to say, you won't be seeing much of anything flying off of my needles for a bit while this heals.