The Naughty Finger

You know how in the cartoons when a character hurts their finger, it’s animated into this huge, red, pulsating digit? (I’m visualising Fred Flintstone going “Yeeeeeooooow!” as I write).

You do? Well that’s me right now. Except, if I’m totally honest there’s really no huge, red, pulsating finger, just rather a poor excuse for a cut on the end of my ‘pointer’ which has been giving me absolute grief for days.

And I’m getting no sympathy from my dog, Moses, either as it was an attempt to swat him that caused the injury in the first place. In fact, I can almost hear a smug little doggie “serves you right” as he reminds me that he was just trying to ‘help’ me when my finger connected rather sharply with some woodwork instead of him.

But the reason I am even writing about this is that it’s almost as if this sore finger has its own dastardly agenda. Whatever I’m doing it seems to find itself in an awkward (read ‘excruciatingly painful’!) spot.

I have a shower; it clunks itself on the soap tray. I try to dress; it gets itself caught in the elastic of my undies. I rummage through the cutlery drawer; it finds a couple of loose spoons to wedge itself between. I flick on the car blinkers; it goes one step further and whacks the steering wheel. It’s on a mission to make me notice it!

“Look at me!” it seems to be saying. “Don’t just go about your daily life like a normal, pain-free person. We have an ‘injury’ here, woman! Suffer!”

My handbag is like a mobile torture chamber. A simple search for the car keys has now become an exercise that must be planned with military precision. Firstly, the bag must be placed on a flat surface.

Then, using LEFT hand only (the non injured hand), items impeding the view of said car keys, are removed one by one. At NO point whatsoever in this delicate operation is the right hand permitted to engage in the activity. That is, until my mobile starts ringing in the bowels of the bag and ‘Old Righty’ goes into auto-response and dives foolishly into the fray.

Result? Me hopping around, waving my sore finger in the air like a mad woman and trying to stop myself from turning the air blue with expletives ….. and a missed call.

“Was it really worth it?” I ask Old Righty grumpily (yes, now I’m even talking to the thing). “You’ve just set your healing process back by about three days, I reckon.”

Old Righty just gives a sickening throb and says ‘Whatever’. He’s had his fun.

And then there’s night time. You wouldn’t think one could continue to injure one’s finger in bed, would you? But yes, that’s exactly what I can do.

After several pain-wracked moments of arranging myself under the covers, I attempt to roll on to my side, only to find Old Righty’s having none of it. He’s decided to wind himself defiantly into the corner of the sheet where he stays until he is ripped forth by the momentum of me doing my beached whale impersonation.

“Yeeeeeeeoooooow!” hollers Miss Flintstone as her pulsating, red, swollen digit wins again.

I lie there for the next several hours with my hand in the air in an attempt to keep the blood from flowing freely into the end of the finger.

“What the hell are you doing?” the spouse inquires after waking to find me looking like a zombie-fied, horizontal goal umpire.

Well, anyway, I think Old Righty might have won, afterall. I reckon it could be a trip to the doctor for some antibiotics in the very near future.

“I told you so,” says Old Righty, smugly admiring his latest bandage.

Argghhh! There’s nothing worse than the finger of scorn!