Also, I’m in excruciating pain.

I took a header on the walkway this afternoon–skidded on wet grass clippings–and landed hard on my left knee on concrete. It hurt in that cataclysmic way that knee pain hurts, I rolled over on the lawn, sent a peat pot of sweet basil flying, soaked my ass in wet grass, and did all the usual "okay, okay, I can breathe, it’s not broken, it’s okay," things that one does in such circumstances (and would doubtlessly do if I had just trod on a land mine–it’s an attempt at self-reassurance and bears no resemblance to an actual assessment of one’s physical condition) Fortunately it was not broken, and it subsided to an ache and some stiffness. I walked around on it, knelt on it, generally did a lot to try and keep it from locking up, and thought I was doing well. Figured it was a skinned knee, I’d be shaving around scars for the next five years*

As of about an hour ago, I am in the making-involuntary-noises stage of pain. It aches badly. Putting weight on it is no problem, it’s just when I move the angle of the leg at all–to bend or straighten or whatever–I get to spend a few breathless moments suspended in the void with the God of Pain, whom I first encountered when I threw my back out at eighteen. (This was not an acquaintanceship I was eager to renew.)

Threw down a couple ibuprofen, reading Carl Hiaasen’s Native Tongue, and have "Chronicles of Riddick" playing in the background on TV. There are worse ways to spend an evening, but I could do without the shrieking whenever I have to get up to go pee.

*God, I miss being a kid and having a skinned knee heal up scarless in a week.

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