fingered

Today's clinic appointment was a twenty-five minute wait followed by a quick change of bandages plus another iodine swabbing in the midst of the bandage-changing. I told the old doc what Ligament had said about how the first bandage job looked like the Pope's hat, and how Ligament wanted to draw a face on it. He guffawed.

And that was really about it. The second session was very brief. The only advice the doc gave was, "Try not to run." I patted my large belly and said, "I'm not the running kind."

Oh, yeah: I took a closer look at the "scissors" that the doc had used yesterday. As it turned out, the "scissors" weren't scissors at all, which explains why they weren't sharp: they were, instead, a sort of scissors-shaped forceps (here's a pic of the tool... the photo comes from a veterinary-supplies website), so yeah, I wasn't hallucinating the ripping and tearing. Imagine viciously plucking at your eyelid skin with tweezers; it was about like that.

I went back to the front desk once the re-bandaging was over; I paid my bill, collected another prescription—this time for several days' worth of antibiotics. I was given no advice on how long to keep the bandage on, and I didn't ask, so I'm just going to use my common sense. At a guess, I can take the bandage off in two or three days. Hell, I might even take it off tonight, given that it's a bitch to cover my middle finger in plastic whenever I have to shower. I have a box of bandages at home, so I think I'm covered.

It bothers me that this infection happened at all. I've had random eye infections before; they normally go away after I apply ointment and a dropper antibiotic. I've also got plenty of sores and scars on my skin—obvious places for bacteria to invade. But my left middle finger has never been cut or otherwise injured, and as a former employee of an infection-control company, I religiously wash my hands. I'm also not in the habit of finger-fucking my asshole, so I really can't understand where this infection came from. I'm just going to chalk it up to life's vicissitudes and hope this doesn't happen again.


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