Blistering Week at Work

I wrote earlier in this blog that my wife always buys my clothes, a task she jealously guards, especially from me.  We reached a crisis point with my favorite pair of work shoes this week.  It rained one day and I complained to her that my socks were all wet because of the hole in the bottom of the shoes.  She incredulously asked me how long the hole had been there.  In the interest of self-preservation I said only a couple of days (in reality nearly a month – but these were great shoes).  She decided to let me buy a replacement pair without her presence since the shoe store is only a couple of minutes from my work.  I hesitantly approached this assignment with the reverence due, realizing the immense trust she was endowing me with. I understood how difficult it was for her to relinquish this perogative.  I found the exact same type of shoe in the right size and I even tried them on.  I was extremely proud of myself for accomplishing this extremely challenging mission.  When I got back to the office I changed into the new shoes and reluctantly consigned my beloved old shoes to the trash.  When I got home that night I noticed a slightly abraded area on the heel of one foot.  Having spent a quarter of a century in the infantry I am no stranger to blisters and for the rest of the week just slapped on some moleskin and went about my business. I’ve always taken the approach that blisters are just a necessary step in toughening the skin in a new area abraded by new shoes.  At some point in the week the blister ripped off and by Friday the combination of the new shoes and my daily runs had created a fairly gnarly situation on the heel.  I made the mistake of letting my wife see the affected site – big mistake.  I was trying to explain to her that it was a simple blister and that I had a whole lot more experience with these things than she did.  She was not to be denied.  I was actually a little impressed.  She spent twenty minutes cleaning it out, removing dog hairs, applying antibiotic cream, and delivering a lecture the entire time.  The lecture started out with my failure to adequately care for myself and transitioned to my failures in the shoe buying expedition.  Again, I was actually a little impressed that she could keep this up for twenty minutes while staying busy with my foot the entire time.  Of course I was trying to be macho and not react to any of the pain emanating from her ministrations to include the scrubbing of the exposed raw skin.  All Buddy the Wonder Pooch sees is raw meat and thinks that his job is to lick the wound.  I’ve taken to wearing a reversed sock this weekend to avoid that fate – he’s very sneaky.  I don’t think I’ll be trusted in the future to buy any more shoes for myself.

The Affected Site

Buddy Trying to Get His Licks In