First Doctor Visit

After fifteen months in the country, a domestic accident yesterday evening left Joe with his left pointer fingernail torn loose.

Thankfully, I'm no longer as squeamish; I was able to put the nail over the tender, exposed skin, bandaid it up, give him some Arnica for trauma and another remedy for hurt fingers and put Joe to sleep. After 14 hours, with only intermittent wakeful cries, he awoke cheerful and happy.

We stopped by our doctor friend Zach Bush's house on our way to church. I found out later that, despite being a family practitioner, nail injuries make him squirm even still (he refused to look at his sister-in-law's toe when she tore off her nail even!). He managed to get Joe to bend both joints, and if the tip of the bone broke off, there's nothing that can be done for that. The bruising underneath the nail has begun, without sign of pus or infection.

Joe bore with patience the gentle prodding. The skin at the tip will soon fall off, so it will be a long recovery, but it could be a good deal worse, and we are very thankful for such helpful care. (Zach said that if we had gone to the emergency room, that would have been an $1800 trip!)

In less dramatic news, we awoke on Saturday to a very chilly house. The space heater, in transit, had no reached us on Thursday (the day it was on the truck), nor Friday, and Saturday morning the thermometer said 20 outside and 40 inside.

Phil tried to start the heater in the motor home, but found that the propane heater had been damaged since we used it last, and without heat on the thermostat to get the temperature up to 55, the motor home heater wouldn't go on, either. He managed to be resourceful, though, and soon we were all happy and warm enough in the motor home. The sun came out, too; that helped a lot.

While Phil and Butch lumberjacked along the new fence line, I spent most of Saturday dealing with chickens. I checked to make sure I had removed all lungs, pulled off any extra feathers, and bagged the 24 birds up and put them in the freezer.

I also tried a new culinary adventure. I have read about the amazing health properties of chicken feet, but, when we processed chickens in Boulder, took one look (and smell) at the feet, with bits of dung and dirt pressed into the pads, and composted the feet.

Michelle Bessette mentioned that she had learned from a woman from Jamaica that, if the feet are dunked in boiling water for about ten seconds, they outer layer of nastiness peels away, leaving healthy, clean connective tissue underneath.

This worked! It is not a fast process, as I would estimate it took me three or four minutes per foot to peel. Then I had to chop off the yet-nasty toenails. Even now I'm only maybe halfway done. But I look forward to the rich, healthy broth I will make one day, and that sounds good.

As a random bit of trivia: based on the recommendation of a friend, I put a penny on a wasp sting and was surprised to see that I had no swelling the next day, and very little itch. So you might try that remedy, should you be stung.