Over the course of a lifetime in journalism, I have inevitably incurred my fair share of injuries. A blackened eye - administered by an association footballer who liked to think of himself as ‘professional’ (but who was strictly amateur when it came to answering questions about his alleged affair with a waitress), was not the least of them. A broken rib or two - caused by slip on a step outside the Dog and Kettle in Stockport (which the brewery solicitors refused to accept was uneven, choosing to defend my claim by producing my - admittedly rather large - bar bill) figures somewhere along the line. And an injured knee – occasioned by a hammer-wielding ex-husband in a suburb of south Manchester (which shall remain nameless: no veil would be discrete enough where that story is concerned).
But the strangest injury of all has to be the one that has got me tapping away at my keyboard much more slowly than usual, with the middle finger of my right hand splinted up for the next 6 weeks thanks chiefly to a fight with a sock.
This posting is, therefore, published as a warning to any man (or indeed, woman) out there who carelessly attempts to remove their socks tonight, without giving a thought to the potential for bodily injury.
STOP!
Think carefully before you absent-mindedly try to push off a sock with an extended finger. Had I had the foresight to be in Seattle in 2001, I might have learned about Fran Joy’s experience, and given more thought to what I otherwise had come to think was a fairly safe procedure. Having followed the advice (from an early age) of many of my teachers to ‘pull my socks up,’ I always believed I had become equally skilled at removing them. After all, in the simple act of removing a sock, no ladders, no electrical apparatus, and no dangerous chemicals are involved. And it’s an act I’ve performed at least 40,000 times in my life - sometimes more than twice a day (pass the discrete veil again, please).
However, I am here to testify about the dangers: mallet finger, and two months in a splint, awaits all who fail to heed my warning. Tonight, then, take extra care when taking off your socks. You’ll be glad you did.
