Just a typical evening at our house

My husband came home last night earlier then usual.  I let the dog out to greet him and then went outside to my laundry room in the garage.  When I finished there I messed around in the kitchen for several minutes.  Finally, noticing that the husband hadn't come in to greet us I went to look for him, finding him standing in our bathroom his left foot in the sink.

Me:  "Get your foot out of my clean sink!  I just cleaned this bathroom today.  What are you doing?"

Him:  "I'm soaking my foot."

Me:  "Why?  What's wrong with it?"  I peer at it closely, looking for cuts and blood.  "There's nothing wrong with it.  Get your nasty foot out of my clean sink!"

Him:  "I didn't cut it.  I twisted it or something."

Me:  "Twisted it?  What do you mean you twisted it?  Just now?"

Him:  "I was turning my foot around in my shoe and I heard a pop, and the thing hurts like a mother."

Me:  "What?  You were turning your foot around in your shoe?  What the hell does that mean?"

What it means is that Tom bought a new pair of dress shoes for work.  He wore them on Friday and again yesterday, but the shoes were very stiff and never really loosened as he wore them.  He was sitting at his desk last night working and the shoe was tight on his foot so she twisted his foot around some to try to get the shoe to loosen.  The shoe held in place while his ankle twisted and he pulled something.

Me:  "You heard a pop?  Is it broken?"

Him:  "No, it's not broken, but I definitely tore something."

Me:  "Well, we should probably get it x-rayed."
 Him:  "What?  Why?  I don't need an x-ray.  I just need for it to stop hurting."

Me:  "Well, get it out of my clean sink because soaking it isn't going to help it!"

He dried his foot and then tried to put weight on it to leave the bathroom.  It was a no go.  He couldn't put any weight on the foot and collapsed on his back on the bed.  He whined and winced and moaned and cursed.  The ankle was swelling some, and I suggested ice, which was rejected immediately.  I finally left him on the bed and went about finishing up my nightly chores.

Darcy was in the shower taking one of her hourly cleanses complete with singing and steam rolling under the closed door.  Madison was in the kitchen doing homework.  I went out into the Steelers room to put away some belongings.  When I returned to the kitchen it was to find the husband sitting at the kitchen table eating dinner, his foot and ankle wrapped with a bath towel as if it were an ace bandage.

Me:  "What the hell is that?"

Him:  "I have to wrap it because it hurts.  I need some stabilization."

Me:  "Seriously?  How about an ace bandage?  Connie has a whole load of those things up in Dunedin."
 Him:  "Do we have any?  I know we don't have any hot water.  I tried to take a shower, but Darcy had used all of the hot water."

Madison: (laughing hysterically at the entire conversation, as well as the wrapped foot)
 Me:  "I'm not sure I follow that logic, but I'll go to Walgreens and get you an ace bandage if that is what you want."

So Madison and I drove to the corner Walgreens and purchased an eight dollar bandage for his foot.  It was self-adhesive and didn't come with the little hooks that Connie has on all of her bandages.  I offered to apply the bandage to hubby's foot, having had athletic training, but he said he could do it himself.

He started at the ankle and wrapped it around twice and then brought the bandage under his heel and over his foot.  At that point he declared it sufficiently wrapped and looked around the living room as if a pair of scissors would magically appear so he could cut off the remaining bandage.  I shook my head and offered up some advice about using the whole bandage for better support, and because no scissors materialized, he took my advice and wrapped his ankle and foot some more.  Darcy sat on the couch with him and critiqued his handiwork.

Darcy:  "Where are the little hooks that go with the bandage?  You need to use those at the end to hold the piece onto  the other piece."
Him:  "It is self adhesive."
Darcy:  "Huh?"
Me:  "It doesn't come with those hooks."

Darcy:  "Grandma's does."

Tom:  "Well, your mother got me the self adhesive kind which means it sticks so that I don't have to use hooks."
Darcy:  "Well, if you want my opinion, you need the hooks cause that it isn't sticking so well.  You need to press that dangling piece better."

Sure enough the end of the bandage wasn't sticking because hubby hadn't applied enough pressure to the end.  He sort of patted it down to the rest of the bandage and then got up off the couch, his wrapped foot in the air behind him.  He began hopping on his good leg around the couch and into the kitchen.  Darcy and I looked at each other and rolled our eyes.  Elliot, the dog, looked at us and then jumped off the couch to join in the fun hopping game.  Tom hopped out of the kitchen on one leg and Elliot jumped up on him.  Tom stopped at the doorway to the hall to catch his breath.  Darcy pointed out that his bandage was coming unraveled and that he seemed out of shape.  Tom made a snide comment about her trying to hop on one leg so she did just so, hopping around the living room.  Elliot ran from one hopper to another, barking.  Eventually, Tom began hopping away, his wrapped foot in the air, his bandage end dangling just enough for the dog to jump up and grab that end with his teeth.

Him:  "Dog!  Dog, stop it!"  Hop, hop.

Elliot pulled in the opposite direction on the bandage.  Hop, hop.  Tom tried to get away.  The bandage began unraveling.  I sat on the couch and thought about how I would try to write this scene in front of me as it was too good not to blog.  Darcy finally got the dog loose, Tom hopped back to bed, Madison went to take a shower, and I helped Darcy study for a test.

An hour or so went by and the girls got ready for bed.  I went into the bedroom to find hubby curled on the bed sound asleep.  I turned on the shower and brushed my teeth.  I put my hand in to feel the water and discovered it ice cold.  I waited some, but the water never got hot.  Annoyed at Madison's use of all the hot water, I wrapped a towel around myself and went out into the living room to watch television while the tank refilled. About fifteen minutes later, Tom hopped out on one leg.

Him:  "What are you doing?"

Me:  "There isn't any hot water so I'm waiting."

Him:  "What?  What?  There has to be hot water.  Something's wrong if there isn't any hot water because there wasn't any hot water when I tried to shower.  No way is there no hot water."

Me:  "Well, there wasn't, but I'll try again after this show."

Which I did.  I turned on the water and waited.  It was cold.  I got into the shower anyway because, as people know, I do not go to bed without a shower.  While in the shower I thought it odd that the water was ice cold and never getting warmer, even a tad.  A light bulb went off in my head.  Earlier that day I had taken off the knobs in the showers and bleached them all.  Perhaps...perhaps I hadn't put this knob back on correctly.  I turned the knob toward the cold water direction.  And I had hot water.  I chuckled and began washing my body.

Hop, hop.  I heard Gimpy come into the bathroom on his one leg.

Me:  "If you want a shower tomorrow morning, make sure you turn the knob to the cold water for hot water."

Him:  "What?  Why?"

Me:  "Well, I may have put the knob on wrong after I bleached it out today."

Him:  "I knew it.  I knew something was wrong, and I think I have the flu."

Me:  "What?  The flu?  What are you talking about?"

Him:  "Because I'm shaking and I'm cold.  I have the flu."

Me:  "That's probably shock, Tom, from your broken ankle or whatever is going on with that thing.  You don't have the flu for heaven's sake.  You had a flu shot!  It's shock."

Him:  "I don't have shock.  And my ankle isn't broken, it's sprained.  Like how you twist your ankle playing basketball."

Me:  "Yeah, only you didn't do that.  Although that is exactly what I'd tell people at work tomorrow as you hop around the office, because telling them you sprained your ankle by sitting at a desk twisting your foot around inside stiff, new shoes doesn't sound all that manly."

Him:  "I have a fever, but I took an advil."

Me:  "You don't have the flu."

Him:  "Well, I have something because Melanie went home sick today.  Isn't that weird that both things happened to me at the same time?"

Me:  "Oh, my god, you are as bad as Gabby with the germ-a-phobia thing.  Just because a co-worker went home sick doesn't mean you have the same thing?  Just take your wrapped foot and go to bed already.  What are you going to do tomorrow?  You can't hop around work like that."

Him:  "I'll have to stay home tomorrow if I feel like this.  My nose is all stuffed and I've got congestion like Darcy."

Me:  "Make up your mind on your illnesses, would you?"

He went to bed.  I went to bed.  I felt his forehead.  He did not have a fever, despite his insistence that he did.  He asked me to get him some cold water.  I gave him my bottle that I had brought in with me.  He went to sleep.  The next morning he woke up and walked normally to the bathroom.  He shaved and brushed his teeth.  He walked normally around the bedroom.

Me:  "How's the foot?"

Him:  "Fine.  Like nothing happened.  How weird is that?"

Me:  "Uh huh.  How's the flu?"

Him:  "Gone.  And my nose is fine and the congestion is gone.  It's as if none of that stuff happened.  I feel kind of silly now."
Me:  "Not half as silly as you're going to look when I put together that video of you hopping around!"(Which I wish I had thought to do, but I was too annoyed to do so) 
Him:  "Put it on Facebook."

And so off to work he went, strutting nicely on his ankles, his flu and chest cold gone.  My little miracle.