I've known for days something was afoot. I know, I'm already sorry I wrote it. But it's going to be that kind of post, so you may as well start getting used to it.
This is not an actual picture of my foot. For starters, my story is about my right foot not my left one. My legs are also considerably more muscular from the exercise they get walking from the bedroom to the refrigerator several times a night. It's all about the calves.
Anyway, I've had an ingrown toenail on the big toe of my right foot for a while now. It had gradually gotten more and more painful, finally to the point where I had to do something about it. So I went to my podiatrist, Doug Richie, who also happens to be Jerry Seinfeld's podiatrist when he's in town. Hope I don't hurt my foot again dropping a name on it.
With my vast medical background, I figured Doug would trim the nail properly, the pain would be gone and that would be that. Were it only that easy.
He said apparently what happened is the shape of my toenail has changed, something fairly common as "one gets older", a phrase I can never really hear enough. He then informed me the best way to stop it from reoccurring was to do a minor surgical procedure called a wedge resection.
This little piggy screamed ouch.
Basically, it consists of numbing the toe, then trimming the wedges on both sides of the toenail so they don't grow into the toe. Ever again. Part of the procedure involves putting acid—not the fun kind—on the roots where the trimmed nails were to make sure those suckers are gone for good.
When it's over, he wraps the toe up and it looks like the toe in the picture. Actually, by the time I got home, the bandage looked a little more, shall we say, colorful. Which is why I'm sparing you a picture of my actual foot.
So if you need me over the next few days, I'll be sitting here soaking in epsom salts while I finish bingeing Hannibal.
By the way, I don't know if you noticed, but I got through this without any "arch" enemy or "He's a heel" jokes.
And we had a ball anyway.
