Of course. In 120 degree heat with a cloudless sky the pavement can suck in so much heat that my thick soled combat boots turned into tiny foot ovens. I have stepped on tacks, nails, lego, glass, and so on. These cuts and punctures are brief and relatively forgettable compared to walking 32 miles on that blistering hot surface. Making that road the most painful thing I have ever stepped on.
32 miles is like a full days walk nonstop. If you were there on military business what led to your situation in which you didn't have a vehicle to carry you such a long stretch?
I was Volunteered to do it with the Squadron Command along with a few hundred others. While difficult to carry a full ruck with a few days of supplies/sleeping equipment and an M249, it was worth it; I got a belt buckle. I think, of those that finished, took as long as 15 hours. The fastest was 7 and my group was 9 hours.
Yep, there is great satisfaction in overcoming any hardship. Even the self imposed. Also, it's one of those things that randomly come up in conversation. Story ends with me and 2 friends staying up and floating a keg over the next 48 hours. It was good times. I still cycle quite a bit these days, so I'm active, but I live a different life. The stories are good to have.
Weirdly enough, a single dog hair. It managed to get lodged into my foot, creeping in slower and slower, and I couldn't figure out what was causing me so much pain. I'd take off my shoe, shake it out, put it back on, and nothing changed. Frantically scraped inside for whatever tiny sharp object was causing me pain, still no change. It went on for a long time before I found the hair and pulled it out. It has happened a few times, but at least now I figure it out much quicker. It's weird because I grew up with dogs and never had this problem until the current dog.
The same thing has happened to me. Got a labrador, and its hairs have some damned magic hooks that make them get stuck on cloth surfaces. I suppose when a hair's tip is pressed against the skin under your foot, it can actually get lodged into the skin. It seems rare, though, considering the amount of dog hair inside my shoes. :)
I remember a time when I was little, I was at the beach with my family. At one point I was running back from the sea to where my parents were. I wasn't paying attention and stepped on a sharp rock which was embedded in the sand. It gave me quite a nasty cut on the bottom of my foot. Young me did not like the pain.
A concealed sprinkler head. I was partaking in a water gun fight as a kid and ran right onto one of the sprinklers. It slashed open a 2-3 inch gash on my foot between my 4th and pinky toe. There's still a pretty deep ridge from the scar. It took months for it to heal completely and not ache.
A Black Locust tree thorn. It went through my cheap flip-flop sandal and about an inch into the arch of my 6-year old foot. All I really remember is the throbbing, which went on for a long while, and the fact that it didn't bleed much.
Not too traumatic - probably because of the lack of blood - but the memory has certainly stayed with me. I have a healthy respect for Black Locusts now too!
You know, bad as the pain may be, I actually find it quite impressive to think that evolutionarily these venoms were engineered to kill prey, and obviously based on the pain have been engineered well, are very potent, very strong... but we survive easily, either by immune system or with medicine. Human biology is no fucking joke.
Well yes, it's largely a matter of concentration right? Just like numerous stings from anything would kill you, children have smaller bodies and that increases default toxicity.
edit: I guess I see what you mean, it's more that we're just large than that we are superb at avoiding toxins biologically yeah
I don't know why but something about exotic colors trip my danger sensors. If I saw something exactly that spiky but it was like a sandpaper brown or something I would think it half as scary looking as that bastard in the picture.
When I was a teenage job hopper, I worked day labor. One job was at a construction site doing the grunt work (translated: cleaning up the crap left on the job site).
In one particularly dirty, dusty, scrap wood laden area, I mis-stepped.
One assignment-ending incident: a dirty (but not rusty) nail, straight through my double-soled work boot and up in to the ball of my foot, held securely in place by the board it was originally nailed in to.
A 2 inch deep hole. Rolled my ankle, dislocated my kneecap and resulted in a plateau fracture of the tibia and a high ankle sprain. 11 weeks on crutches, non-weight bearing. It's how I've spent my summer.
I was skateboarding barefoot (problem 1) and hitting a very, very old wooden quarterpipe (problem 2). On one descent, my foot slipped and I stepped down on the splintery top edge with lots of resultant blood and pain. The pain was initially intense, but became a dull ache over the next few weeks. I won't go into gory details, but the huge splinter that had actually gone deep into the flesh that fateful day (unbeknownst to me) managed to work itself out in a festering volcano of grossness many months later.
I'm amazed that no one said a lego. Probably the worst thing I've ever had the misfortune of stepping on was a sharp rock on a sandy beach. I didn't need stitches, but getting all that sand out of the wound wasn't fun lol
A cats nail. One time at night I was trimming my cats nails while one of my shoes was nearby. One of the damned things flew right into the shoe, but I didn't notice it right away. Next morning, I was shopping for computer parts downtown and that unberable sting on my foot, I almost fell to the groung.
I removed the shoe inside the store I was in to check what it was, and saw that piece of nail sticking to my foot.
Needless to say, now I'm very carefull with where my shoes are when trimming my cats nails.
Once I stepped on a sewing needle that managed to jam itself about 1/4" into my heel. And then I needed pliers to yank it out since I couldn't get a decent grip on it. :/
Either a sewing needle that fell out of my sewing kit or a piece of .05 graphite from my mechanical pencil. Sewing needle was on the steps so the pain mostly came from the force of stepping down onto it. The graphite was painful because I couldn't get it all out as it would break up and had to wait for it to kind of...work itself out so walking hurt for a bit. Whoops.
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Walking on black pavement in the desert. Your feet feel like they are being slowly cooked, after enough time it becomes very mentally distressing.
Did you not have shoes?
Of course. In 120 degree heat with a cloudless sky the pavement can suck in so much heat that my thick soled combat boots turned into tiny foot ovens. I have stepped on tacks, nails, lego, glass, and so on. These cuts and punctures are brief and relatively forgettable compared to walking 32 miles on that blistering hot surface. Making that road the most painful thing I have ever stepped on.
32 miles is like a full days walk nonstop. If you were there on military business what led to your situation in which you didn't have a vehicle to carry you such a long stretch?
I was Volunteered to do it with the Squadron Command along with a few hundred others. While difficult to carry a full ruck with a few days of supplies/sleeping equipment and an M249, it was worth it; I got a belt buckle. I think, of those that finished, took as long as 15 hours. The fastest was 7 and my group was 9 hours.
So it was purely for honor? Sounds rough. You really do think it was worth?
Yep, there is great satisfaction in overcoming any hardship. Even the self imposed. Also, it's one of those things that randomly come up in conversation. Story ends with me and 2 friends staying up and floating a keg over the next 48 hours. It was good times. I still cycle quite a bit these days, so I'm active, but I live a different life. The stories are good to have.
Weirdly enough, a single dog hair. It managed to get lodged into my foot, creeping in slower and slower, and I couldn't figure out what was causing me so much pain. I'd take off my shoe, shake it out, put it back on, and nothing changed. Frantically scraped inside for whatever tiny sharp object was causing me pain, still no change. It went on for a long time before I found the hair and pulled it out. It has happened a few times, but at least now I figure it out much quicker. It's weird because I grew up with dogs and never had this problem until the current dog.
Is your dog the product of a test tube experiment with superman's dna? How the hell is a dog hair strong enough to pierce your foot?
The same thing has happened to me. Got a labrador, and its hairs have some damned magic hooks that make them get stuck on cloth surfaces. I suppose when a hair's tip is pressed against the skin under your foot, it can actually get lodged into the skin. It seems rare, though, considering the amount of dog hair inside my shoes. :)
I remember a time when I was little, I was at the beach with my family. At one point I was running back from the sea to where my parents were. I wasn't paying attention and stepped on a sharp rock which was embedded in the sand. It gave me quite a nasty cut on the bottom of my foot. Young me did not like the pain.
A concealed sprinkler head. I was partaking in a water gun fight as a kid and ran right onto one of the sprinklers. It slashed open a 2-3 inch gash on my foot between my 4th and pinky toe. There's still a pretty deep ridge from the scar. It took months for it to heal completely and not ache.
As a kid, I stepped on a well armed bee. Yeouch!
A Black Locust tree thorn. It went through my cheap flip-flop sandal and about an inch into the arch of my 6-year old foot. All I really remember is the throbbing, which went on for a long while, and the fact that it didn't bleed much.
Just reading this hurt my foot. I couldn't imagine what it was like as a child.
Not too traumatic - probably because of the lack of blood - but the memory has certainly stayed with me. I have a healthy respect for Black Locusts now too!
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A sea urchin. Ended up with half a dozen spines in the bottom of my foot.
My sister did the same thing, right on the second day of a fourteen-day vacation.
I don't know why but something about exotic colors trip my danger sensors. If I saw something exactly that spiky but it was like a sandpaper brown or something I would think it half as scary looking as that bastard in the picture.
A rusty nail, not sure what hurt worse the nail or the tetanus shot....................
I know the pain.
One time working on a landscape crew I stepped on one and never said a word just cause of the hassle and that dam shot, still I live!!!
When I was a teenage job hopper, I worked day labor. One job was at a construction site doing the grunt work (translated: cleaning up the crap left on the job site). In one particularly dirty, dusty, scrap wood laden area, I mis-stepped. One assignment-ending incident: a dirty (but not rusty) nail, straight through my double-soled work boot and up in to the ball of my foot, held securely in place by the board it was originally nailed in to.
Who paid for the medical costs?
family medical insurance, if I recall correctly -- I was a teen, still at home w/ the parental units.
A 2 inch deep hole. Rolled my ankle, dislocated my kneecap and resulted in a plateau fracture of the tibia and a high ankle sprain. 11 weeks on crutches, non-weight bearing. It's how I've spent my summer.
I was skateboarding barefoot (problem 1) and hitting a very, very old wooden quarterpipe (problem 2). On one descent, my foot slipped and I stepped down on the splintery top edge with lots of resultant blood and pain. The pain was initially intense, but became a dull ache over the next few weeks. I won't go into gory details, but the huge splinter that had actually gone deep into the flesh that fateful day (unbeknownst to me) managed to work itself out in a festering volcano of grossness many months later.
A plug prong hiding between some clothes on my floor, I kept my room spotless after that.
I'm amazed that no one said a lego. Probably the worst thing I've ever had the misfortune of stepping on was a sharp rock on a sandy beach. I didn't need stitches, but getting all that sand out of the wound wasn't fun lol
A cats nail. One time at night I was trimming my cats nails while one of my shoes was nearby. One of the damned things flew right into the shoe, but I didn't notice it right away. Next morning, I was shopping for computer parts downtown and that unberable sting on my foot, I almost fell to the groung.
I removed the shoe inside the store I was in to check what it was, and saw that piece of nail sticking to my foot.
Needless to say, now I'm very carefull with where my shoes are when trimming my cats nails.
The culprit.
I stepped on a muscle shell and ended up slicing my toe open with a half inch long gash and boy did that bleed. Thankfully I didn't need stitches.
Once I stepped on a sewing needle that managed to jam itself about 1/4" into my heel. And then I needed pliers to yank it out since I couldn't get a decent grip on it. :/
Either a sewing needle that fell out of my sewing kit or a piece of .05 graphite from my mechanical pencil. Sewing needle was on the steps so the pain mostly came from the force of stepping down onto it. The graphite was painful because I couldn't get it all out as it would break up and had to wait for it to kind of...work itself out so walking hurt for a bit. Whoops.
My penis.