Ouch!

  My son is one of those folks that almost never wears shoes.  Even though he is a grown man now, he would much rather tromp about the hillside sans shoes.  I cannot fuss at him since I often do the same and on the rare occasions that I do wear shoes, they are simple leather moccasins.  (No hard sole shoes for me!)  Still, this treading about without something protecting your feet can be dangerous.  He found out just how dangerous inanimate items can be.  

  We were racing out to cover up a load of lumber before a thunderstorm decided to dump about an ocean of water from the sky.  The plywood and other boards would be soaked if we did not do something quick.  He hopped over the cactus garden to grab a tarpaulin that could be used for such a job.  When his foot landed, it landed directly on a wicked, rusty tack.  This was one of those Simplex nails that are used to attach sheeting to roofs.  It has a square metal base and an 1 1/2 inch long nail poking straight up.  The metal base causes the nail to always be pointing upward as if it is just aiming for some hapless person's bare foot.  That unfortunate person was Son.  His heal came down squarely on top of the nail.  It jabbed into his foot the entire inch and a half.  Poor guy!  That had to be excruciatingly painful!

  He reached down to pull the nail out of his foot but it seemed to be quite stuck.  It took some doing to pry it out and once he did, the blood started gushing.  I called to Darling Daughter to make "THE" soak. As he hobbled into the house, she filled a plastic pan with hot water and added a Epsom Salts.  Into this a heaping lot of ground turmeric and oregano was stirred.  I know this sounds like an odd foot soak, but trust me....it works.  Both the turmeric and oregano have antibiotic properties that can immediately set to work on bacteria and possibly prevent infection. 

  I covered the lumber while Son soaked his foot.  Darling Daughter kept him company and told him jokes to make him forget about the throbbing pain.  When I came inside, she had him laughing.  Even though these two are adults now, they sure can act like kids!  It was good to hear!  Son will have to take a few days off from shed-building but has volunteered to make the fig jam and tomato sauce.  Since he will take over some of my chores, I will be out swinging a hammer!  It has been a long time since Mark and I worked together on a building project. It should be interesting. As his foot will bear watching for the next week or so, Son will be confined to the indoors.  If it starts to look bad, a doctor's visit will definitely be on the agenda.