Not sadly a physical metaphor for some flawless athletic performance or even the predictable outcome of finessing Creme Caramel with a blowtorch. No, I’m on fire on the inside according to the giver of pain, who has the thankless job of jump starting my creaking carcass through the power of chiropractics and money.

And while there are hundreds more photos and sufficient tall stories to give a giraffe vertigo only a couple of beers away, I know how much joy you take from my whining hypochondria so sit back, relax and spend some quality time with the idiots guide to anatomy.

The tingling in my fingers escalates to an elbow biting howl as pain marches up my arm and garrisons itself in the shoulder muscle. Apparently this is due to a distorted trapezium which sounds like hated geometry lessons from my youth. All that “how many sides has a pentagram ?” and “What’s the difference between a parallelogram and a rhombus?” nonsense – if only I knew how totally bloody pointless it all was, I could have saved myself much angst and frustration with a simple “sorry sir, I don’t really give a toss”

Anyway, this triangular muscle is the size of Belgium due to a level of inflammation last seen in the Great Fire of London. To paraphrase that oh-so-jolly song “the shoulder bone is connected to the elbow bone and the elbow bone is connected to the penis if you’ve been born unlucky,etc” hence hurty limbs and throbbing shoulder. Obviously I’ve cut out some of the complex medical stuff there.

The upshot other than medical bills that put me in mind of US Medicare is no riding of bikes for two weeks, much riding of the horrible tube and general one handed uselessness if asked to perform any difficult act such as painting. On the upside the newly prescribed Co-codamal donkey stunners are pretty damn powerful. So powerful in fact, they come with a stern warning that the recipient had better not operate machinery or drink alcohol otherwise the world may explode or some such catastrophe. I’m assuming that attempting both simultaneously would turn that into dangerous machinery.

I’m treating that caveat in the same way Italian drivers regard stop signs. Interesting, possibly informative but only to be obeyed on a case by case basis. Still to stay on the safe side, I’ll stay away from the heavy machinery for a few days.

And on that happy note, it seems the sun has crested the yard arm in a fridge opening manner.