We went ice-skating at the foot of Half-Dome today. It was truly gorgeous -- snow and frost and pines and towering mountains, and not half as cold as Paris. At one point I swear I saw Hugin -- or maybe Munin -- winging by, and the other half of that pair dominated the parking area from the ground.

The ice in the rink was scratched and dented from the holiday rush of skaters, and I will confess to giving it some uneasy looks. I never did get the hang of roller-blades or skate-boards, and generally if I'm at an ice-rink I spend 80% of the time attached to the wall and the rest of it off the ice. So when, after about three minutes, I abandoned the wall and took a few turns around without using it as a crutch, I was fairly pleased with myself. I even bragged to Mimi that I hadn't fallen once yet -- an accomplishment, let me assure you!

--Pride goeth, and all that, and so of course I fell two seconds after my boast, doing injury to my tailbone, dignity, and left arm. But I clambered back up and continued on, and by the time I quit the rink some forty minutes later I was much more comfortable and had regained all my missing pride, though my wrist was still rather sore.

Then I went to pull off the gloves.

That was a Bad Idea.

My wrist, as it turned out, was not fine. As a matter of fact, it had swollen up rather badly, with a marvelous lump where the bone ought to have been, and it was impossible to move it or my thumb without a great deal of pain. I hadn't used it while skating, only flailed my arms about, so it was something of a surprise.

I tried to use both hands to remove the skates. It only took my wrist about half a second to convince my brain that that, too, was a Bad Idea.

We got into the van, and I realized that I could not crochet one-handed. Half an hour later, the lap-top died, and even though the scenery was beautiful I think I may have veered close to madness on the way back to Calvin Crest.

So now I'm sitting in Cedar Lodge, typing this with one hand and trying not to move the other one. The swelling has extended most of the way to the elbow along the back of my arm, and now I can't safely move that, either. My wrist is almost certainly sprained, probably with a bruised bone tossed in, I'm to get it X-rayed tomorrow or the day after, and winter term at CSUS starts the 5th. We are hoping that the bone is not actually fractured or outright broken.

Also, the scarf I was working on for my grandmother's Christmas gift will not be finished by the time she arrives, which is a source of vast annoyance since it was almost done.

But hey, I went ice-skating at one of the most beautiful locations on earth.

And I only fell over once.