Must be cabin fever (as I force myself to work in the blacksmith shop and go to the gym as we prepare for maple syrup season) that is making me try to come up with a fun new thread. The question is--what injuries, physical handicaps, or other impediments have not stopped you from going on the next canoe trip? Some of my answers:

1. Halfway through a two week trip with a lot of portaging, I developed a pussy (as in pus!), painful ingrown toenail. Every evening just before dinner, I used the biggest cook pot to soak my big toe in hot salt water. The other three guys ate without complaint.

2. On a July trip I tore up the medial meniscus in my right knee, which didn't seem so bad until I got home and the doc prescribed physical therapy because I said I had to be good to go for a long August trip, which I limped through. Before the following season I had surgery on both knees.

3. During the five years I tried unsuccessfully to treat ulcerative colitis with pills, I never knew when I would have to drop trou without warning. The solution was to take a five gallon plastic bucket with lid to set a few feet from the tent. In the middle of the night I often barely had time to unzip the mosquito netting.

4. A day before Liz and I were to leave for the Park I got a piece of rusty metal in my eye while grinding. Not enough time to go to a doctor. I could see the piece and reasoned it wopuld pop off in a few days. It hurt every time I blinked, and my eye was super sensitive to light. In the middle of Welcome Lake I had an intense jab of pain and it popped off--along with my sunglasses, which disappeared into the lake. A little later we camped on the far side of Welcome, and there hanging on a tree was a nice pair of sunglasses. As brother Mark likes to remind me, happy things happen to the happy person. (Now I always wear a floating strap on my glasses.)

That's a painful list to read, John! There should be some sort of ribbon or medal to reward that...unless being in Algonquin is the reward!

Neither were my personal ailments but tripping partners':

1. On one interior trip my Dad lost one of his front middle teeth. All week long he flashed that "backwoods" smile.

2. My brother-in-law broke his ankle 8 weeks before our May fishing trip. He got the cast off on Friday and we left Tuesday on the trip where I got to carry the oversized aluminum canoe the whole way...including the Dickson-Bonfield as he limped along with a light pack. I guess his injury was my onus afterall but, man, was it ever worth it!