Entering the sixth grade, I was playing whiffle ball in my back yard.  We had pruned our hawthorn trees and the garbabe men hadn't picked them up yet.  I managed to get a hawthorn needle deep into my inside lower thigh when I stumbled on the thorny branches trying to make a catch.

We expected the darn thing to fester out -- but it never did, even as I continued playing whiffle ball and later basketball for my school team.  (I was the team's star, but that was merely because it was a crummy team, believe me.)

Finally during Christmas vacation I had the darn thing cut out -- four or more months after getting the darn thing in my leg.  Yeah, it hurt a lot -- but it still was playable.

Speaking of "playing" with pain, a referee friend of mine a few year back kept refereeing on a stress fracture in his foot.  When he finally had the thing treated, he continued reffing -- and the thing must have killed him.

Because it did, literally.  I have no idea how he stood the pain, but he developed an infection in the foot that suddenly shut down his body.  He had to be taken off life support quickly, since his kidneys had shut down.

I think the last thing he said to me when I saw him a couple of weeks before his sudden death was, "My foot is hurting, but it's getting better."

I try not to be as dumb about "playing" through ongoing aches and pains anymore.

I thought this thread would be about Evan Longoria and the seven others that Gammons DOOMED by giving them his preseason rub.

a 1/4 inch long piece of cactus thorn stuck in my right ring finger near the palm.  i was coming down a mountain in new mexico and stepped on some loose rock.  i had the choice to pitch forward and go headlong unimpeded for quite a while, or immediately fall on my back.  i went back, of course...into a large patch of cactus.

that night i cut some 20 spine pieces out of my hands with my friend's knife, but this one went so far in, i just could not cut myself deep enough to get it.  it bothers me about once a year for a day or so (it's been 9 years).  actually, all the little hair-like points (probably thousands in my jeans and hands) hurt a lot worse than the spines.

Did this happen sober? "Cactus" is right up there with "porcupine" and "druglord" on the list of things that make sense to kick. I want to hear the pretext to this story.

needs surgery to keep from losing a testicle