At the end of August my sister and I went on a canoe trip in Algonquin park. We were on our second day when I got us lost. We spent about two hours fighting our way up a constantly narrowing river before I figured out where I'd gone wrong.

On the way back I slipped on a slimy rock. While trying to catch myself, I jammed my left-hand thumb against a waterlogged (also slimy) branch, bent back the upper-left quarter of the nail, and pushed some slivers into the flesh under the nail.

It wasn't very painful. I squeezed it to try to bleed out as much junk as I could, then turned my attention back to navigation.

Later that day I tried to clean the dirt from under the nail using my SAK Classic, but didn't have much luck.

That night it started to throb. I looked at it around 2:00 a.m. and noticed that it was swollen. The swelling sealed the nail against the flesh, preventing drainage. I squeezed some pus out, and went back to sleep.

Next day it was a little worse, but I put some triple-antibiotic as far under the nail as I could stand, put on a bandaid, and soldiered on.

That night I started to get concerned. At very least, if things kept getting slowly worse, I was looking at a painful two or three days. I worried that it might get worse faster.

The next morning I tried soaking some dental floss in alcohol (diluted methanol) and drawing it under the nail to sterilize the area and pull out the slivers and dirt.

This didn't prove very effective, but it did gradually inure me to the pain. Eventually, I decided I had to cut the nail away to get the underlying flesh cleaned out. (Not the whole nail, just the part that had been bent back.)

I was able to to do a pretty neat job of this using my SAK Classic. It's a Wenger, and while the scissors wouldn't work well, the blade was very sharp and slender, and did a great job.

After that, I started a routine of soaking my thumb in hot water morning and night, applying antibiotic cream, and covering it well. After two days it was back to normal -- or at least to the point where I was no longer worried.

Lessons learned:

1. Check all liquids and jells in my first aid kits on a regular basis. Almost all of the alcohol wipes were dry. I had to go through three kits to get enough that were still wet.

2. I'd sneered at the roll of white adhesive tape that came in one AMK kit I was carrying, but it was invaluable for protecting the end of my thumb. Humble stuff, but very versatile.

3. Carry salt. I'd stopped carrying a little plastic bag of table salt, but I would have loved to have had it to soak my thumb in. It's great for a sore throat as well.

4. I can't substitute or improvise an irrigation syringe. I'm going to start carrying one on long trips.

Bear

PS: I'm aware of the danger of topical application of methanol, but it was all I had. I'm considering using ethanol for my stoves in future.