The radio code for an incident on my ski hill is "10-40", no matter the severity - torn rotator cuff, dislocated knee, sprained ankle, and internal organ damage due to trauma are just some examples of the 10-40's I've attended to this season.
But there's a category of 10-40's that I feel deserves a different code - the splinter, the bruised calf - I call these injuries "10-Baby"s. Sure it's better to be safe than sorry, but come on...

Most recently I had 10-Baby call from a 57 year old lady, with whom there was a language barrier, and who was accompanied by two incredibly pushy overprotective males. When I arrived on scene she was unwilling to move her right leg and the pain was 10 out of 10. This is incredible pain, the most you could imagine ever having, on par with pain felt from injuries such as a broken pelvis, torn achilles tendon, or testicular torsion. So, I expose the injury to reveal...nothing. Then I asked her to identify the area that hurt and determined it was near neither bone nor tendon. This was my first hint that I was looking at a 10-Baby, my second hint being the fact that the pain seemed to move, with each attempt in finding the pain resulting in a different location. Sure enough, time revealed that the pain moved from a 10 to a 6 to a 4 and finally ended with her walking out of the first aid room, no treatment done and no limp apparent.

Perhaps our society is getting more pussy and the slightest bit of discomfort turns us into whining deteriorating fools. Perhaps with time we've become adapted to an unchanging environment of constant weather, temperature, slope and lighting, namely our house. Perhaps the lesson to people of the 21st century is that if you work up the courage to leave the living room, expect the possibility of discomfort. And please don't call ski patrol when your muscles hurt.