Buggered up fingers lead to diversified outings!

I partially tore my A2 pulley in my middle finger, and it is taking for ever to heal. It feels good enough now that I can get out and at least screw around on rock a little. I decided that now would be as good a time as any to figure out this whole aid-climbing nonsense, since I can't "really" rock climb still. I got the required mess of slings, steps, hooks, mini speakers (so I can rock out to music while hanging/belaying) and grabbed Matt to go play at Broughtons. We first aided a very steep half bolted half traditional climb. This felt good, so we went over to a flaring, slightly funkier, crack. Matt pulled first lead, which was fine because it started with a bad hook move then a micro nut for the first two moves. Since there was no point belaying yet, I spotted him from the ground. He was able to weight and lightly bounce the micro nut, but after about a minute of it holding his body weight, the thing blew and he was plopped back onto the flat ground. No worse for wear, Matt donned climbing shoes and free'd the first 15 ft to get some gear in, then continued the aid climb uneventfully to the top. I did the same to finish it off.
I have ripped on aid climbers a lot over the years, and while I am not prepared to stop it entirely, I realized that aiding, especially a few hook moves, can feel just as scary as free climbing. Aid is definitely something good to have in the back pocket, but I can't wait to get my fingers curled around a nice big hold again soon!