What a day. Mom and I went hiking on the pristine coast between Ano Nuevo and Pigeon Point. Two hours in the sun with amazing views, birds, anenomies to poke and shells to collect.
Unfortunately we did have to hike next to some poison ivy that got on our pants. Once home my mom suggested we grab pants and then change next out in the laundry building so that we could put our oil laden pants straight into the washer and check for ticks. Well, I strip and she goes back into the house for something. As I check my self in my thong, I see a black thing on my hip. I poke it and an insect leg comes out and I'm totally repulsed.
So I do what all adults do - call for my mother. But she doesn't come. I call again. No response. Now, I'm thinking that if I pull this thing off the head might stay in me and then it will get infected and I'll be stuck on Cipro for the rest of my life. So I sprint back to the house (thank GOD there is a fence between us and the road) and into the house to get mom (the expert) advice. She says to just flick it off. I try, but then all the legs come out and wiggle around. So she hands me a tissue and tells me to pull it off. I'm about to puke, but I'm an adult, right? So I do it and then try to crush it in my hands, but am unable.
I open the tissue and all of it's terrible little legs are desperately trying to grab at me. I yelp and try not to drop the tissue, instead wave it like a flag on at a 4th of July parade.
It vanished and all was well... Until mom asked me for her help. I promptly find a tick on her sleeve. She generously asks me to use the tweezers to take it off - again I taste lunch in my throat. But do as she asks. Maybe I really am OK out here in the wilderness...
But we get de-ticked and I take some time to relax in the sun. Amazing how I'm OK with lying around in nothing risking total tick exposure. Anyway, after a bit mom asks me to help her fell some trees. I go and put on clothes that will prevent more tick access and say yes.
Took down two trees, put up chicken wire around her tomatoes and did time in the garden cutting flowers and pulling weeds. Pretty good for a city girl. I kinda like it out here.
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2 comments:
Jen, You're such a girly girl :)
I've pulled literally hundreds of ticks off Zeke over the course of his life, and here's the technique: grab it lighly between thumb and forefinger, and using your nails dig into your skin around its head as far as possible. Then work it back and forth, and pull. OCCASIONALLY you'll leave the head, but the real issue is that you don't squeeze the body too hard -- you risk smushing it, pushing its insides INTO your body. I know, gross, right?
If you do leave the head in, you'll know it by looking at the tick, and if you do, just dig it out with a tweezer. If it does get irritated, no big deal. Your body will handle it.
And you can't crush em good at all, they just don't crush. Flush em. They hate that.
Thank you, btw, for the Jen, screaming for her mother while running around in her thong image. :)
Chief,
That is the NASTIEST thing I've read in a long, long time. I think I prefer to be an uber-girly-girl. But just in case, when I check my body tonight (I'm on the Cape where they tell me I have to be careful and I was wandering through bushes with my cousin yesterday) - I'll be thinking of you.
Jen
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