I don't have time to post something deep and meaningful, so here's a funny picture to tide you over the Labor Day Holiday. I believe its caption is "New Riding Lawnmower", and usually there's a good story to go along with it about a wife nagging the husband to get her a new riding lawnmower, so he does. Have a good weekend everyone!
Here's a brief summary of how I did in the triathlon. Maybe I'll post a picture later (later as in the next few days). The weather on Saturday was a bit chilly at Detroit Lakes, MN. The air temperatures were in the 60's with wind and threatening rain the whole time. Needless to say, it made the swim a bit rough.
Place out of females ages 29 and under: 27 of 29
Place out of all females: 68 of 76
Total time: 1:45:18
Swim time (1/3 mile): 27:40
Transition from swim to bike time: 3:42
Bike time (10 miles): 41:54
Transition from bike to run time: 1:04
Run time (3 miles): 31:00
Needless to say, I wasn't really burning up the track there, but I didn't drown, and I finished in less time than I thought I would, so it was all good. Contrary to Jen's belief, I had been planning to do this most of the summer, although you probably couldn't tell that from the amount I was exercising. What do you mean, I'm supposed to train? Plus, if I told everybody in advance, it would make this blog boring. I like to spring a surprise on my readership now and then.
Whoever you are that guessed that it would take me between 1.5-2.0 hours to finish, you guessed correctly. Once again, you get a free subscription to this blog and a possible opportunity to put a post on this wonderful publication. And to whoever guessed it would take me more than 3 hours I say, "Oh ye of little faith."
I was at one of my company's manufacturing divisions this week, and apparently sometime in the last year the city had passed an ordinance outlawing smoking in buildings. Anyway, what the company had done was build these little 10'x12' buildings with benches inside and windows all around so that employees have a designated place to smoke outside the building. I saw at least five of these little enclosures (I called them smoke shacks), and there were probably more of them.
On one hand it's sort of nice of the company to do that for the employees, but on the other hand it's sad if the union demanded that be done. It's even sadder that so many people use those smoke shacks. I don't know what the real motivation for the shacks was. In the design center where I work, they don't have smoke shacks. You're not allowed to smoke on company property unless you're in your car.
The 5.5 hour drive home was interesting. I went through an area where they were having severe thunderstorms. I saw some hail (luckily I had a rental car), and it was raining so hard part of the time that I had to pull over. I could see almost continuous lightning for about 1.5 hours. Speaking of rental cars, I was lucky enough to get a red Mustang. The only problem was there were too many cops in Indiana to put it through its paces.
That's all for now. Wish me luck in the triathlon!
And I'm not talking about the music. An "old" friend from college stopped by last week for a little over a day. Why, she must be at least three months older than me. We had fun going to the beach, then going to the beach again. And, we rented a kayak and tried that out on the big lake. What is that they say about friends? They're like M&M's? You know when you've picked a good one or something like that. Or maybe that was a wedg.....never mind. We saw a killer sunset too. It looked like Chicago was on fire.
By the way, you're all welcome to come and visit anytime (as long as I know you or you know someone I know). If you give me some warning, I might even clean the house for you.
Earlier this week, I did the scabies treatment, and it wasn't as bad as I had dreaded it to be. You put a medicated lotion/cream on your entire body from the chin down (under fingernails, armpits, soles of feet - everywhere), leave it on overnight, and then wash it off. Then they recommend washing in hot water all the clothes, sheets, and towels you've used in the last two days. The cream made my skin tingle some, but other than that it was OK. My new washer and dryer got a workout; I don't think I've done so many consecutive loads of laundry before in my life. Scabies actually are fairly "fragile", and most websites I read said that scabies can only last 24-72 hours at the most without a host, and usually they are only spread by direct skin-to-skin contact. That is apparently why you don't have to do a whole house disinfection.
After reading all about scabies, I'm still not sure if I had them or not. First of all, I'm not sure where I could have gotten it. Maybe on the Amtrak train? Maybe from the hotel sheets in Mexico? Maybe from kissing all those people in Mexico? :-) I wonder if they can live in a pool that's not properly chlorinated (Mexico again)? All of those situations fall in the 2-6 week time frame, but none of them fit the "direct skin-to-skin contact" requirement it doesn't seem, and I can't really think of any "skin-to-skin" scenarios. I did itch quite a bit, but it wasn't keeping me awake, which some sites said they would do. Maybe they hadn't gotten bad enough yet. There did seem to be a correlation between doing the treatment and the itching not being as bad, but it was only a correlation and not a proven causation. I guess I will never know for sure. "Usually" you can not get them through handshakes and brief hugs, but just in case I did have scabies and they beat the transfer odds, if you've seen me in the last 6 weeks, be on guard for unbearable itching symptoms!
Speaking of human parasites, if you're going to get one, probably scabies isn't so bad. You do NOT want bed bugs. Those suckers can live for up to 18 months without a host, only come out to feed about once every 5 days, and they can hide in all kinds of cracks and crevices from what I read. Fleas too can apparently live weeks without a host. Sure, the symptoms of scabies are worse, but I think I would prefer that to living in fear of other parasites reoccurring months or even a year later. Maybe a tapeworm would be preferred over scabies though? I've never had one, so I don't know......
Two of you guessed correctly that it would be 11-20 days from July 13th before I turned on my air conditioning. I turned it on last night (20 days from Day 0). I think this is a new personal record. Last year I turned it on around July 17th or so if I remember correctly. The cooler weather here in July helped. For those of you who guessed correctly, you get a free year's subscription to the MelB Marvis blog! Maybe I'll let you do one post sometime if you let me know who you are.
I won't bore you with too many details here, but I've had itching/rash over my legs and arms for more than a week, so I finally went to the doctor. The doctor said, "My first suspicion is poison ivy, and my second one is scabies." So he called the physician's assistant in to look at it too. He looked at it, and then they went out into the hall to have a consultation amongst themselves. It was only semi-private as I could hear them somewhat through the door. When the doctor finally came back, he said, "I think it's probably poison ivy, the P.A. thinks it's scabies, so we arm wrestled to determine which diagnosis you got." After a little bit of discussion, I decided that if it was poison ivy I would just tough it out, and in case it was scabies I would do the treatment for scabies. If the scabies was cured by the treatment, symptoms would generally go away in two weeks, which was about the same for poison ivy. So unless the scabies has a relapse, I'll never really know which one it was. Nice. Engineers hate not being able to find the definitive root cause.
Interesting fact: If it's the first time you've had scabies, they usually take 2-6 weeks to make themselves evident. If you've had them before, you're more sensitized, and symptoms will appear within days. Other interesting fact: Scabies can sometimes be commonly known as "the itch" or "seven year itch" and is fairly contagious.
Here's an AC update now that my poll is closed: So far I haven't turned it on, but it's possible I may have to in the next couple of days since I have company coming and the temperatures are supposed to be in the upper 80's and lower 90's for at least the next five days. I may have to be courteous to my visitor and turn it on. Plus, being warm makes the itching worse, so I might do it for my own comfort too.
