Well, I'm in Oregon visiting my folks and extended family and friends. Highlights from the last week:
* Trying on a shirt in a Maine mall, when my daughter suddenly exclaimed, "Mom, what's that huge black mole on your back?!" I examined my "mole" in the mirror, and shrieked when I saw its tiny wiggling legs. Somehow, I'd picked up a tick while walking the backroads of rural Maine. For the next hour I gritted my teeth and tried not to think of blood-sucking bugs while I drove home to the inlaws and got Jeff to pull the tick off carefully with tweezers. Now I need to watch for symptoms of Lyme disease, but I think my critter was a wood tick, not a deer tick, so that's fortunate.
* My first full day in Oregon, I walked into a Safeway store and asked my mother, "What in the world is that?" as I pointed to the grocery cart. She peered in and then told me, "Laurie, that's a cup-holder. Haven't you seen them before?" Ahhhh. Remember, in Germany, most of the cars don't have cup-holders, and none of the grocery carts do! (It's illegal to drink or eat while driving in Germany. Also against the law for the driver to talk on a cell phone) Funny moment there, and I realized it's indeed been awhile since I've lived in the States..
* Have I said that I adore the abundance of coffee shops in Oregon?? Free wireless, indie music, and shelves of books in English.
* I do miss the network of bike trails and well-constructed walking paths in Germany. Oregon's one of the better states in terms of bike-friendliness and pedestrian awareness, but I had to walk from the urgent care clinic where my tetanus shot was updated, and trekked over broken concrete, barkdust, and a few blocks of mediocre sidewalk.
*Dad's picking fresh Hood strawberries for us to feast on each day--the best breakfast on earth.
Frenchman's Bay, Maine
5 comments:
Aaack! Ticks! Noooooo!
Cup holders on a grocery cart? Do people really need to be drinking while they're grocery shopping? That is just such a foreign concept to me!
We are always stuffing our mouths with something here in North America. I have co-workers who walk around all day nursing a coffee cup. A tick! Ughh! I'll keep my mosquito bites,
I read recently that you can also get a tick of by putting liquid soap on a cotton ball and holding it over the tick. Maybe enough that it suffocates? I don't know how it works, don't ask me to explain it. I would not have managed the car ride home, I would have bought tweezers on the way home and possibly taken my shirt off in the parking lot.I know, possibly illegal, but I would have been insane from the tick invasion.
Oooohhhh a tick, Laurie?!!! I truly think I would rather have poison oak even though it lasts longer and nothing satisfies the itching.
I preserved the dead tick in a plastic baggie. Now I just need to find an online photo guide to ticks...ooh, the thought just makes me squirm.
Thanks for all your sympathy!
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