system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why does "pure" alcohol feel so strange to the touch?

I had to clean out some PC junk recently and I used a tupperware container filled to the brim with 99% isopropyl alcohol to get the gunk out.

I dipped my hands in to get the parts out and I noticed that the alcohol felt very weird in my hands. I don't know quite how to describe it, but it felt very strange compared to water. Not as much resistance, and it felt very weird on my skin. Almost as if there was no friction against my skin.

What's the cause of this? Is it surface tension? Maybe a weird chemical reaction with my skin that makes it feel that way?

I googled this and only got results about treating open wounds with alcohol.
gpt
Short answer: there aren't all that many liquids that you come in contact with frequently. Most of them are water-based. Water with stuff in it.

Alcohol is fundamentally different. It's not alcohol in water, it's that the alcohol IS the liquid. Most of us have water as our frame of reference for what we expect a liquid to be like, but alcohol is as different from water as oil or dish soap is.