Monday, August 25, 2008

Hip to be Square.

Once upon a time, in a time not so long ago, a man-boy returned from a trek in the tropical wilderness and was at peace with his journey there. That was a life he very much enjoyed, he thought, one full of rain and clucking geckos outside his door and curious animals and cutter ants and things that bit him in the night. Well, that last part, he could have done without. Yes, two days before he returned from his 10 days in a land not so far away, he noticed a strange mosquito-type bite in his hip and wondered to himself at its dark color. He thought nothing of it again for three days, when he caught a glimpse of it in the mirror after a shower; he discovered that, not only had it had grown in size, it had gained a purple horseshoe shape swelling around it. This concerned him. He thought it may very well have been a stowaway, quietly hoping it was a bot fly while hoping against it being a very happy, ballooning-by-the-hour tick. He tried (unsuccessfully) to cut it out with a pocketknife, cutting open his thumb instead. He decided to go to a doctor and promptly confused him. The unsmiling man would not so much as touch it, instead prescribing him a bottle of red pills, a bottle that is now nearly empty. To see it now is to see more pink and less purple, it resembling both a removed tattoo and a permanent memory stained upon his body. Should he return to this curious country, he might not like to have such a thing happen again. For now, though, he aims to finish his pills over the next few days and dream about its complete disappearance.

Moral: As Shakira already knows, the hips don’t lie.


Jillian said...

He tried to cut it out himself?!?!

Pretty sure that sort of activity is frowned upon in most medical communities.

Dainon. said...

He spits in the face of conventional medical "wisdom" ... P-tooey!

frog said...

Keep an eye out D. My mom got a little bite by something in the jungles of Napal and is now allergic to quite a few things that she wasn't allergic to before.