Put the lime in the Coconut.....

......and definitely call the doctor, woke him up he say. ( Henry Nilsson)

I added the definitely to the lyrics of this song, because I can't stress enough how prophetic the singer Nilsson turned out to be. Now I did not have a bellyache as his protagonist suffered from, but I certainly required a visit from the doctor. One of my co-wokers mysteriously had this rash form on his wrists. It was concentrated on his wrists only and it looks like someone took a brush with red paint on it and then spattered the paint all over his wrists. However, as fun as this sounds, the contestant won the ultimate rash prize when these red marks began to form blisters. I know, you are asking where to sign up. At the time, I scoffed at his hands, and pretended that this could not happen to me as I had been there for two years and nothing had ever happened to me at Bowls. Oh how the mighty have fallen. This past Friday, I began to notice the spots forming on the back of my hands. Small red dots which then spread into bigger red spots at the base of my thumb and then the banquet of red large dots on my wrists. My left hand was much more affected, but my right wrist was not squeaky clean. I hurriedly raced to clean my hands, but while running my hands under cold water, I felt the sensation of burning. Alarm bells went off. The dots over the course of the day turned darker red and were raised. When I showed Ben what was happening, Ben looked at me sternly and said, it burns now wait till the blisters form.
I had become a monster, except the monster was located on my wrists only. When I woke up on Saturday, my left wrist was covered with about 5-6 blisters with a sprinkling of red. My right had far fewer, but one large party tent blister on the base of my thumb. To say it was unsightly, was the understatement of the year. In this day and age, we have become our own doctors as we try and diagnosis ourselves by using the internet. As Lewis Black aptly pointed out, most humans incorrectly diagnose themselves by thinking they have the worst ailment possible. He stated that flying from NYC to LA, he read a 30 page article on Diabetes and by the time the plane landed 6 hours later, Lewis had diabetes.
I had the same reaction, I was 100 percent sure I had three things: a spider bite, leprosy and that I was becoming a zombie. To debunk my fears, I just listened to the Australian public and Sam. They told me that if I had spider bite, well....to put it bluntly, I would be dead. If I had leprosy, typing this blog would be tough with one hand and finally, the zombie theory is still open for debate. Have you seen me in the morning?
I reluctantly went to the doctor, not because I was worried about marauding for flesh, which would be my new diet as a zombie, but because I am something scarier than a zombie: uninsured. Yes, I heard you scream all the way over here. In any case, I went to the doctor. He led me to his room, where I recounted my tale to him. I showed him my rash. He painstakingly took notes, his slowness was not attributed to the fine details he was taking, but more attributed to holding the shotgun in his left hand. He couldn't rule out zombie either. After finishing his notes, he looked at me and said the most comforting thing a doctor can say to a patient: I have no idea what that is at all. I am sorry, I am paying 80 dollars for this consultation that for all intent and purposes, a 4 year old could have said to me. The best part of the encounter was that the doctor could not declare with certainty that the rash was a product of work; he hinted at the relationship between Ben and I. To set the record straight, I work with Ben nothing more, nothing less. Period. After 10 minutes of awkward silence, he printed out my referral to a dermatologist and I left.
On Monday, dressed in my bright red leather jacket, tight pants, gloves I thrillered my way to the determatologist. (Thrillered= walking and dancing like Jackson in Thriller). At the office, to my chagrin, the dermatologist took one look at my hands and pronounced that the cause was lime juice on my wrists combined with prolonged time in the sun. I immediately shut off the music, and my back up dancers shuffled out and I got down to business with the doctor. Contact Dermatitis it is called. A product of Tahitian limes and exposure to the sun. I had a severe case with the blistering and the ailment should vanish in about two weeks. The reason to why the rash was so localized can be explained by the way I was cutting the limes. My left hand had it worse because I cut with my right and the juice splashed onto my left. I spend oodles of time outside working with groups so there is the sun. Relieved, I got my prescription steroid cream, and one more time for posterity, moonwalked out of the office. So warning to all of you, craving a lime colada, diet coke with lime, or hang out with English people: it may cause severe blistering.

On an unrelated note: When coming to Sydney, remember how I told you it is tantamount to pack a bee keeper suit for the flies, well a map of all the streets in Sydney is just as important. Now you might rebuff me, and say "well Alex, I always travel with a map to foreign cities and lands." Smart traveler, I would reply. However the map is not for your enjoyment, but for the cab drivers in the city who have no idea where any place is. The amount of times, I have been given the wheel to a taxi cab to drive the actual taxi driver to my destination is astonishing. It is not exactly like that, but what usually transpires is: I will say our destination, which is followed by some humming and huffing by the driver, all the time displaying facial features of a student called to answer a question in front of the class even though he didn't do his homework. To make up for his lack of geographical knowledge, most taxi drivers just drive in some indiscriminate direction to quell any fears that he is utterly lost. At this point, after driving in five circles, the taxi driver hands you the street directory and/or stops the car and spends an inordinate amount of minutes looking at the street directory like a detective at a murder scene. He then interrogates me on my whereabouts at 7 pm 24/10 2005 and where I am going tonight. The procedure is then duplicated with any other passengers. With his suspect, I mean street, firmly established he returns to indiscriminately driving. What is incredible from these situations is most cabs are equipped with a GPS system. No joke. This is like choosing to use a typewriter rather than the super fast computer. Unbelievable. Just beware before coming out here, and I plead you to take a bus.