When I lived in Littleton and worked at Martin Marietta I fell in with a group of people that would exercise during the lunch period. I became rather dedicated to exercising. For a long while I would run 3 miles during the lunch hour. I was slow, but persistent.
There were times that I could not keep up with the others in the group, as they were built like, well ..., runners. One day I headed down to Waterton Canyon, where the South Platte River would come down from the mountains. This day I went cross country and headed straight down into the canyon across the yucca and prickly pear encrusted slope just outside the company property.
I thought I felt a wasp or something such as that bite me on the left calf. I reach down and swatted across the back of my leg in order to hit the pesky bug away. To my dismay it was not a bug. I had to calculate for a while just what happened before it all becaame clear.
With my right foot I had placed it next to prickly pear and broke one pear loose from a plant. As my right foot passed my left leg it embedded some of the prickles into my calf. As I felt the sting I swatted it with my right hand. Now I had to extract prickles from my right hand as well as my left calf, and also from my right shoe.
Things are not always what they first seem to be.
3 comments:
It is no fun to get into prickly pear. When I was in school, we went East of Manassa on a field trip. We climbed some of the hills there. I fell down and rolled in prickly pear. Everyone helped me pull thorns out of my body. It took weeks to get all of them out. Some were too small to pull out, so they had to fester and then they would pop out, if they were squeezed. That was miserable. How long did it take to get them all out? Mom
I learned too, that prickly pear and tennis shoes are not a good combination. Once spines are in the rubber, they keep working their way inward. Tennis shoes with prickly pear in them are best tossed in the garbage.
My experience with the prickly pear was not too bad. I only had to pull spines from my calf and my hand. I was surprised to see the prickly pear when I lifted my hand.
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