I am just beginning to recover from a horrid bout of contact dermatitis, conveniently situated smack in the middle of my upper back in a spot where putting medication and gauze on it required impossible arm contortions. Complicating things was my skin’s concurrent severe allergic reaction to the tape I was using to hold the gauze in place. I had a real party going on back there for a while. It’s well on its way to being healed now, but it was a nightmare for a few weeks. I believe that I was reacting to a new type of hairspray I started using. It’s the only thing I can fathom that would have caused it, and it suspiciously lined up with where my hairline falls onto my back now that I am growing it out to shoulder length. I recently got a new, chunky, layer-y cut and was very proud of my clever styling solution, which involved dampening it slightly and spritzing it with Common Drug Store Hairspray Brand. I didn't spray-bomb, mind you—I’m hair product minimalist—but it was enough apparently to really upset the skin on my back. Then somehow I scratched myself into an open wound and it all became very gory very quickly.
This whole debacle did prompt me to re-think the sheer number of unnecessary chemicals I bathe myself in on a regular basis in a misguided effort to look good and smell pleasing: Regular soap, body wash, body spray, hair spray, cosmetics, face cream, stuff I slather on my legs when I shave them, and the occasional body lotion. I’ve gone without everything except basic soap and cosmetics for the last few weeks in case any of them was the culprit, and no one has gnawed their arm off at the sight of me or accused me of stinking, so I could probably do without them permanently. I just like things that smell good and I don’t want to do without them. Plus, it’s too late now to avoid beauty-product-related cancer—with the sheer amount of stuff I have slathered and sprayed on my body since adulthood, that train has left the station and no amount of backtracking is going to stop whatever is lurking in my cells, waiting to replicate.
On a slightly less morbid note, I haven’t talked about this yet because I wasn’t sure I was going to stick with it, but my latest gaming adventure is Palworld, a totally shameless and blatant rip-off of Pokemon (which I have not played.) I was attracted to Palworld because I love cute little fantastical critters, and Palworld entirely revolves around cute little fantastical critters. I’ll do a full review at some point, but to give you the basics, it’s a tool-around-the-map-and-catch-critters, build-a-base, fight-monsters, and craft-stuff situation. It’s quite entertaining, and it doesn’t take itself seriously at all. I finally got my base set up and all of my critters put to work, but they are turning out to be strangely temperamental. I have plenty of food for them and not one, but two hot tubs, and still, at least once a day, one or more of them develop an ulcer, get shirty and decide to stop working altogether, take to their beds with an angry red slash over their heads, or instigate a work stoppage due to “poor working conditions.” As someone who thinks of myself as a benevolent boss, this irks me. I mean, yes, I did poach them from the wild and force them into jobs on my base, but I was nice about it, and I make sure they have tons of pancakes and all the hot tub breaks they want. I don’t understand this recalcitrant attitude. At any rate, I’m wrapping this up now because I have to go put some more pancakes on the griddle before there is a full-scale critter riot.
--Kristen McHenry
A pleasure to read!