Thursday, January 14, 2016

Silent Night, not so much

We closed out Tuesday afternoon with our first dinner on the island, the usual fare consisting of red beans, white rice, boiled plantain and a fried fish (whole). We ate heartily and I began to get some idea of Frank's ferocious metabolism. He is compact and muscular and lean, an absolute metabolic engine. As most of us were finishing the latter portions of our meals I looked down the table to see that Frank's plate looked completely clean. I don't mean like he had finished eating. I mean, it looked as though there had never been food on that plate in the first place. I was pleased to offer him some of mine - heaven knows I can get by on what I have stored on me - and that was when I realized one of my jobs was to keep chow heading his way. Thanks to the wonderful Paul and Marion Scism, their abundant gifts of bear and venison jerky, as well as a few of my cliff bars, were translated into the energy Frank needed to do everything he had to do. We finished our dinner on a bit of a low note, beginning to understand how much remediation needed to be done before we could start our planned project. In fact, we really did not comprehend how much there was to do. We had originally budgeted five working days, Wednesday to Sunday, figuring we would finish by midday Sunday and have the better balance of a day to relax, socialize and pack out. I too had assumed that I was going to have more time than last year and had planned to use it to improve my rapport with the people on Isla Popa and to post this blog in real time. We were all pretty naive.

The above being said, we finished up our dinner and headed back to the swamp to bed down for the night. Aside from sheer exhaustion, I was paradoxically looking forward to night time to take a quick shower using my solar lantern and camp shower, then settling in under my mosquito netting. I admit to having an ongoing romance with toys and gadgets and love to use the crap I have hauled from one side of the world to the other. Chip and I broke off from the group and went to our quarters. We quietly discussed the situation and outlined our plans, as, come the morning Mike and I would be heading back to Isla Colon while Chip and the rest were to unearth the buried first-flush system and try to determine what had happened as well as how best to fix it. We also realized that the room was uncomfortably hot and there was absolutely no air movement. The smell wasn't terrible but for the first time we became aware of the proximity of our neighbors generator. We said our good-nights and patiently waited for exhaustion and sleep to overtake us.

I guess it eventually did because some time later I was awakened by a yelp from Chip. After 29 years as a doctor I am used to being suddenly awakened from sleep but I was still pretty drowsy and had to shrug off my sleepiness.

"What happened ?", I called out.

"Something bit me in the ass", Chip replied.

We were both too tired for him to be bullshitting me, so I turned on my lamp and told him to come into my room. He said to hold on, I saw his light come on, then I heard something hitting the floor.

"Damn (or some approximation thereof), it's a scorpion", says Chip.

"No way" says I.

"Really" says he. "I killed it, look".

So I walked into his room, lo and behold.




















Yes, it really was a scorpion.  Now, after 29 years as a doctor, I have never treated a scorpion sting as we generally do not have beasts like this where I hang my hat. The first thing I realized was that, at least in theory, I was prepared for this. I always carry a container of meat tenderizer in my first aid kit as it is a powder of proteolytic digestive enzymes (mainly papain, if anyone is interested) and most venoms are proteins. It is quite useful for jellyfish stings - make a paste of the powder with water and smear it on the sting site. I did this for Chip and covered the sting site (yes, his rump) with a dressing to hold it on. Whether or not it would help, and whether Chip was a goner, was anybody's guess. The second thing that struck me was the similarity of this situation to the old cowboy joke I told the students last year. "Chip", I thought to myself, "yer gonna die". I chuckled to myself and we both, fearfully, crawled back into our sleeping bags.

I was beginning to understand what this week was going to be like.

1 comment:

  1. I wish I had some of that venison jerky! So glad it was not me getting stung by a scorpion! I would have convinced myself I was going to die of pancreatitis the whole trip!

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