I went to Stanislaus National Forest to celebrate America’s independence and pizza and other things but mostly pizza. But before the pizza, I went hiking and probably caught the plague.
There’s an inherent danger when it comes to any outdoor activity. Things like sprained ankles, dehydration and sun burns. Those are just the things that can happen to you without even having to try. I’ve done plenty of stupid things intentionally – swam in nearly freezing water, approached an 1100lb bull elk, and one time, even mixed some Country Time into tepid water and drank it. But walking straight into an area infested with plague is so stupid it may as well be referred to as the rhythm method.
The sign circled in the photo is where I saw the, “You’re about to get plagued” warning. It basically tells you to stay away from small woodland animals and ticks, since they’re the major carriers. Armed with this gentle suggestion that, for most people with functioning risk assessment faculties would translate to “Don’t do it,” I sprayed myself down with 100% DEET, gagged because of the sudden gust of wind that directed the poisonous mist into my mouth, and went on my way.
After around the 11th time of thinking that the same patch of dirt on my ankle was a tick, I ditched Plague N’ Save in search of pizza. From there, the rest of the weekend was a blur until I woke up with a sore throat the morning after returning. In other words, I had swollen lymph nodes – one of the main symptoms. I rushed around my apartment looking for the thermometer, which is what I do in order to know whether I’m going to overreact by taking an ice bath or drinking eight cups of green tea. I couldn’t find it so instead, I wondered if the plague was the kind of thing where, assuming I didn’t die, I’d get to eat a lot of ice cream during recovery. Eventually, I did what any medically ignorant individual would do and resorted to Google.
Check out the guy whining about having the wrong tax code. Dude, I might have the plague. You just have a minor inconvenience. Predictably, my Google search didn’t yield much more than a barely literate Yahoo Answer and lots of links leading to information about the plague over 600 years ago. So not only was I kind of swollen and achy, but I was also grossly anachronistic.
But I’m fairly certain that I don’t have the plague. To be safe, however, I’m clearing my search history before I go to bed.