[at-l] chafing

["shannon williams" <razerblade99@hotmail.com>]

Rough-housing in a busted concrete & glass Chinese Restaurant parking lot in 
East Dallas last year, I did a nose dive that left me with knee injuries as 
hideously ugly as they were agonizing.  I had to re-grow my wounded flesh 
from the inside-out.

My very rich uncle who owns a cattlefeed company took one look at my knee 
and told me I needed hoof cream for it.  I went the very next day to the 
Purina feed store and bought a yellow pot of this mentholated goo 
(Coleman's?  Can't quite remember the name).  The back of it read 
"guaranteed to re-grow hooves."  Gads.  I know such things as eyelid 
piercings and scrotal tattoos are mad fab these days, but I'm not sure if I 
want a cloven heifer toe growing out of my knee.  I very reluctantly stirred 
the stuff (it separates like organic peanut butter) and smeared it across 
the gaping maw of my wound.

Wow.  I expected the menthol-medication to sting & burn, but it actually 
cooled the maddening itch and provided a kind of soothing "seal."  I 
eventually had to stop using it because my knee neede air in order to scab & 
develop scar tissue, but it was great to have when I was going to be wearing 
clothing that might rub, while trying to wean myself from gauze dressings.

No hooves on my anatomy (that I know of), but I am left with a delightfully 
purple scar about as big as the heel of my palm that looks like I knelt in a 
hyper-fertile blackberry patch.  I can see how the hoof-cream would be great 
for chafing, but you'd wanna wash it off before bed to let cool night air 
work its magic on skin trying to heal.

My question on all this:  what about STINK?  Aren't we supposed to avoid 
putting anything so smelly on our bodies when we're in the woods?  Only a 
liter of Coco Chanel is stinkier than Desitin, and besides all that, most of 
this crap -- Vaseline, Diaper Cream, even the hoof stuff -- is 
petroluem-based.  And petroleum isn't something we wanna be thoughtlessly 
washing into soft forest floor.  What about good ol' salve?  Comfrey and 
olive oil and beeswas & alla that?

10-4
shannon
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