Dawson's Rashy New Year

I have a hit or miss relationship with New Year’s eve. Once I spent it in the hospital with a broken neck. Last year I had food poisoning. This year…

Thus far, 2006 has been defined by the poison oak rash covering my eyelids, cheeks, forehead, ears, neck, chest, arms, waist, back and parts of one other extremely sensitive region. I don’t know exactly where it all began, but it was probably in the hills near Los Gatos, California. At some point, I touched poison oak, and everything I touched on my body after that point is now covered in a vile itchy evil rash. I had no appreciation for poison oak until now. To those who suffer, I feel your pain.

Fortunately on the internet there are millions of web pages full of occasionally helpful information. But if you get poison oak, don’t be like me and fall for the old “It costs 40 bucks for a one ounce tube so it must work” ploy advanced by Zanfel. It didn’t work for me, and if you have poison oak bad it probably won’t work for you. The best bet is a trip to the clinic if you have insurance. One other bad idea that I fell for is the old application of heat to the rash. That feels amazingly great and stops the itching for awhile, but I’m pretty sure it spreads the rash. On the other hand, icing gets a big thumbs up.

Today I went to the clinic and the doc prescribed an oral steroid, some type of anti-itch pills, and triamcinolone cream, a topical steroid. It’s been a week since the rash appeared, and it’s still spreading, so the new plan is to stop it in its tracks once and for all. I hope it works.

I didn’t make any at the time because I was concentrating with all my might on not scratching my puss oozing blistery face, but my first New Year’s resolution is to appreciate good health. On a side note, my new year’s eve had the potential to be awesome – a fondue party with endless tasty items prepared by none other than master chef Gilder and his relatives. But it was hard not to feel self conscious being the extremely rashy guy at the communal (and germ friendly) setting that a fondue party is. Still, I enjoyed some tasty items before I had to retreat to a neutral setting. I was vainly applying cortisone to my face as the ball dropped this year. Party!

The good news is, no where to go but up! As I close this, KYUK is reporting the Bethel boys varsity basketball team has won, and a Yup’ik version of For Auld Lang Syne is playing.