The 5 Unhealthiest Things I Did in July

Well...this is a blog post about health and also about how I spent July. It also shows that I love making lists and I think the best blog posts are lists.

So, a little background before I start listing all the unhealthy things I did in July. Through my work, I had this one 20 day long assignment pulling buckthorn, a disgusting invasive species that grows in New Hampshire. So this was basically how I spent most of July and I can say with some certainty that it was an extremely unhealthy experience in almost anyway you might look at it. Here's why:

1. Ticks and other pests--We were working in this hell hole field that was absolutely infested with ticks. The first time we walked through the field our pants and sleeves were just absolutely crawling with ticks. I think we counted 60 that first day. I ended up with 7 ticks embedded throughout the course of the 20 days, and one of my co-workers ended up with like 13 including one, freakishly, on his face! As if that wasn't enough, there were many other creatures crawling throughout that field, and in addition to the tick bites, we also endured being occasionally stung by wasps (surprise, surprise) and bitten by ants. The mosquitoes were also bad at times, and let me tell you, New Hampshire mosquitoes are monstrous. To combat all these pests, I wore a giant mosquito head net that made me look like a widow and duct taped every gap in my clothing. Clearly, I was the height of cool.

2. Environmental hazards--Rain, lightening, 90 degree humid weather in an open field. That was nothing. The main hazard was actually the buckthorn itself, although the effects on our health were slow and cumulative. Hopefully, oh my brothers, you have never experienced pulling buckthorn, but it has roots that choke out everything around them, that weave their way and entangle themselves into the ground, that come away in layers as you pull on them so you never quite get a solid grip. ("I hate buckthorn.") The effect of pulling up buckthorn day after day for 20 days is that you wake up with claw like hands and spend the day dropping things because your knuckles are swollen and your fingers are numb.

3. Junk food--The people we worked for, who were actually awesome, felt pretty bad for us, so they constantly brought us junk food--ice cream, fried chicken, soda--whenever they visited us. We also went out for ice cream about 7 times during those 20 days and would consistently order things like double chocolate chocolate ice cream with brownies and flurries with butterfinger, Reese's and health bar.

5. Mental health--We all went a little insane. Probably on a daily basis.

*I do, however, have to say that some things somehow strangely grew on me. The wetland we were working in had a subtle beauty with black moss, translucent flowers, and crickets that hopped around at your feet. Despite the ticks, it was kind of an amazing place. And I can never forget, the first dreadful night we spent there, I saw fireflies. I'd never seen them before, and when I realized what they were, I jumped out of our car and chased them, futilely trying to catch them in my grasping palms.