Egad--those are hives!

Here are a few photos from the last night at Curacao. I did not take the time to post them yesterday when we finished the swim. This is me feeding crackers to Kenneth the Iguana. When I asked how we knew his name was Kenneth I was told that he has many names.... How do we even know he's a he? Maybe we don't want to know the answer to that. Second photo shows me, Walt and Phyllis at dinner. We left the cocktail party on Andy and Irene's patio to go to dinner at 7:30. We are not big on eating late... we were joined by Don and Darlene shortly after this photo was taken. We are toasting each other and this wonderful trip with our last Bright beers for this year.

After the swim and breakfast on Sunday, we all spent some time on the beach and then brought our stuff down to load up for the airport. It was rather fun to be in line with so many friends. And rather fortuitous for me, since (I found out when I called the Credit Union today) the airline clerk typed in the security code from the back of my credit card wrong and it was blocked. I wonder what others in the line thought when I called out for someone to loan me the cash to ship my bike home and several people pulled out their wallets? First Asa bailed me out, and by the time I went to the ATM and got cash to pay her back, Walt and Phyllis had already paid her since they knew they would see me here in Michigan and Asa lives in Oregon.

We boarded the plane and it left on time. Jeannine and I played a game of Scrabble in flight, and I was so terribly itchy! I kept getting new welts on my arms and legs--they looked like large mosquito bites, but I could not see any insects.... Phyllis (a nurse) took a look in Miami and told me they were not bites, but hives. I was having an allergic reaction to some unknown thing. By the time we landed in Detroit I was insanely itchy and had hives all over my arms and legs. The Benadryl that Darlene gave me did not help, nor did the cortisone cream.

Bill picked me up at the curb, and we went to the emergency room, since urgent care was already closed. They gave me intraveinous bendryl and steroids to stop the reaction, observed me for a couple of hours and sent me home, no longer itchy, hives gone, but of course still covered with sea-creature bites. I wonder if the allergic reaction was to the bites? Or the papaya I ate for breakfast? Too much sun combined with taking ibuprofen? I may never know.

Not a good end to this wonderful trip. Unfortunately it was almost a year ago that I gouged my leg on my bike chain ring on the last day of my trip to FL and had months worth of medical care... Maybe I'll stay home the first week in March from now on.