The Tick

[andyhat]

There is one downside to living on a nice wooded lot in North Carolina. Getting ready for bed last night, I found this girl munching on my leg:



She is safely preserved (and, apparently endowed by her vampiric nature with indestructibility and immortality, still alive) in a Ziploc baggie should I come down with anything in the next few weeks.

I have to say I'm amazed by what I can do with this $60 Epson scanner (model 3490). I bought it to scan book covers for my librarything catalog, but the ability to scan at 4800dpi obviously has its uses, too.

Comments

[defenestr8or.livejournal.com]

Approves!


Look for a red spot with a red ring around it, if you're worried about Lyme.

[maegwynn.livejournal.com]

That is a lone star tick. Gak, I dislike spiders...

[docstrange.livejournal.com]

Yep. You won't get Lyme disease from it.

However it does appear to sometimes carry a similar illness . . .

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/stari/index.htm

[ymasen.livejournal.com]

creepy 8 legged thing *shudder*

[alchemist.livejournal.com]

I preserve the ticks that think it's fun to munch on me in alcohol. Kills them dead, perfectly preserved...

[vivian2112.livejournal.com]

wow.

[a-nightengale.livejournal.com]

Ahhhhhh!!!!!! Stab it stab it stab it...

*runs screaming*

I absolutely HATEHATEHATE ticks. Nasty, disgusting creatures with no ecological benefit whatsoever that I'm aware of. I don't like mosquitoes either, but I understand that lots of other critters -- bats, frogs, etc., feed on them, so that's at least something. But ticks? Ugh.

[greatblueheron.livejournal.com]

That is a novel use of the scanner. I'll have to remember that. And, though I hate and loathe and fear and despise ticks, I do think that there are a fair number of things that like to eat 'em (ducks?) so there's that.

And also, as Carl Zimmer has pointed out - predators are creatures that make their living by attacking and killing things smaller and weaker than they are, and yet we idolize them and name our cars after them.

Parasites live by daring to attack things far larger and stronger than they, and yet we revile them.

I say we make up for this bully-favoring and start naming sports cars after parasites. The Mitsubishi Tick! The Porsche Tapeworm! The Dodge Leech!

[a-nightengale.livejournal.com]

I do think that there are a fair number of things that like to eat 'em (ducks?) so there's that.

Ah, thank you. I wasn't aware that they were anyone's food source.

Reminds me of a joke my dad told at lunch the other day, though I don't recommend reading this if you happen to be eating...
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Spoiler space
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OK.

So a little boy was playing outside in the back yard, when suddenly his mom, looking out the window, sees him eating something.

She opens the windows and yells to him, "Boy, what'chu eatin'?"

Boy calmly says to his mom, "Raisins."

His mom hollers back, "Raisins?! We ain't got any raisins! Were'd you get 'em?"

Boy replies, "Off the dawg."
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See? I warned you. ;)

[badger.livejournal.com]

And my copy of The Parasite arrived today, in a lovely piece of synchronicity. :)

That scanner is amazingly impressive, esp. given the cost.

[phoenix-defiant.livejournal.com]

icck, a tick. i am an arachnophobe. thanks for the closeup though- now i know a new variety of tick (new to me).
i hope you don't get sick!
icck, tick, sick...