Bronko & Nagurski's First Day of Summer

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

 [Linkage thanks to Anomalistic Christian the Bearded] 

The Da-da is IN: Getting the Itch Out of Mosquito Bites (or, "Mosquito Bite Remedies That Don't Suck")

The best cure for mosquito bites is prevention, like Da-da's thick monster fur. But if you're lacking
in monster fur, or you've already been bitten by a monster or mosquito, use the following.

Mosquito bites are the price of summer, but there are a few counter-intuitive remedies available that take the sting away. The good news is that the below remedies are state-of-the-art AND old-fashioned, and of course, CHEAP. Best of all, neither use drugs or ointments.

1. First, there's this device:

The Therapik. The needle is only 3" long.

Yes, Da-da's kidding. It uses heat.

The Therapik heats the bite to 120/140 degrees F, neutralizing the venom. No, there's no needle. As per this site:

To relieve the pain, itching and swelling of insect bites, Therapik uses the focused application of heat to neutralize the venom. The reason the heat treatment works is that the venom of most common stinging and biting insects is thermolabile, meaning that high temperatures render it harmless.

Applied for less than a minute, Therapik concentrates heat (120° to 140°F/50° to 60°C) on a tiny target area so the heat penetrates as deeply as the venom without damaging surrounding tissue or causing pain.

Effective on the venom of bees, hornets, wasps, mosquitoes, blackflies, ants, jellyfish, fleas, ticks and even stinging nettle (not recommended on spider bites, snakebites or scorpion stings), it works best on fresh bites, but soothes even day-old ones.

It's only $14, and no, Da-da was not paid for this mention; he's not a shill, he just wants to help. This device works best carried in a backpack, and applied on fresh bites. However, there is a cheaper, equivalent home remedy that works just as well. 

Look at that spoon stand straight up. Now THAT'S Da-da coffee.
Yes, it's also a cure for mosquito bites.

2. The following is how Da-da ministers to Bronko and Nagurski, chronologically aged 7 and 9 (mentally/emotionally aged 2 and 2).

Da-da Disclaimer: Be careful, so you don't burn anyone. If you don't have any sense or nerves in your body, and/or you can't follow simple directions, best not try this yourself. In fact, you might want to just lock yourself in a box with a wombat.

Place a metal spoon in a mug of hot water or coffee -- water for coffee is about 190 degrees, so use a coffee maker or hot water spigot; you could also boil water, but be sure to let it cool a bit before using.  

Pull the spoon and blow on it a bit till it cools to around 140 degrees F, say about 10-20 seconds, depending on air temperature. (Da-da tests the spoon against his cheek for his kids, but you can use your hand, your arm, eyeball, the cat, whatever you want.) Apply the back of the heated spoon to the bite area and hold for 10-30 seconds. This magically takes the itch away and even works for old bites. This technique also works on the venom of bees, hornets, wasps, mosquitoes, blackflies, ants, jellyfish, fleas, ticks and even stinging nettle (not recommended on spider bites, snakebites or scorpion stings), but you should still seek mendical attention in any of those if you see any symptoms other tha the bite/sting. Please use common sense, which is fairly uncommon now, so we'll have to call it someone else. 

Note that this heat remedy should be done, as needed. Da-da's youngest just got severely eaten alive at a pool party and Da-da had to use the hot spoon therapy twice in six hours before the itching vanished. Again, it really helps to apply this immediately after bites/stings.
 

Note: some mosquito bites are worse than others.

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

How much longer till school starts?

 

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Uh oh. Looks like Da-da shouldn't have left the monkeys with Ma-ma today.
Also looks like she's been watching too much Buck Rogers, again.

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Some road trips are like that.

But It's a Wet Heat

That's still 250 degrees cooler than Venus, but it's a wet heat.

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

HELLO, summer with insane small children! GOODBYE sanity!

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Ah, a typical summer day with kids out of school.

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

THIS... is the only safe place while school's out. And Da-da's not coming out till it's in again.

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Ah, Da-da finally achieved enlightenment. (Ok, the Rocket Buddha Shoes helped.)

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Ug, Da-da might need to go on a diet before someone decides to toast him.
But you have to admit, his new ROOF hat is the cat's uvula.

Da-da Issues KME Alert (Kid-Mass Ejection)

School's out. Here they come.

The Santa Pause: A Summer Primer

Don't worry, it's not technically child abuse.

Da-da grew up in the desert. Someone had to. This means all those summer dreams of smiley picnics and BBQs and cookouts and volleyball and beach frolics mean absolutely nothing to Da-da. In the desert, summers are brutal, to be avoided; you get to feeling like a bat, stuck inside all day in the coolness of your cave, hanging upside down, going out only at night. Well, maybe that's just Da-da. Anyway, it's hot in the desert in summer. No. HOT. Dry. Dead. Tires stick to the driveway. Everything's brown, dessicated. You get the idea. Weatherwise, the only time anything happens in the desert is in the fall, winter and spring. So, those who see winter as a lifeless season... well, that's how Da-da sees summer. Needless to say, Da-da doesn't look forward to summer much, but he manages to get through as he used to get through it: with Christmas music.

And now, if you could please stop punching your Da-da doll a moment, Da-da will explain.

Seems the only times Da-da was happy as a kid was when school was out -- esp. during Christmas vacation/winter break, when Da-da would put on a huge stack-O-Xmas music and proceed to build one hellaciously enormoid Gothic Christmas diorama in the living room all week before the main event, sorta like this but with more zing:

This was a small one.

As a recovering musician (jazz and classical), a love for Christmas music is pretty much Da-da's main personality flaw, apart from that inner troll thing. And we're not talking Barbara Streisand Christmas music here, or John Tesh Christmas music, or any of the current, fey pretty-boy dredge-pop effluvia that should never ever ever be listened to, not even by prisoners. No, Da-da's talking about tasty Christmas music: Vince Guaraldi (who did the music for all the Charlie Brown specials), Art Tatum, Red Garland, Oscar Peterson, Dexter Gordon, Ellington.... Those guys, playing mostly instrumental Christmas music, peppered with the odd tasty dead vocalist from way back when you could buy white bread or say the words, "Merry Christmas," without cringing.

99.99% of musicians find Da-da's musical aberration horrifying. Da-da is, in fact, a monster to them. Rocks are thrown. Invectives hurled. Fires are set. Da-da certainly doesn't find fault with any of this abuse. Hey, some people like, "Mork & Mindy." And Da-da can totally take a punch and be just fine. Just don't try it twice, Chuck.

This is how most musicians react to Christmas music.

Anyway, Da-da tries not to inflict his Hideous Summer Yule on others, but his children are being tangentially exposed, musically, on occasion, BUT hold up on that big red CHILD ABUSE button a sec. Da-da mixes things up with Space Pop, Monster Pop, bizarre sound FX, old Disneyland ride soundtracks, jazz and classical, the sound of crickets, all salted with a tinny '30s jazz substrate. Da-da can't stand anything contemporary; music is so redundantly bad these days that Da-da treats it like Vincent Price treated vampires in, "The Last Man on Earth."

So, the logical question that forms in any rational person's mind is: IS DA-DA A MUSIC NAZI?

Well, he does have the mustache, but he keeps it in his Bad Mall Santa Da-da suit. Jeez, what do you expect from a guy who hangs upside down in a cave like a bat all summer listening to Christmas music?

[By the way, special thanks to Da-da's old college friend, BADLANDS, for shaving off (most of) Da-da's Music Nazi Mustache. A former college DJ and barking dog music aficionado (aficionada?), BADLANDS helped Da-da see the value in all kinds of music... well, except rap. Sorry, B. Da-da hates rap. Ok, so Da-da might have a little Music Nazi stubble, but one does need to discriminate a little, otherwise, we'd all still be watching, "Mork & Mindy," while hanging upside down and listening to Christmas music.]

Na-nu, na-.... Nah.

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

"Ha ha, Timmy, remember what happened the last time you pushed that poodle's button?"

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Kids, THIS is a demonstration of centripetal AND centrifugal force.
Either way, your blood should be pooling somewhere -- and NO, we aren't there, yet.

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Da-da's been staring at this for hours and it's STILL funny, HAAHAAHAA. Ok, maybe not.

Scenes From Da-da's Mind-Roasting Summer

Ma-ma KNOWS how to pick a motel.