Poison Ivy vs. Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

If you ever find yourself out on a pleasant afternoon hike on a sunny summer day and then all of the sudden you understand that the trail you chose is desolate for one specific reason: leaves of three all over the place…

… remember the sage advice of Douglas Adams: DON’T PANIC

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in your back pocket, conveniently published in the form of a micro sub meson electronic component, is a singularly useful reference for this problem. Specifically the section which explains the best possible article to bring with you on your travels: a towel.

Because, as most everyone now knows, the only way to ensure you come away from your repeated brushes with leafy death unscathed is to take a vigorous shower whereupon you scrub every inch of your skin until it nearly bleeds. Then repeat. Oh, and once more again.

45 minutes later you are cleaner than you’ve ever been, but you’re also soaked. Aha! The towel.

Other uses for the towel include, and I quote:

“you can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapours; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a mini raft down the slow heavy river Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or to avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (a mindboggingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you – daft as a bush, but very, very ravenous); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.”

See? Incredibly useful.

This may have happened to us while hiking in Michigan. Glad we brought our towel!