Holy crap I’m allergic to WHAT?

Apparently I’m allergic to Aloe Vera straight from the plant. I had used it, but not lately. Wednesday night, I covered my face in it and coconut oil (which I have used lately.) I woke up looking like a cabbage patch doll.

I iced my eyes open, drove to “fake chemo” (herceptin), got lots of sympathy, and a prescription for steroids from the on-call oncologist. He practically rolled his eyes at me, and told me not to put ANYTHING ELSE on my skin….

My face got all crusty and I’ve spent three days with a wet washcloth on my face. It’s sort of fascinating to watch the skin heal.

MY FACE HURTS.

This is your cue to say “yeah? well it’s killin’ me…”

This song has no title, just words and a tune

My rash is … mostly better. I did get red where my shorts and shirt covered the other night, when I went out dancing to bluegrass. It looks like a reverse splotchy sunburn. I’m hoping it is just heat rash. It didn’t “bump up” like the other rash … and it doesn’t itch as bad.

But now I’m reading the ingredients lists on the new stuff I just bought in my latest drug store trip that same day. Sigh. Am I allergic to beeswax in addition to lanolyn? Cetyl alcohol? Isopropyl palmitate? Each of these things has 25 to 50 ingredients, even the Burt’s Bees.

Another possibility is that I’m allergic to clothes. I want to go on disability and be naked all the time. Or they could let me telecommute.

Early on during the rash, I cut my fingernails all the way down, and have to file them every 12 hours. One hand madly tries to scratch and as soon as it succeeds, the other hand grabs the nail file and gets rid of the sharpness. I miss my fingernails. I try to scratch my scalp, it gives no relief and my crazy, curly, never-trimmed hair-grow goes all Einstein. I can’t get things open, and the ends of my fingers hurt from rubbing and trying to scratch, awake and asleep. For a while my arms were sore from putting on lotion. I can reach every part of my body and do quick complete coverage, now. I spent so much time scratching and lotioning that I didn’t sit around eating all day, and I lost ten pounds. I didn’t even realize it at first until my husband asked about it.

Last week, my face had either a sun reaction or a late rash reaction, and my freaking eyelids hurt. They had little sores on them. At least I have that under control. But my scalp still itches, and I have some sores on my upper lip that bleed a little sometimes. Nice huh? I’m sort of self conscious about it.

But I did get out for live music on Wednesday night and I’m so proud of myself. My husband was out of town on business so I had to get myself out of the house, which hasn’t usually worked.

The band, Hot Buttered Rum, has been one of my favorites for years now. There were two openers, so I didn’t want to be on time. I was nervous, though, cause the only other time I got myself out of the house when my husband was gone, it was to see them, also. It was a couple of years ago. When I arrived, I found out they were the opener, not the main act, and they had finished playing. I was totally crushed and left pretty soon, after wandering around the crowd for a while feeling disappointed.

One other time when we went to see them, they were sold out. We were amazed, this is bluegrass, in SoCal, sold out? So this time I bought a ticket on the internet ahead of time. For $12 I figured if I didn’t feel up to it, so what.

Doors were at 7, first band at 8. When my husband and I go to this venue, we show up at 6:30 and “do the line” so we can get a particular table. We are often the only people in line for 15 minutes. The closer a band is, in some imaginary family tree, to the Grateful Dead, the more people show up early.

This time I cruised in at 9, not expecting to get a seat. But the “bleacher” section was almost empty, so I got a fairly good seat, watched the opener, and had a coke.  I guess Wednesday nights are not as crowded. I was in a row with a couple who seemed content to ignore me, which was perfect. The fourth chair disappeared at some point, even better.

During the break, I ordered one of the trick drinks they had on a card, called a Vanilla Lemon Drop. It was some vanilla vodka, some triple sec… and uh something else I forget. And sugar on the rim of the glass. It was pretty good. But it turned out to be $11! so I won’t be getting it again. If I’m spending that much it better be a shot of single malt, straight up.

Drinking again is still a novelty for me. Before I got sick I was down to a drink or two a month, but while I was in treatment I didn’t drink for a whole year. I broke that fast with a G&T made by my G&T friend a while back.

HBR came on and after a couple songs I went down on the floor and danced almost the whole time. They were great, as usual. You should go see them. I was there til the end. They came back for the encore and played six more songs. During the last song, they played Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean” for a while. It was okay to dance to. Probably the second time ever I’ve danced to an MJ song in public.

I got home at about 12:30. I stayed up til 2 watching “Ugly Betty” on hulu. I got up at 6:30 am, got to my desk at 8, and semisnoozed through the day (no change there).

Now I’m watching “WKRP In Cincinatti” and listening to a Guster CD, the first CD I’ve bought since I bought all of HBR’s last year.

There is no coherent end to this blog post, kthxbai