Warm Fuzzies Versus Burning Itchies?

This afternoon, I worked on a Habitat for Humanity (for any Canadians that might be reading this, "humanity" is the "condition of being human." Which I understand you might not be too clear on. Oh, snap!*) house with a group of volunteers from work. I was excited, not just because of the whole bettering society thing, but because it meant a day off work cavorting in the sun. If by "cavorting" you mean "working your ass off" and "sun" you mean "that thing in the sky that causes your skin to burn and peel, and sweat to pour down your face in such a copious amount that you could collect it in an aquarium and house several saltwater fish."

The crew leader, with her obligatory "Amnesty International" t-shirt and armpit hair, gave out the assignments. My visions of painting a porch while sunning myself and getting an adorable smudge of paint on my nose quickly vanished when I learned I would be installing fiberglass insulation in the crawlspace beneath the house. The fiberglass insulation of extremely fine glass fibers that collect on your skin and make it itch and burn like gonorrhea (which I've never had, rest assured, but which according to Scott C does itch and burn*). The unfinished crawlspace of bare earth floor and no ventilation, which had been collecting heat all day and smelled of a thousand wet dogs.

Because this was charity work, I don't want to bitch about how my arms were bright red and itched like a mofo by the time I was done, or how it was really hot in there and I could barely breathe, or how the crew working outside drank all the water so I didn't get any, or how my eyes were burning but I couldn't itch them or wipe them because I was totally encased in fiberglass, or how when I got home and took a shower my skin burned as the glass shards sloughed off my skin, or how even after the shower my arms still itched.

No, I don't want to bitch about any of that.

Instead, I've chosen to look at the bright side of having fiberglass cover you from head to toe.

To wit:
1. The tiny shards of glass made my skin sparkle in the sun.
2. Glass makes a great exfoliator!
3. If I collect enough, I'll never have to buy a winter coat again.
4. All the itching took my mind off the burning in my toe from where I stepped on a rusty nail. That didn't really happen, but I really needed a fourth item to round out the list. And it sounded plausible.


*Just kidding. I love Canadians. Especially Celine Dion.

** Not that Scott C has gonorrhea. Not that I know of, anyway. But he is in pharmacy school so I expect him to know things like that.