Another Gardening Story

I try to keep things organic in the garden. I think I like the challenge of fighting nature with nature. It's a fair fight. There's a huge infestation of cucumber beetles on my plants this year. They're all over my cukes, tomatoes, beans, and basil. So I'm trying to clean up some basil plants that have been eaten and pooped on and I say to The Captain, "What (besides humans) eats herbs? I thought only people ate herbs" and I notice that my hands (and plants) are dripping with these guys. Now I'm not saying that the cucumber beetles are the guys that are eating and pooping on my basil, but it was kind of like a wake up call to finally rid myself of these pests.

So I make myself a hot pepper smoothie. I throw a couple habeneros, a couple Caribbean reds, a couple jalapenos and a couple tabascos in the blender with some water. I strain it out, add some rubbing alcohol and put it in a spray bottle. I'm out in the garden spraying like a crazy person. What I have failed to consider, until it is too late, is that I have created a pepper spray. And I have surrounded myself in a cloud of it. That was fun. An exercise for my lungs. But not the end of my homemade pepper spray adventure.

Flash forward about an hour and a half later. I have changed out of my shorts and flip flops into work out gear. I'm at the gym and after about 20 minutes on the treadmill, I notice the tops of my feet are beginning to tingle. At the 55 minute mark the capsaicin burn on the tops of my feet is so intense that I have to abandon the treadmill and Judge Judy to seek relief. Apparently a fair amount of pepper juice landed on them during the spraying and the friction from running/walking activated the heat.

I love learning new things that are most likely totally obvious to the rest of the world.