BACK

I'm back - back online and back in metropolia: Taipei City. Unfortunately, my last few days at Turtle Island were without internet. I did a lot of reading of the only book I had: a Comprehensive Wilderness Medicine Manual. Don't count on me rescuing anyone soon though. If you have a pneumothorax emergency, I don't know if I'd have the guts to stab you in the chest with a pointy object no thicker than a pencil above the third rib to release trapped air in the pleural cavity. Eeesh.

Well how does it feel to be back, you ask? Tired, I say. My legs are still tired from hiking each day on Turtle Island. The one trail that goes along the north shore of the island is pretty rough. I think the biggest danger working there isn't snakes, or giant spiders, or "tiger-faced wasps" (虎頭蜂, I'm told one sting will put you out for half a day, and several stings may kill you); but falling off the edge of a trail. Some areas are right up against a pretty high vertical drop. I would probably get vertigo walking along them if my safety wasn't belied by profusely abundant grass and annoying flowers whose spiky seeds get stuck to everything, growing over the edge and hiding a sheer drop into oblivion. Well not oblivion, but sometimes several meters down. Risk is like that a lot, I find. In the end, despite my fears of bears attacking and then learning about the arbitrary and sometimes temperamental nature of bull bison, the greatest risk of working at Yellowstone was traffic accidents. I think I had more and closer close calls driving than anything else. Who knows though, I've only been there once and there are lots of snakes and wasps. Hopefully there won't be any accidents. Knock on wood.