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Jul. 5th, 2003 06:08 pmBeing as I'm still poison ivy girl, I did a little web checking just to be sure I'm not being atypical. And yes, it can take a week or two to get at all better, and the fifth day can be really nasty, which is why it's been a week and I'm still scratching and still oozing. And for that matter, still getting new patches of it. At least so far the new patches are mild. I'm still worrying about my face and/or eyes. meh.
I'm reading this stuff, and poison ivy ends up sounding like an evil alien. The allergen in it is urushiol (which to me sounds like a character in Anime), and it's like the cockroach of the plant world. The urushiol is present in all parts of the plant--leaves, branches, stem, root, etc--including smoke particles if you burn it, and dead or decaying plants. (the site doesn't mention that it works on a runner system, where it sends off shoots which touchdown elsewhere and grow into fully evil plants there, so when you're weeding, you may get part of the plant, but you're really not likely to get the whole thing. And even if you use roundup on the root, you can still end up getting it x months later as you pull the random root you don't know what it's from out of the ground without realizing it's now-dead poison ivy.) The urushiol is easily transferable from pets or tools, and can linger places for up to a year, or maybe longer. And it can take between 4 hours and 10 days to show symptoms. Also, it's in the same family of plants as the cashew and the mango, and people can get the same reaction to a certain type of Japanese lacquer that's made using some related wood product.
Man. If that isn't just crying out for a mystery novel, I don't know what is. Imagine a doorknob made of a wood that does that? Most people aren't really allergic to it, and if they are allergic enough to get that reaction, it probably would kick right in, but imagine poisoning someone and having it take 10 days to take effect? Or just giving people rashes randomly, both temporally and physically, as different people react differently to it, and you can easily transfer it from your hands (not so likely to get it) to other parts of your body, or other places--from a doorknob, to your hand, to the wall or window or chair.
I'm reading this stuff, and poison ivy ends up sounding like an evil alien. The allergen in it is urushiol (which to me sounds like a character in Anime), and it's like the cockroach of the plant world. The urushiol is present in all parts of the plant--leaves, branches, stem, root, etc--including smoke particles if you burn it, and dead or decaying plants. (the site doesn't mention that it works on a runner system, where it sends off shoots which touchdown elsewhere and grow into fully evil plants there, so when you're weeding, you may get part of the plant, but you're really not likely to get the whole thing. And even if you use roundup on the root, you can still end up getting it x months later as you pull the random root you don't know what it's from out of the ground without realizing it's now-dead poison ivy.) The urushiol is easily transferable from pets or tools, and can linger places for up to a year, or maybe longer. And it can take between 4 hours and 10 days to show symptoms. Also, it's in the same family of plants as the cashew and the mango, and people can get the same reaction to a certain type of Japanese lacquer that's made using some related wood product.
Man. If that isn't just crying out for a mystery novel, I don't know what is. Imagine a doorknob made of a wood that does that? Most people aren't really allergic to it, and if they are allergic enough to get that reaction, it probably would kick right in, but imagine poisoning someone and having it take 10 days to take effect? Or just giving people rashes randomly, both temporally and physically, as different people react differently to it, and you can easily transfer it from your hands (not so likely to get it) to other parts of your body, or other places--from a doorknob, to your hand, to the wall or window or chair.
