When it comes to whiteness of skin Angels can be seen at a hundred yards in the blackest night; whites of eyes bear no comparison. So it was foolish to lie in a deckchair intermittently reading and looking at the raptors circling on the thermals high above. Those were not hawks or falcons, those were vultures waiting for toast.
It is a large tree that seemed to cast enough shadow but the shade was dappled and the sun seems to have become fiercer than in other years. Looking at the imprinted dappling effect, another stanza could be added to Manley Hopkins. For 24 hours there was fever and shivering with burning skin, then that strange sensation that the skin is too small, then it all starts to calm down and there is the beginnings of a sun tan and others can be greeted with a hug rather than a distant bow; then it all falls off and underneath is pallida come la luna once more.
It will be nice to return to everyday life and everyday blogging.
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'I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free'
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13 comments:
Hope you're feeling better soon.
Fresh tomatoes, chopped, mashed and gently spread over the skin. Nothing like it for sunburn.
Lavender oil will help the burning sensation. Aloe, of course, as well.
I once got badly burnt in what can only be described as a sea fog, camping in Cornwall.
Oh HG :-( Nasty.
Hmm. It's very kind but basted in a fresh tomato mayonnaise made with lavender oil? That should make people keep their distance though.
Thank you S. I have been quite shaken by how bad it can be.
'..a sea fog camping in Cornwall'. Boggling here E.
Sob, L.
You have my sympathies.
I am a sufferer too (fair skin, red hair, the works), and as a yachtsman you get it worse.
Ceaseless vigilance and endless Factor 25 is required at the start of the season; perhaps a tinge of colour is achieved and a relaxation of the regime may be contemplated by the end, or maybe it's just that the sun is lower by September.
Keep cool and carry on!
HG: As you seem to be the Angel in question, you must have mystic ultra brilliant, not to say luminous, skin if you reckon you can be seen in the darkest of nights.
Let me disabuse you of this. If you had spent any time in the wilds of Africa on a cloudy moonless night, believe me, you would know that there really is nothing blacker. Complete and utter coalmine blackness. I know that because the fuse to my car lights popped in such a location one night on the way home and I could not even see the front of the car! Happily I always carried a torch so that helped with the groping around. The silver paper on a sweet in the glove box wrapped round the two ends of the blown fuse reignited my lights long enough for me to get home in one piece. Not an experience I would like to repeat, but these conditions go a long way to explain many unnecessary road deaths in Africa. A large animal in the middle of the road, or truck with no rear lights (the rule rather than the exception) stops by the side of the road; a hapless driver comes trundling along half an hour later and before there is time to see it, even on full beam, clunk! RIP.
HG- I have the perfect cure,several large gin and tonics (easy on the tonic) followed by a smothering of "Banana Boat Aloe After Sun Cream".Not sure if you can get it there but if you ever see it - buy it.AA
Che scottata manina. Poor brinded HG. I hope you enjoyed the afternoon. I am pallida come la luna too and for this reason I dread my late August visit to Rome and Florence. I burnt a little last week; there is no practical way to carry a parasol whilst playing croquet.
You're right Calfy. Even if a kind hand offers to hold a parasol over you there is to be considered the lack of rules unless specifically required and even then to be umpired by the player at the time. A parasol wielded by another could be a very useful off-putter. Then there's all the backing and eying and circling and silent, preliminary mallet waggles that would demand a very agile parasol bearer. No, borne by self or borne by others, sunshades are out.
How can you be AA and recommending G&Ts? Unbelievably even a glass of cold white was repellent. Darkened room, (accidental eye toasting had swollen it up nastily) canapa sheets, and calamine lotion have at last worked with tepid lemonade and tepid showers.
I've ordered some burkas online.
Nomad, Africa isn't called the dark continent for nothing then. I never have got there but Mr HG went often. Curiously he appeared on the Ten O'Clock News once playing croquet and clutching a gin and tonic - not a parasol, and he was being quite handy with it - near Lusaka.
HG: Oddly enough it was the Lusaka area I was describing. After a dinner party in the unlit rural residential areas the guests would stream out into utter blackness, in which the whites of eyes, teeth or even wedding dresses were totally useless as guides, going "yoohoo" to determine where we each were. The sensible ones carried small torches, whilst the other kept clicking the car remote until something went beep in the distance and the indicator lights flashed.
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