Forgetting to Take Care of Basic Needs

In a comment to my last post, mikey reminds me not to forget the basics of health and hygiene in the busy season:


Have a good October - don't forget to take care of your basic needs. Foot fungus will get you dusted off just the same as a sucking chest wound...


Thanks for looking out, mikey... I promise not to catass. On the other hand, though, a friend of mine told me a cautionary tale.

This particular friend is one of the contract employees who works our special events. She's a personable, loquacious young woman who's trying to balance her lackluster day job with the creative career that landed her her special events contract with us. I see her a couple of times a year (in my first draft, I referred to her as an acquaintance, but I didn't think that would be fair to her, because I really enjoy working with her on those all-too-rare occasions when she's with the organization). This friend of mine has a younger sister who recently started college, and I always make a point of asking her how little sis is doing. This year, I inquire of little sis and I get the cautionary tale:


"Hey, **REDACTED**, how is your sister doing?"
"She had some health problems, but she's okay now."
"WHAT?"
"Well, she had a case of scurvy.
"SCURVY? Was she eating nothing by Kraft mac-n-cheez?"
"No, she was eating nothing but oatmeal. She's in college, and she's been living entirely on oatmeal since she got there."
"Damn, she really needs to eat some vegetables."
"Right? And she's a vegetarian."


The irony of this story is that my friend's typical drink is pink lemonade and gin, to the extent that the barkeeps in the places she frequents have named the drink after her. If only little sis had a taste for her drink, with its antiscorbutic properties, she would not have had her bout with this sailors' bane.