As a teen I did that back in the Dream Time, before family, before wives or even girlfriends. We were in the foothills by Bragg Creek and we found a stream and all drank our fill. Within hours we all had the squirts!
The lucky kids tied up all the stalls at the youth hostel. I wasn't so lucky, I was about 100 yards back in the bush, leaning against a tree, trying to do my business without getting any on me. The Out House Poet is correct:
No matter how hard
You wiggle and dance
The last one of all
Always lands
In your pants.
My brother Big Mike hikes the Grand Canyon on a regular basis and knows better than to drink the water. He recalled once when he was at the bottom of the canyon and a Sourdough Charlie came by on a raft and asked Mike's crew what they were doing with all those contraptions and such. When Mike told him they were purifying the water, the old man laughed and scooped up a handful and drank it, proclaiming there was not a thing wrong with it. Sure, if your digestive tract is used to what you've been feeding it all your life.
ReplyDeleteYou want to really get sick? Drink downstream from the animal farm. If you're lucky, you'll get Motezuma's Revenge for a few days. If not, you could end up in the hospital, sitting in a tub of ice water with a raging fever and one or parasites that the doctor hasn't quite got on the run yet.
And, while we're at it, think about that long line of parasites on the march from Central America all the way through Mexico. You can't do that without water, and it better be filtered water.
There is some REALLY nasty stuff out there...
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