Sarah v. The Tick

One of the many downsides (constant worry about a squashed cat, having to let him in and out every 30 seconds) of letting Bean go outside is that he has aquired one of the world's most hated creatures as a friend...a tick.

Animal lover that I am (well, I thought there was a small space in my heart for even ticks...), I tried to live with the tick being on Bean for several days... Finally, I couldn't deal anymore and purchased a glorified pair of tweezers in the form of the Tick Lifter.

The directions for use alone made me want to barf.

Directions for use: Push button to open claw. Grab tick firmly at skin surface. DO NOT PULL! Turn entire device slowly several times counterclockwise until ENTIRE tick lets go.

The emphasis is not my own. The directions are really like that!

Since my friend April was coming over to see my new rat that I found WALKING AROUND OUTSIDE (that is another blog entry) I decided to sucker her into helping by acting like ticks are no big deal. Luckily, she was strangely unfamiliar with ticks (???) and she readily agreed to use the Tick Lifter on Bean... It seemed to good to be true and indeed it was. More later...