Dear Crabby,
I recently came into contact with poison ivy and have these terrible red rashes. Is there a good and quick remedy for this?
Sincerely, Joe Notsocool
Dear Mr. Notsocool,
Yes, I have had my fill of poison ivy in my lifetime! When I was younger, I would seem to get this rash every summer. I would simply walk past an area in the woods and this stuff would attack me from a distance! I think my mother and father bought more calamine lotion for me than they did food for a few summers. I would get the blisters all over my hands and up to my elbows. The other kids called me the pink pizza boy because that calamine lotion was bright pink for the simple purpose of embarrassing 
anyone using it! I did have a friend though that got it worse than me just recently. He was out trimming bushes and doing some yard cleanup in his own yard of all places and it got him bad. I guess he still doesn’t know what the stuff looks like. But from the looks of him afterwards, he not only got it on his hands and elbows, but on his neck and face and beyond. When I saw him, he had blisters everywhere so I asked, “Is what I can see the worst of it?” His reply still gives me chills. He had answered, “No, I also had to go to the bathroom while I was out there and got it all over that area!” Ouch! He ended up going to the doctor and getting a steroid shot to help alleviate the pain he was in. I guess there really isn’t much else you can do for this type of rash. It would be great if you could get inoculated or something to prevent this from ever happening again. It does seem however that some people get it worse than others. My father told me he never once contracted the rash until I was born. After I got it a couple of times, he ended up getting it and then he would also get it about once a year as well. I guess I just have that way with people. So my advice to you is to learn to identify the leaf, stay away from it, and if you do somehow touch some- don’t go to the bathroom! It is also a good idea to keep plenty of calamine lotion on hand for an immediate application! Good luck, and if you get it – stay away from me!
Sincerely, Dear Crabby
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About Tom and Ann Gendich