BLUE NOSE GUIDE TO SUMMER SAFETY - PART 1

 By Rick_Slick

 

Summer is my favorite time of the year¹, not only because I get to buy RavenTresses presents for her birthday², but because of all of the fun and exciting activities I get to do outside that I really can't do in the winter because it's really cold out and I can only stand to be outside in the snow in my swimming trunks for about 30 seconds.³  Unfortunately, some of these fun and exciting activities can be quite dangerous, especially for those of you who are clumsy, don't pay attention, have bad luck, or enjoy doing stupid things that get you hurt.⁴  Here is a list of potentially dangerous summer activities and some helpful tips on how to avoid bloodshed, embarrassment, or catastrophic damage (physical or psychological):

 

TIP 1 - OVEREXPOSURE TO THE SUN.  Most people don't know this, but the sun is just a huge ball of lava floating in space that emits light and harmful ultraviolet death rays that are mostly blocked by the ozone layer surrounding Earth.  If it were not for this ozone layer, we would all turn into burnt pieces of roast beef. ⁵  Sometimes, ultraviolet rays get through the ozone layer anyway and get absorbed by little organisms all over our skin called scabies which turn our skin color from milk to latte to caramel and then to expresso.  If you absorb too many of these death rays, the scabies get all mad and give you skin cancer and whatnot.  So the only way to avoid getting skin cancer is to either a) never ever go outside and just bask in the warmth of your computer monitor, or b) use Sonblock.  I'm not sure what all Sonblock can do about skin cancer and scabies, but apparently he is the inventor of sonblock, which is a creamy white lotion that you rub all over your skin to block the death rays.  Sonblock (the lotion, not the There staff member) comes in different levels of Sun Protection Factor (SPF), ranging from SPF 0 (basically it's just some sort of marshmallow creme that doesn't really block anything) to SPF 200 which crusts over and encases you in a white plaster shell, totally blocking all light and UV rays.⁶  Be sure to protect yourself with this magical lotion before you spend any time outside this summer.  If you decide that the sun is too dangerous to expose yourself to, you could opt to stay indoors, but you will need to purchase a fan with which to stay cool.  I'm not totally sure how to tell the difference between the kind of fan that blows air out and the kind of fan that sucks air in, so make sure you ask the helpful staff at Home Depot or Fans & Whatnot or wherever you intend to buy your fan at.

TIP 2 - DROPPING IMPORTANT THINGS IN THE OCEAN.  When you are walking around the ocean, especially near cliffs or piers, please take care to not drop anything important into the ocean.  Things that can be susceptible to randomly falling into the ocean, never to be seen again, include cell phones, car keys, cars, money, jewelry, firearms used in committing crimes, fish food, and postcards I meant to send RavenTresses during my last trip but they "fell into the ocean" so that's why she never got them.⁷  If you should drop something important into the ocean, do not try to retrieve it under any circumstances.  Most likely, sharks are circling around and they are waiting to eat you, because to them you smell like a juicy ham sandwich (with or without mayo, depending on how long it's been since your last shower.)  If you jump in after your stuff anyway and sharks do try to eat you, please try to fight them off until next week, so you can read what to do in this situation in Tip #8.  To keep things from falling into the ocean as you walk past, you should wear one of those trendy fanny packs, or clip everything to your belt like Batman.  You never saw Batman lose any of his stuff in the ocean, did you?  And even if he did, I think he had Aquaman to help him get his things back.  I'll have to get with Vash_Community and have him look through his extensive comic book collection to find out for sure.  Since Parker over from Parker's Point figured out my trick to get my article into the There Fun Times, I may as well go all out...  Vash_Community!  Vash_Community!  Vash_Community!

 

TIP 3 - THE DANGERS OF COOKING OUT.  The most important thing to remember when grilling up some steaks or whatever is to never let women go near the grill.⁸  Since the dawn of the human race, the men were the providers, hunting and gathering meat and plants for their family.  Women just sat around and looked pretty, and probably invented fire and the wheel and stuff while men were out throwing rocks at animals and clubbing each other with sticks.⁹  So it only stands to reason that men should be in charge of burning meat on the grill, and RavenTresses should go look pretty somewhere far away from anything capable of catching anything else on fire.  If you do accidentally set something on fire and can't redirect the blame, throw it into the pool because there's lots of water in the pool and water puts out fires.  If there are people currently playing in the pool at that time, you may want to give them a quick heads up as a courtesy.  People generally appreciate warnings ahead of time when you're heaving flaming debris at them.  Otherwise, they tend to get madder than a Hawaiian who just won an all-expense paid vacation to Hawaii in one of those scratch-off contests.  If you don't have a pool, you should run and get your fire extinguisher and attempt to spray powdered sugar or whatever comes out of fire extinguishers all over the flames to put them out.  If you don't have a pool or a fire extinguisher, your only option is to watch all your stuff burn to the ground and then try to pick out the pieces of meat for your burger if you are still interested in eating after that.

 

TIP 4 - EATING BEFORE SWIMMING.  You should always wait 30 minutes after eating before you go swimming.  Not 29, not 31... 30.  I never followed this rule as a kid, and I always threw up in the pool all the time (after eating like 10 Hostess Ding-Dongs, cake, liver and onions, a whole thing of Cheetos, and washing it down with Jolt cola) almost as soon as I hit the water.  The reason this happens is because your food is still all bouncing around in your tummy, and then you start bobbing around in the water and flailing your arms and legs around and your body is like "HEY!  Settle down, Romper Room!  I'm trying to digest food here!" and then makes you throw up to get you to get out of the pool and sit still for a few hours while you turn all pale green -- except for your orange Cheeto fingers.  Worse yet, if you eat a bunch of stuff and then go swim in the ocean, you're pretty much just presenting hungry sharks, jellyfish, and electric eels and whatnot with what they will perceive as a stuffed meatball.  Sharks can probably smell Cheetos like five miles away.¹⁰   The only people in the entire world that can eat and swim before the 30 minutes are up are the Navy SEALs, because they train for scenarios like that all the time.  I think I saw that on the Discovery Channel -- or maybe it was a Steven Seagal movie -- both of which are reputable sources of factual information.  So... unless you're some sort of elite special forces soldier, you should probably lay off the Twinkies before jumping into the water.  Also, as a side note, I've learned that if you ever see a piece of chocolate sitting in the sand on the beach, but you're not absolutely sure it's chocolate, do not stick it in your mouth.

 

TIP 5 - DON'T LEAVE CRAYONS OUTSIDE.  If you're like me, you spend all of your outside time coloring pictures with crayons.¹¹  Unfortunately, crayons are made of ice cream or some other such secret material that melts when it sits out in the burning hot sun for too long, because the sun is basically just a big ball of lava floating around in space, shooting out death rays, as explained in Tip #1.  If you do leave your crayons out in the sun and they melt, please resist your first instinct to scrape your finger in a crayon puddle and eat it.  The melty crayon could still be boiling hot and burn your finger or the inside of your mouth.  I know you're all depressed about your loss -- like that time I spent $100 to buy someone's air guitar on eBay and never received anything in the mail -- but you've got to keep it together and think straight, man!  What you should do is to try and salvage any crayons that look like they may still be solid.  Usually, these crayons are useless colors no one uses like mauve and maize... all of the important ones seem to melt more quickly than the others.  Cool off the melted colored crayon puddles with cold water and then scrape them off whatever surface you laid them on with a paint scraper.  Remember kids... if you aren't damaging the surface, you probably aren't scraping hard enough.  At this point, you can then eat them if you can no longer resist the urge, but see Tip #4 if you are planning to go swimming.  Alternatively, you could place the hardened crayon giblets into the dryer and make RavenTresses' clothes all sorts of pretty colors!¹²  In the future, try to draw pictures with colored chalk, magic markers, or colored pencils, as they will not melt when left in the sun.  More difficult routes to prevent this unfortunate situation are to actually practice responsibility and not leave your crayons out in the sun in the first place, or if that proves too complex, perhaps stay indoors to draw.  Also, wear a helmet and tether yourself to a fixed object.  I'm not sure how this helps, but my parents used to do that to me all the time. 

I hope you found the first part of this two-part summer safety guide to be helpful in preventing common summer safety incidents.  I would have written this sooner, but someone replaced the ball in my mouse with a gumball.  Stay tuned for another five tips in next week's installment! 

COMMENTARY IN FOOTNOTES BY RAVENTRESSES:

¹  "It's really not his favorite time of year, because he's a weenie and it's too hot for him outside."

²   "Yaaaay... I LOVE presents!"

³  "Can we say.... shrinkage?"

⁴   "Haha, like that Evil Medieval guy or whoever!"

⁵   "I bet those harmful death rays can't get me in my gas-guzzling SUV!"

⁶   "I'm thirsty, I'm gonna go get me another Vodka Cranberry."

⁷   "Heeeey.... wait a minute... you went on a trip without ME?" ''mad

⁸   "I thought lighter fluid would make the wooden deck and picnic table appear lighter."

⁹   "They probably also went shopping and spent all their men's platinum pieces or whatever they traded back in the olden days like in Guild Wars."

¹⁰   "Speaking of smelling, my armpits smell like soup."

¹¹   "No he doesn't, he spends all his time outside whining about how hot it is and how there's too many bugs."

¹²   "You did that?? You tin-can spam sandwich eatin' trashy trailer court livin' government commodity cheese line standin' pretty clothes ruinin' [CENSORED]!!!!"