Leprosy, Let's Do Thai Food

We'll be going on vacation next week to Arizona.  It's been awhile since we've been on vacation, because who wants to travel with babies?  I'm still questioning my own judgement in taking a two-year-old and three-year-old on a plane.

Also, I'm the only adult that vomits on airplanes.  There's nothing quite like being crammed in a small space with a bunch of strangers and losing your lunch in a paper bag.  Let's just hope it's a smooth landing.

What do you mean, this won't help?

The last time I felt really excited about getting on a plane had everything to do with what was at the other end.  Any guesses here?  Wait, before you guess, remember whose blog you're reading and try again.



Nope.




Nope.




A leprosy colony!!!!  I would say The National Hansen's Disease Museum or the Kalaupapa Mule Tour, but then no one would know what I'm talking about.

Loot from my visits.

And by the way, if you know what Hansen's Disease is, let's have lunch.  I'll buy.


Before we go on, I'm sure you have some burning questions.  So let's just get this out of the way:

Q: Wait!  Do you have leprosy now?
A: No, it's not that contagious.  Even if I did catch Hansen's Disease, it's curable.

Q: Isn't that where people's body parts fall off?
A: No, people's body parts don't just fall off.  Hansen's isn't some sort of weird flesh rot.  People with Hansen's lose their ability to feel pain and injure themselves to the point of severely damaging limbs and extremities.  Infections can also cause loss of of fingers, toes, etc.  

Q: Why are you so weird?
A: Don't know.  Next question.

Q: If it's curable and not contagious, why are people living in the leper colonies?
A: Well, I'm glad you asked this question.  Before anyone knew very much about Hansen's, they were very afraid.  And when people are afraid, they do hurtful things.  So the government decided to take all the people with Hansen's Disease and lock up them up in isolated communities where they couldn't pass the disease on to anyone else.  The people in these communities formed bonds with each other and didn't want to leave just because a cure was found.  Then the government realized that they had made a very costly mistake.  They would be taking care of these people for the rest of their lives.  And the government decided never to mass quarantine ever again.  And they lived happily ever after.  The End.   

Here's a picture of Kalaupapa, Molokai, HI

Before I forget to mention it, I posted a poem yesterday.  You can find it here.

I've also uploaded the latest chapter of The Culling, where things start to seriously heat up between Charlotte and Orville.  But if you really want to blush, you'll just have to follow the link and read Chapter 41.  I'm just going to keep talking about octopuses.  So let's get kraken:

“What was with the octopus anyways?” Charlotte reached over and turned on the lamp on the side table.

“It’s supposed to be a kraken, but I’m still not that great at the Water enchantment,” Orville glanced at her, “Stop laughing.”

Unable to hold it in, tears dripped down her cheeks.  “Here we have the majestic unicorn, the legendary phoenix, the ferocious dragon . . . oh, and this octopus I picked up somewhere,” she slapped her leg, gasping with laughter.

“Hmph,” Orville crossed his arms, “A kraken’s just a big octopus, you know.”