One more thing to worry about

Just in case you woke up today, concerned because there is nothing else to worry about except how well the Ravens can do this year with a rookie quarterback playing (or, in sports talk, with a "freshman QB at the helm,") or the affects of Hurricanes Hanna, Ike and Josephine, or the likelihood that Bristol Palin's boyfriend, who just had her name elegantly tattoed on his ring finger in the style popularized by Hollywood's - and America's - sweethearts, Pamela Anderson Lee and Tommy Lee Anderson, will soon be appointed Secretary of Hockey, I offer this, from the wires of the Associated Press:

ELKTON, Md. -- A species of stinging caterpillar more common in southern climates appears to have arrived on the Eastern Shore.

Francis Breeding, a pest management consultant with the Queen Anne's County Extension Office, says a woman needed medical treatment last week because venom from a puss caterpillar traveled up her arm to her lymph nodes.

Breeding says puss caterpillars don't bite, but their hair contains the venom.

Now, I had thought that civilization had reached a nadir some time ago when I first got word of the notion of warming Dr Pepper in a saucepan and serving it as an apres-ski libation (with a slice of lemon floating atop), but this is even worse. I can see a new reality show on TLC next month: Nature's Deadliest, One-on-One! In which the puss caterpillar will duke it out with a tapeworm for the rights to take on a hissing dung beetle for the interstellar crown...

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