Cactus vs. Stupid Tourist

From my recent trip to Arizona. It had rained rather hard late Saturday and into Sunday morning, although you'd never have known it, as everything dried up rather quickly. Hfdoll and I went out that afternoon for food and photos; the place we stopped at for the latter was an unspoiled desert wilderness, loaded with cacti, other plants, and wide open spaces bordered by rocky hills, unlike anything we have back East. This particular species I'm told is known as a jumping cactus; the buds on the ground were presumably knocked off of the main plant by the heavy rains the night before. Idiot that I am, I decided that one of those buds would make a pretty nifty souvenir, and I figured if I was really careful I could handle it without much harm. Ha, guess again. The needles on the dang thing go through skin easier than the finest medical syringe, and unlike a syringe, they don't slip back out just as easily; no, they hang on like Lindsay Lohan on a bottle of cheap whiskey and refuse to let go. We eventually got it off my hand by wrapping a double-folded towel around the bud and pulling, and let me tell you, it hurts. But we did manage to remove it, and as far as I know it's still wrapped in the towel in the back of Hfdoll's car, waiting for someone brave or insane enough to try to remove it. Score: Cactus 1, Stupid Tourist 0.

Oh, on the way home we stopped for a large, late lunch at the Golden Corral, where halfway through the meal I discovered that a second bud had attached itself to my shoe. Fortunately, no one in the restaurant noticed... or if they did, were too polite to say anything. Cactus 2, Stupid Tourist 0.

I'm sure there's a moral to this story, something about not playing with sharp objects, but believe me, I already know.