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Los Angeles 2016: Mark of the Volunteer

As I mentioned last time, the Mild Girlfriend and I headed down to Los Angeles a while back. We had a good time and we even tried a pretty tasty fusion BBQ restaurant. As good as the food was, though, it wasn't all that amusing. Tasty, yes. Funny, no. For funny, something much less mundane did the trick. All it took was two pieces of tape.

You see, we were in the area for an event. The Mild Girlfriend was already part of the festivities, so she was front and center with a lot of the proceedings. I, on the other hand, was more or less there as moral support. There were a few tasks that I could help with, though, so I figured I'd try to be actual support in the process, too.

As it turned out, there were a few of us in the same boat. We helped move chairs, pack stuff up, and generally just did small tasks so that other people wouldn't have to do so. It wasn't exactly glamorous, but I don't think any of us particularly cared. Of course, the people who actually knew what was going on needed a way to tell that we were there to help. If random people decided to start shuffling things around, that could get out of hand quickly. So, the one bit of glamour that the "job" provided was some shiny red tape. It was up to us where we placed it, but it basically let people know, visually, that we were trying to be helpful.

For whatever reason, I decided to grab two pieces of this red tape. I then proceeded to wrap one piece around each forearm. It wasn't quite a fashion statement, but it was more interesting than slapping it on my chest like a name tag. A couple of people noticed and laughed, but for the most part, we all quickly forgot about it. We had stuff to do, after all.

Honestly, I wouldn't have even remembered that I'd done that were it not for one small detail: the sun was out that day. It wasn't a hot day, and I didn't sweat much. But the sun was out nevertheless, and the sun did its thing all day long. So two days later, I noticed that I had the weirdest tan ever. I had two strips of skin on my forearms lighter than the rest. It was sort of like a reverse tattoo. Instead of a darker color standing out, the lack of color drew attention to my lack of weather awareness.

The Mild Girlfriend laughed at me, of course. Worse yet, it took something like two and a half weeks before my forearms looked normal again. So during that time, I was constantly reminded that I should probably check the weather report and wear sunscreen more often.

This whole travel thing is hard sometimes, I tell you.

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