out! out damn spot!

[the_siobhan]

There was a tumblr post I saw a while back that talked about how we used to dismiss medieval treatments as superstition. "Rub egg shells and honey on boils and say twelve Hail Marys, lol, poor dumb primitives without antibiotics." And then people started actually looking at the treatments and figured out, well egg shells are a mild abrasive and honey is an anti-bacterial, and you would need to do that for about four minutes (or whatever) for efficacy and a dozen Hail Marys is just about right.

Now every time I see people talking about singing This Corrosion or Barbie Girl or Happy Birthday or reciting Shakespeare I think about that post.

Comments

[conuly]

Relatedly, "evil spirits" no more cause malaria than literal "bad air" does, but if the end result is that you stay away from swamps and close your windows at night you'll still avoid mosquitoes.

[nicklausse]

Medieval studies has been very useful to have as of late.

I'm periodically breaking out in hives bc I'm allergic to most hand lotion. That's sort of like This Corrosion.

[the_siobhan]

My skin is splitting open. So that's fun.

And somehow, despite all the hand washing, I still seem to have picked up a cold.

[beaq]

See, this is exactly the kind of quality content that I'd retweet with a heart on it.

[ironed_orchid]

Yes, and now I'm going to be singing This Corrosion when I wash my hands because it will likely be stuck in my head for a week.