Thankfully, someone is doing the science so that the rest of us can know the meaning of pain without the actual pain. I have never really developed such an amazing vocabulary of pain. http://scienceblogs.com/retrospectacle/ ... ich-sting/
Lucky for all of us, an entomologist named Justin O. Schmidt decided to take one for the team and let a lot of bees, ants, and wasps sting him. Then, he would rate the level of ouchiness in an admirably systematic method. He published his “Schmidt Pain Index” in 1984 (refined in later papers, eg 1990), which ranked the sting-pain on a scale from 0 (completely benign) to 4 (mostly dead). The descriptions of the stings he presents are borderline precious, hearkening back to wine-tastings or sampling a pungent perfume:
1.0 Sweat bee: Light, ephemeral, almost fruity. A tiny spark has singed a single hair on your arm.
1.2 Fire ant: Sharp, sudden, mildly alarming. Like walking across a shag carpet & reaching for the light switch.
Anybody can make a hike harder. The real skill comes in making the hike easier.
life is like a roll of toilet paper. The closer it gets to the end, the faster it goes. Andy Rooney
cactuscat wrote:Tarantula Hawk Wasp is supposed to be one of the most painful, and looking at them I have no trouble believing it ... You have to figure that if the sting will paralyze a tarantula, it's gotta hurt! Thankfully, they don't seem inclined to sting people too often.
apparently one landed on my shoulder/back/pack? last week in the Bradshaws
With true concern my fellow hikers asked me to hold still so they could... get a photo
It would have made pure youtube fodder.....grown adult screaming like a prepubescent school girl while running in circles and flailing arms wildly.
Dang..
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