When I was a kid my family and I lived in New Mexico and, at the time, I thought there was nothing stranger. There was no grass in the yard, strange creatures wandering around, and it seemed like there was danger at every turn. If it wasn’t a tarantula in the house it was a scorpion. Outside, snakes, poisonous lizards, and even tumbleweeds, threatened us with their presence. As if all of that wasn’t bad enough, the plants were also treacherous. Get too close to a cactus and it turns out to be a bad day.
One day, things didn’t work out too great for my sister, when she fell into a cactus while we were out playing. She was so little, and screaming so much, it was horrifying. I remember that it took hours and hours for my mom to pick each and every thorn from her hip and leg, painstakingly, with tweezers. There was a magnifying glass involved, tools and implements – it was a major accident. Who knew, way back then, that something so common could have made those thorn removals much easier? If you live around cacti you might be interested to know that a familiar item around your house can help you get thorns out easily.
Whether you’re a person who grows cacti, and often gets pricked, or you just happen to get to close to a cactus, you’ll find duct tape to be just what you need to relieve your misery. When you apply the tape to the pierced area you can easily rip the thorns out in a few seconds. Tear off a piece of the tape and lay it across the thorns. Gently press down on the tape to make sure it’s affixed to the skin. Then, pull the tape off in a rapid movement.
The direction in which you pull the tape off can make all the difference in how long it takes to remove the thorns. After the tape is in place, yank it off, pulling it in the opposite way that the thorn entered. For example, if the thorn went in from left to right, pull the tape from right to left.
Working or being around cacti is treacherous and, when you get stuck by the needles, it’s extremely painful. Once it happens, duct tape is the best solution. Keep a roll in your car, your gardening basket, and at your house. You never know when you might need it.