Does sweat regulate its own smell (or the myth of BO)?

I am just back from another four days of scrambling up mountains, hiking through gullies, entertaining leeches, encountering lyrebirds who have not read the textbook that says they are supposed to be shy, and being out of range of any type of communication. I was also in areas where water is scarce, so washing was something I left behind as an unnecessary appurtenance of wimpiness. But would I smell, I wondered? So I plastered on an extra layer of deodorant, hoping it might last for a bit. It did until somewhere on the second day. By that time my shirt was reeking so strongly, it drove away mosquitoes. One could see the fumes rising from it in a cloud.  But then I sweated some more, copious amounts in fact. By the fourth day, my shirt smelled vaguely used, but  certainly not like it had done earlier. Two possible answers suggest themselves:

1. My nose had lost the ability to smell in its usual way.

2. Sweat, once unencumbered by soap, deodorant, and whatnot, regulates itself.

I’m going for the second option. It’s a bit like hair and shampoo. Toss the shampoo and it takes a while for your hair to get used to its new-found freedom.  Once it does, it regulates its own moisture levels, ceases to smell, and self-cleans.

 

My weekly budget: $50

Since the itchy-fingered DG challenged me to substantiate my claim that I live on no more than $50 a week in the very expensive Land of Oz, here is a standard weekly budget:

$2.25  - 1.5 bags of rolled oats

$3.00 – half a bag of powdered milk, used for both breakfast (oats) and home-made yoghurt

$2.20 – two home-made loaves of bread.

$2.80 – 500 g of cottage cheese

$1.00 – usage of jars of honey, peanut butter and vegemite

$2.00 – 750 g of brown rice

$1.15 – a kilogram bag of pasta, if I don’t make my own.

$3.60 – assorted fresh beans (red kidney, chickpeas etc) and cans of beans

$10.00 – fresh fruit and vegetables – in season and on special

$1.50 – toilet paper

$3.00 – my indulgence: coffee beans (decaf)

$5.50 – occasional items, such as soap, detergent, toothpaste etc.

$12.00 – Meal out, transport, bicycle maintenance, etc.

$50.00 total

As you can see, there’s considerable room for luxuries, such as coffee, eating out, etc.

Note that this does not include accommodation, utilities, and internet costs: $180 per week. That’s a total of $230 per week for a very comfortable life.

All this comprises one reason why I argue that most people working at universities are grossly overpaid.

 

Journey to the West: the film

Alongside reading a 2000 page novel, you can now see the film:

Journey to the West: The Conquest of the Demons (2013): In this exciting adventure comedy viewers will see a very strange monk, Xuanzang (with an unusual name). It follows a journey along the Silk Road to India, in order to find the Buddhist scriptures. He travels not alone, and is in fact is not the main character. This monk, fortunately or unfortunately, has a passive and wimpish role. The film is more about a secondary monk, who is the Monkey King, Sun Wukong. Other strange creatures accompany the monk. Even more, the monk is the companion of another monk and a white horse-dragon. Do not miss this exciting movie and its adventure heroes. Director: Stephen Chow. Cast: Huang Bo, Zhang Wen, Shu Qi, Shou Luo, Chrissie Chau, Chi Chi Ling Ming Hung Fung, Yu Hin. Country:China. Duration: 109 min.

 

Eight tips for hiking in the mountains

In the spirit of Lenin the hiker, I would like to offer the following tips for walking in the mountains hereabouts.

1. Keep your rucksack snug on your back, for otherwise it swings wildly and sends you careening down precipices.

2. Equally, tie your boots firmly, for otherwise the gentle rubbing over 30 km has the curious knack of producing blisters.

3. Harry high-pants! If not, that couple of centimetres between belt and rucksack has a tendency to pinch and rub.

4. Avoid precipitous descents and climbs, with tree roots, fallen logs, mud and leaches … when the sun is setting!

5. Set yourself reasonable targets with a laden rucksack, full of food, water, camping gear and whatnot for a few days. Otherwise, you enter a liminal zone and arrive at your stop in a bewildered state.

6. Speaking of leaches, be generous: give blood for a good cause. They need it. So refrain from using salt, insect repellent or burning cigarette ends on those innocent creatures.

7. Carry enough water. You never know if you will need to pitch camp – yes, a tent is the only way to sleep – in a dry location.

8. Washing? That’s part of conspiracy by manufacturers of soap, shampoo and detergent. Since the vast majority of human beings throughout our history have had two washes in their lives, at birth and death, let the natural colonies of bacteria flourish. Take socks, for instance: you can switch feet and then turn them inside out on each consecutive day. That evens the wear, for at least four days or more. And the seriously powerful aroma of days-old socks is a wonder to behold. The same applies to undies.

On my recent stroll, I can claim to have adhered to only the last three, at least on the first day. It was a hike, in my beloved Watagan Mountains, with three mountain ranges each way, on a track with a devil-may-care attitude to the niceties of gentle inclines and declines. That’s for wimps. Straight up and down is the way to go.

There was the track, idyllic one moment …

… impossible to discern the next:

There was the backpack, made by my late father, with food, water, camping gear and clothes for a few days:

Ah no, this is it:

Note the Harry high-pants:

There was the tree:

The camping spot:

The cooking fire:

The extraordinary views:

The glimpse of what I needed to climb to get home:

And there was the wombat turd. They like a clean slate to do their thing:

Can’t wait for another dose.

 

Great North Walking

Summer is still here, or at least the water is still warm and the sun is shining every day. So I’m off to so some Great North Walking. The whole walk covers 250 km of mostly bushland between Newcastle and Sydney, but I will do a section of it in the Watagan Mountains, camp for a bit and enjoy the company of the leaches. And after much thought, I have decided not to attempt setting a new running record for the whole route. That record stands at a little over 54 hours by these two crazy runners.

 

Nick Cave in paperback

Equinox will publish a paperback version of my Nick Cave book in June 2013. At $25, it’s a bit more affordable.

 

A book outline, an engagement with my Cave book, and a job

Some stray notes, one concerning an item completed, and two to come:

1. Sacred Economy book outline, over at Political Theology. This is a biggie, offering a whole new model for the economies of the ancient Near East. Due out later this year.

2. A very thoughtful response indeed to my Nick Cave book by Anthony Paul Smith. It deserves a response, especially on the matter of total depravity. And in response to Anthony’s question, a paperback is slated to appear soon.

3. A job: this will be a research associate position, 0.4 ($30,00o per year) at the University of Newcastle. I’m looking for a specialist in Marxist economic theory, ancient societies, and the emergence of capitalism. Full details soon.

 

My latest yoga achievement – headstand!

They say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. Well, I’ve proved them wrong. Following on my earlier efforts at yoga (here and here), today I managed a headstand. I have been trying this one for weeks, if not months. I have almost broken my foot, my leg, my neck, I have thumped up and down, swayed here and there, never getting my legs much past waist high. And then today I decided to use a cupboard as a fall breaker, along with full engagement of the mysterious ‘core’. Up I went into a crouch and then, before I new it, my legs were up. I’ve never done this before in my life.

And then I almost busted my neck, since the shot took ages (tak, Christina).

What’s next? How about this?

 

The truth diet

Deeply immersed in that classic Chinese ‘novel’ of over 2000 pages, Journey to the West, I came across this recommendation for a truth diet – of a Buddhist tendency:

She [the bodhisattva] ordered him to adhere to the truth and eat only vegetarian food, cutting out the five pungent vegetables as well as the three forbidden things: wild goose, dog and fish. (JTW, vol. 1, p. 178)

The ‘west’ in this case is, of course, India.

 

Angry old men, or, the pleasures of withdrawal

On my most recent flight to China, I awoke from my drug-induced slumber to find that we had been diverted from Shanghai to Hangzhou. The reason was fog at Pudong. So we landed at Hangzhou and sat on the tarmac to wait out the fog – for three hours. Meanwhile, some older men became rather irate and criticised the flight attendants. Why? They wanted some ‘fresh air’ while we waited. That ‘fresh air’ turned out to be the sort that came through a cigarette filter. They had managed the flight by anticipating the welcome drag on a smoke at the end of the flight. Now they had to wait for an unspecified time on the tarmac, with no ‘fresh air’ in sight. The flight attendants seemed well used to such antics, and calmly told the cranky old men to take it easy.

I did ponder the usefulness of having some nicotine chewing gum on hand, or perhaps a few e-cigarettes to hand around. But it also made me wonder why those men didn’t take pleasure in the withdrawal symptoms. One of the lost pleasures of age and imminent grand-father status is the loss of that pleasure. Why? I think the thing  I enjoyed about smoking most was the withdrawal from nicotine. On the many occasions of giving up, the greatest pleasure of the craving, the bodily longing for a fix, the mental confusion and slowness of time that ensued. It gave me a different perspective on life and allowed me to indulge in my love of asceticism. On the last occasion that I gave up, I treasured the last time I could experience these feelings. No more, I’m afraid …

I wondered whether this insight would help these cranky old buggers on that flight. For some reason, I kept that advice to myself. Instead, it turned out that the fog stayed at Pudong airport in Shanghai, so we disembarked at Hangzhou and they immediately lit up – in the baggage claim area.