A Tick in Time Saves Lyme?

Yeah, as Julie mentioned in her blog entry today, I found a tick on my hip! Sweet! Actually, not very sweet. I wish I hadn't found a tick on me, but if it is already there I'd rather find it than not. I admit that I certainly felt "paler than normal" as I proceeded to perform microsurgery on myself to remove it. Fortunately we had all sorts of first-aid equipment on hand in our traveling hybrid home, but it still didn't help me get the tick head out with the body. Lovely. Scalpel, anybody? Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on how you consider it, we didn't have a scalpel available at the time, but with a little diligence I believe I got the whole bug out.Now I sit back and wait for death to arrive, right? Take a spin on the tick-wheel-of-fortune?Well, maybe not. But I really have no idea. I'm not much of a tick expert. I'll spend my day off tomorrow reading up on ticks and their fearsome kin, then probably send off my tick for lab analysis and keep an eye out for the vast array of symptoms listed in WebMD.com. Some say that if you get the tick out within 24 hours of attachment then it is unlikely that you'll receive an infection from the tick. I think I beat the deadline, but I'm gonna find out first hand soon enough. And, heck, what would an Environmental Road Trip be without an occasional dramatic brush with nature? It would be a BERT: Boring Environmental Road Trip. And we can't have that! Stay tuned...