A Medical Find

A medical book find, that is.

But first, the latest owl image!

Good thing I have a really nice lens, because this was at least a few hundred feet away and the moment I took two steps in his direction he took off again. Sigh. 

He was fluffing himself right there -- owls are so adorable. (As long as you don't look at their fearsome talons.)

But on to the book! 

Today Mom and I were setting up Grammie's Christmas tree, and after it was all decorated and pretty-looking I started digging at a stack of old books on the heater next to the wall. One was filled with home kits and stuff from the early 1900s (that was cool in itself), and the other was this massive tome called 'Medicology'.

It's 10 books in one, and freakishly huge -- I'd hazard a guess at the thickness being at LEAST 6 inches. And it's filled with quaint words and phrasings, medical terminologies, house building (!), sanitation, herbal/natural remedies (which include belladonna, hemlock, and nightshade in small doses so take it with a grain of salt--not literally, of course), marriage guidelines, exercise, EVERYTHING. It's weirdly thorough, and used to belong to my great-grandma (my grandpa's mom, I think). Apparently she relied on it all the time for the kid's ailments and such.

I love old books like these. They're so serious and quaint and fantastic.

Oh! Storytime! I was innocently flipping through and came across a series of plates with bodybuilders! Totally not what I was expecting. All I gotta say is that the guys back then took their exercise quite seriously. Man.

Lovely illustrations of arteries and muscles and veins and nerves...I'd rather read this book than my modern medical dictionary. That thing has pictures of freaky afflictions on every other page. I can't read it without bracing a little beforehand.

Oh! Before I continue: the next bit is the very first page I flipped to when I picked the book up for the first time. It cracked me up.

I mean--this--where do I even begin?? And then it goes off on a tangent about the terrible state of privies and 'closets' and the reason women are constipated is because of the deplorable state of said privies.

Maybe I just have a weird sense of humor...but I find this freaking hilarious. It kinda set the pace for the rest of the book for me.

I'm going to enjoy reading the rest of this book, that's all there is to it.