After my ambling narrative in "
Arriving Home," I'll be describing in detail my pain and suffering through a nasty viral infection in "
Good Lord, Was I Ill!" So, if you're at all the queasy sort, you may want to skip down to the "
Other Than That!" section of this posting...
Arriving Home...We returned from the east coast, New York City and Boston, Sunday evening around 8:30. The dogs & cats & birds & wildlife all greeted us with open paws, salivating mouths and wagging tails. We were happy to see everyone and it seems they missed us a little too.
Monday I was getting back into the swing of things communing further with our animal family and the home. That's why I decided that cleaning could wait one more day. The animals needed attention. I took our boys, Robert (our Westie) and Rocky (our Cocker) for a nice walk. The island smelled of wild honeysuckle baking under a warm morning sun and the musty smell of sea spray permeated the air on our walk past a big farm that overlooks the Olympic Straits. Gorgeous! I missed home.
I made chili for dinner and took inventory of everything I needed to get to tomorrow. No, it wasn't procrastination, not in the true sense of the word - to put off what you could do today - because I had no intention of doing much but enjoying the fact that I was home again.
But! God didn't agree with my definition of "procrastination" as it turns out.
Good Lord, Was I Ill!By 10 o'clock Monday night, it felt as if someone had stuffed a scrub brush down my throat. I woke choking and coughing and calmored to the bathroom for a glass of water and aspirin... the pain was excrutiating.
I remember a late dance teacher of mine, Gary Naylor, who once said about his sore throat, "It felt like I went down on a cactus." And, well, never having gone down on a cactus certainly couldn't attest to how that feels but, I get his meaning!
By five the next morning, my head felt like a big snot balloon [it's like watching a bad car accident, isn't it?] and my throat was still on fire. Any iota of energy had been sucked from me by energy-sucking-vampires at least that's what my dreams of delirium told me...
"It was the energy-sucking-vampires! It was the energy-sucking-vampires!" The energy-sucking-vampire-witnesses proclaimed in my dreams.
I called the doctor.
"I'm sick."
"What seems to be the problem?" (why do they sound this way ALL the time!?)
"My throat, stuffy nose, congestion, coughing," hack-wheeze, "I might be dying."
"We can get you in after lunch."
"Okey-dokey."
The doctor, in his infinite wisdom swabbed my throat [gag, gag, hucka hucka, gag] then swabbed my sinus...
Okay. At this point stop and think about this. Wait. THINK ABOUT IT! If you've never had your sinuses swabbed well, you haven't lived. It's quite the thrilling experience.
The cruel, cruel doctor handed me a tiny capful of water and said, "You'll need this afterward." About now, I'm thinking that dear ol' doc could possibly have lost his brains somewhere in the lab because what I'll really need is a Costco-sized supply full of Kleenex but, hey, he's the doctor!
Then the cruel, smiling and overly happy doctor asks, "Ready." And, let me be the first to tell you, no one is ready for this procedure - the sinus swabbing! What a sadistic little puke he turns out to be. He angles the swab up and into my nose and proceeds to move in, I'm thinking, because he's taken an unusual amount of time. "Geft ift ouft!" I yell.
When I open my eyes, he's still smiling and tells me he's had the same procedure. I wanted to tell him that I've performed wild animal rehabilitation and would love to cauterize his wounds one day, but instead I said, "Don't ever do that again!" Which made him smile even more.
Oh, and the capful of water, yeah, for drainage. Egad.
After that fun, I limped back home, crawled upstairs, climbed into bed and woke up much in the same way Sleeping Beauty does many many days later. As the sky turned above my head, I watched rerun after rerun of the Law & Order marathon... Law & Order, Law & Order: Criminal Intent and Law & Order: SVU. When that TV marathon was over I watched Burn Notice and House. I ordered way too many PPV movies - Bob's going to KILL me when he gets that bill - and when I'd seen all of those, I had to go back to re-watching movies on HBO, TMC and Showtime.
Much of that time was spent sleeping, crying, vomiting, blowing my nose, coughing, gagging, crying some more, taking an undue amount of aspirin, swallowing Pseudophed, Cheratussin and then finally my mother came to the rescue. I wouldn't let her in the house for fear she would contract whatever the Hell this thing was but she had a prescription of antibiotics she couldn't take and I yelled, "Hallelujah, mother..." She dropped them at my doorstep. She dropped juice and rice cakes there too. I didn't eat anything substantial until yesterday when Bob, dear, dear Bob made me a hamburger. It tasted like manna from Heaven. I mean. I ate about three bites and couldn't eat anymore. My stomach is officially the size of a favre bean. I lost 11 pounds -
that kind of made me happy but, really, it's a lot for only a week, isn't it? Don't worry too much. I'm sure my menopausal metabolism will gain it all back at warp speed.
So, I'm still a little snotty but this time I believe I'm on the mend.
Okay, next... FINALLY!
Other Than That!Writing. Other than that, I've been writing like a junkie spikin' speed. No lie, just like that. I mean what else can you do when all you can do is sit like a lump and after you've watched every freakin' movie on television and every episode of anything worth watching. What do you do? Tell me, I'm dying to know. You write, that's what you do!
Do I sound a little cranky? Yeah, well, your momma! Hey, I haven't eaten in a week! You'd be cranky too!
[Isn't she sweet?]
Later and here's to your health holding up! -Sincerely, Susan :)