One Flu Over The Cuckoo's Nest

Tuesday I had what I thought was a cold. Sniffles, sneezes. No big deal, right? I haven't been sick- really sick- for two and a half years and I wasn't about to let sniffles ruin my mood- I have mourning, grief, poverty, disillusionment, depression, rejection, loneliness and a horribly eroded sense of self-worth for that - with all those, who needs sniffles and sneezes in order to feel bad?

A sneeze- at face value - is a lot like an orgasm. In highly-scientific terms, during a sneeze (or a climax) a great number of specific nerve endings go wheee simultaneously and it causes a brief, powerful physical pleasure coupled with the expulsion of goo from the appropriate orifice(s). This lasts several seconds at maximum.

According to practitioners of Tantric sex, the human orgasm can be extended for hours...this sounds pretty good, right? Well, I have mastered the art of Tantric sneezing and it's no fun at all.
I had a single sneeze that went on for hours- endless, debilitating hours. Usually I enjoy a good sneeze, but this was torturous respiratory misery at it's worst, not revelatory kundalini mysticism at it's best.

It's really hard to enjoy being miserable when you can't breathe. By late Weds. night , my chest and throat- my entire face as well- were sore and painful from coughing, sneezing and the constant, forceful outward blowing required to maintain life...in order to inhale, I first had to clear enough space in my air passages for oxygen atoms to pass through. I am no scientist, it was my mistaken understanding that atoms were fairly small objects; I was a bit surprised when I learned-the hard way- that the air we breathe actually consists of gravel, thumbtacks, twigs and ground glass. Ow.

Shortly after midnight I drove to the all-night druggist. The young lady behind the counter took one look at my sweaty, shaky, emaciated self and started giving me directions to the nearest Methadone clinic...such is the neighborhood I live in.

Then she looked down at my intended purchases: A giant bottle of night-time cough syrup, a bag of menthol lozenges and an overpriced quart of orange juice. She picked up the medicine bottle and pointed to the label:

"Sir, these products no longer contain pseudoephedrine."

"Wha...I am not making homemade meth. I have the flu. "

To illustrate my point I sneezed in her direction, just barely failing to cover my mouth in time. Oops. I felt like wiping my nose on the ten-dollar bill I handed to her as payment, but I refrained from doing so, me being a polite Southern Gentleman and all.

Thursday was a day of torpor. I tried playing a computer game of Civilization IV, but I forgot to feed my citizens; they revolted and deposed me, which I took as a cue to go back to bed.
For 16 hours.

Friday was much the same, although I tried to interact with the real world a little- the results were not much better than my brief attempt at PC-simulated regency- after burning a few real-life drawbridges, I decided that another 20-hour nap was in order.

Today I merely feel terrible, which in terms relative to Thursday's malaise, is excellent.

One thing I did while I was deathly ill was to accumulate blog awards, one of which, ironically, is for Excellent blogging. Usually my blog fills me with the same sense of pride that I felt when circumstance forced me into presenting a Roach Motel from the family kitchen as my 6th grade Science Fair project.
(Hypothesis: Roaches go in but they don't come out. )
I got a B+.
I would have aced it , but one dogged cockroach escaped...in hindsight, I should have rigged the experiment by removing a few legs from each insect beforehand.

But when I saw that ??? had deemed my blog as 'Excellent', I was forced to reconsider my low self-worth. Of all my blogpals, ??? is one of those that I most admire. There are many reasons why I feel this way; one of the primary being her parenting skills.
When I was a kid, I, like her children, loved archery and fencing- one of the best things my own father ever did was 'talk' a local medieval recreation group into suspending it's (18+) age requirements and letting my brother and myself participate in their tourneys and mock wars- some of the fondest memories of my teen years revolve around archery and foam-padded swordplay; when I see pics of her kids fashioning their own bows...well, I can't help but love that.

If she thinks that my blog is excellent, then it truly is.

Thursday I got these, a two-fer from my Pal of Pals, the redoubtable Whim:

Whim became my friend at a time when many of my blogpals were deserting me,
she has since become a steadfast off-blog friend as well. I got to know her before I learned the full details of her story...I have become quite squeamish when it comes to the suffering of people that I care about, so I will not go into what happened to Whim; I will only say that she is one zillion times stronger than she might think, yet she is still only human; I will add that I love her dearly for that. If you haven't visited her site, check her sidebar for the suggested starting points in order to get the complete background.

I must say that I don't participate in many awards, memes and the like. On-line, as in reality, I am an iconoclastic loner with fingerprints on many surfaces and footprints on very few.

This may give the impression that I am aloof, indifferent and apathetic.

Pft. Whatever. I don't care.

I am, however, currently experiencing just the right combination of fever, pharmacology and weariness to allow me to achieve a state of temporary benevolence. Warm fuzzies at 102 Fahrenheit.

In other words, let me say a few kind things about a handful of fellow bloggers before the phone rings and some motherfucker ruins my day.

- Yin-Yang. She's a high school student with a brilliant, inquisitive mind and an intellectual curiosity that typical teen ephemera (such as MTV) cannot EVER hope to satisfy. She entered- and escaped- the carefully constructed emotional and psychological beartraps laid out by one Mr. Ron Luce, a feat which, sadly, many young persons cannot accomplish.

If the world is to be 'saved' -I prefer the phrase 'well-managed'- it will be by young people such as YY and the offspring of ???.
Yin was, in no small way, the inspiration for the protagonist in this short piece of fiction. I hope she doesn't choose revenge.
(The adults are modeled after mine, not hers, btw.)

-Craig. For someone who describes himself as 'doughy', Craig is made of pretty durable stuff. He recently survived a long bout of unemployment and a 50th birthday, two things that I am not sure that I can or will do. Doughy? Pft. He deserves better:


- JP. Acting under direction from then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, I was sent to infiltrate JP's blog in order to gather intelligence about the dreaded Gay Agenda. I must say that the homosexuals do a damned good job of encrypting their data- 'Britney's Panties' seems to be a sort of Rosetta Stone that I cannot decipher...my report to the AG went like this:

"Boss, I think that the gays pretty much want to drink and watch TV with their buddies. They (mostly) go to work but they don't especially like their jobs. They like warm weather and dislike rude neighbors. It also pisses them off when their cars get towed."

I was told to dig deeper, so I watched a couple re-run episodes of Queer Eye.

This, according to my QE research, is how the Gay Agenda works:
They (the Gays) pick an unsuspecting and hopelessly unfashionable straight man (such as myself) and give him an entire apartment full of cool new furniture, clothing and accessories. Then they clean him up, dress him nicely and present him to a heterosexual, unmarried woman- when she sees the 'new' man that the QE dudes have created, she invariably accepts the straight man's marriage proposal.

The Gay Agenda: Encourage Heterosexual Marriages.
Devious, eh?

(JP, please speed-dial the QE dudes forthwith- I could use their help!)

Auld Hat- I think JP helps her encrypt some of her posts, but the ones I do understand are usually brilliant. She's good at everything...it's scary, really.
Attractive too. Last week I was showing my blog to my 80-year old great-aunt and Hat's icon caught her eye.

"That one. She looks nice. Do you like her?"

*gulp*
"Ah, noooo...I don't even know her."

"Liar. You are blushing."
Busted.

Hat knows I'm a mess but she talks to me anyway and I'm always glad to see her when she does. I hope she's enjoying her trip at the moment- spittle, diapers and all.

Wow. I've left out a lot of my favorite blogs. I apologize for that, but I'm still a bit sick and I think I need another nap. Tomorrow brings an early radio show and I have a new trainee to indoctrinate in the morning.

G'day 'till next time.