This post isn't funny. This post is for reals.
I just saw this:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/22/the-passage-cardboard-signs_n_4319568.html
I think this is absolutely amazing. I really love the idea, and I think it is a real attention grabber.
This Thanksgiving I have no real plans. I didn't have the funds to go home. I don't have any close friends who are sticking around Miami and hosting a meal. It will probably be just me and Zoe Buttons hanging around the house and possibly pretending to do work. Also, I despise everything about Black Friday, and I've already completed my holiday shopping. Since that is the case, I think I can find a better way to spend my time than having my own personal Dexter marathon--now that it streams on Netties.
The question is, do I do this, then give the money to Oxfam (https://www.oxfamamericaunwrapped.com/), which is one of my favorite charities with a decent rating (http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=4288#.UpNgNuKn-Hg). OR do I find some other way to be useful this Thanksgiving? For example, I could volunteer at a kitchen or shelter of some kind, though I've heard that those kinds of places generally get overrun on T-gives, and I might be too late to sign up.
I could easily make a sign that says, "I have a home. I have a job. I'm raising money for someone who doesn't.", then provide the Oxfam website. I bet if I did this and stood near Fresh Market's entrance or near Coco Walk on Black Friday that I'd raise a decent amount of money. Whatdoyathink? Terrible plan? Mediocre plan? Get real, Erica, this might work in Portland, but you're not in Portland anymore...
Well, I hate to say "I told you so", but goddamnit, I did. I knew that too many good things were happening (see last post), and now I am very much making up for it. Making up for it with the worst case of The Sicks I've ever had, and if you know me well, you know I'm constantly sick so this is really saying something.
I have pneumonia. Not like big, bad, put-you-in-the-hospital pneumonia, but still, pneumonia--a lung infection by any other name wouldn't make me cough as much.
It all started about a week ago. Friday, my stomach didn't feel quite right, but it wasn't terrible or anything. D-boy was going to his friend's house to watch basketball, and I decided I was tired as a million counting sheep, so I was going to stay in. Friends stopped by on their way to respective outings--D to basketball, M, her sister, and J to some cultural music thing I didn't really want to go to. I did the good host thing and served them wine (while in my PJs) and gave sister and J a house tour. They left after about an hour, I then promptly fell asleep on my couch at 9pm.
Saturday, D and I literally stayed in bed all day. ALL DAY. No this isn't a "new couple sex thing", we were just kinda bored and decided to read in bed and watch TV on the Internet in bed and eat crackers in bed and do pretty much everything in bed. It was glorious... Until I decided I wanted soup for dinner. D suggested that Whole Foods has about a billion soups ready-to-eat, so we jumped in the car and left. Just getting out of bed was hard, but I assumed that my muscles were now accustomed to being horizontal, and so putting up a protest to resume their new preferred position. However, when we got to WF, my stomach started to bloat and cramp, like a lot, like I was doubled over in pain and unable to finish my corn and sweet potato bisque. D drove my car home so I could be horizontal again. Then when we got back to my place, I went immediately to bed and didn't leave for the rest of the evening, including abandoning D, as he went to a party at M's, while I fell asleep again at about 8:30pm.
The real kicker was Sunday, Sunday I woke up with a cough. Not just any cough, but a deep, nasty, thick, grumbly, crunchy cough. I thought, "hmmm, this explains everything, clearly I have some mild flu." We were scheduled to go to brunch with M and her sister, so we did, but I was a massive case of grump-a-lumps the entire time. I ate, but couldn't taste much. I said bad and judgey-wudgey things about the people around us (even more than is typical for me). Then, D and I went to a sports store to look for a bike rack, and it hit me. "I can barely even stand up", I thought. "This doesn't seem correct.", I added. So, we went back to my house, and again, I became a horizontal lump under the blankets.
That night, we decided to sleep at D's, so we did. At one point, I was begging him to turn off the AC, while in a hoodie under a comforter... It was not even a little cold in his house. He guessed it was about 76 or 78 degrees. The next morning we woke up to take his cat to a regularly scheduled vet appointment. The cat was making horrid sounds in the car the whole time, something like Mew-RWAR?!. The funny thing was, my coughing was drowning out the sad/murderous cat noise. Fortunately, there is a Walgreen's right down the shopping plaza from the vet, so I got The 'Tussin. This was a HUGE help. Now I was only coughing every 3 minutes, rather than every 30 seconds. I was still unEarthly tired, though.
Tuesday, I knew I couldn't go to school the way I was. Students had an exam, so I contacted the TAs and told them to take one for the team and lead it on their own. They did so graciously. I slept. Like ALL day. Sleep. Nonstop.
Wednesday, I had a 10am appointment, so I got up, got ready, went in, could barely take the stairs, sat at my desk until the appointment arrived--staring at my lappy--just staring, met with my appointment, and left immediately. I drove home, then slept the rest of the day.
Thursday, I went to class, taught, then had a repeat of Wednesday.
Friday, I didn't even bother pretending to do work or to go to campus. I just slept. That is, until my sister called at 2:30pm and lectured me until I decided to get my sweaty ass up off the couch and go to Urgent Care. The doctor took one look at me (well, ok, and a listen), and he ordered a chest X-ray. I protested. I asked, "What will that tell us?" He said, "It will tell us how bad it is." Me, "What do you mean?" Him, "If it is pneumonia or just almost pneumonia." Me, "Will you treat it any differently if it is pneumonia or just almost pneumonia?" Him, "Um, no." Me, "Then just give me the antibiotics, and I'll promise to rest." Jesus!!! Dude wanted to charge me $90 just to tell me if I had ACTUAL pneumonia or just probable pneumonia... Oh no you don't, Sir. I may be sick, but I'm no fool, and besides, I'm my father's daughter--i.e., cheap about shit like that!
Since then, I've been taking my MEGA-antibiotic. Seriously, it is as big as the first two sections of my pinky finger. MASSIVE. I've also been taking a Rxed cocktail of 'Tussin, 'Phendrin, and Benadryl. Think of the special brand of meth you could make with that shit! Plus, it is cotton candy flavored! So, that's probably good for my liver. I've also been drinking OJ like it is my job and struggling to stay awake for more than four hours at a go.
I'm feeling a bit better, but I still feel like the bottom of a trash bin about 6 days overdue for a dump out.
I guess the moral of this story, aside from being a way for me to get out a big ol' Internet-based WOE IS ME! is to say, "Do not tempt fate!" The next time something is going well for you, listen to nonreason and *don't talk about it*. Old timey diseases that no one actually gets as a healthy adult in a first-world country are waiting right around the corner to take you down.
I suppose the scientific, reason-based moral would be don't move somewhere tropical from somewhere with an oceanic/marine coastal climate and expect for your immune system to be like, "Oh hello there, Beautiful Weather, well aren't you just lovely." More over, this is one of the largest immigrant populations in the country, Erica, you idiot, so there are about a billion new bugs here to introduce themselves to your immune system. And for whatever reason all those bugs want to hug you or fail to move out of your way at the market when you say very clearly and loudly, "Excuse me!" so you have to brush up against them as you walk by.
