Not that that’s news to any of you, I’m sure. But it has rather occupied me for the last few days.
I’m not sure what I’ve had, or even that I should even be using the past tense at this stage. I’ve certainly felt better day-to-day for the last 2 days, but as any financial advisor will tell you: past performance is no guarantee of future results.
Symptoms have included coughing, a headache, depleted energy, sneezing, bunged-upness and fever. Well I say fever, because I felt very cold and was sweating a lot, but I didn’t actually measure my temperature: I don’t own a thermometer and lacked the energy to get down to the shop and back.
I’ve been trying, for no particular reason, to rank the days in order of crapness. The difficulty is that they’ve been crap in different ways.
Thursday was bad because I knew all day that I was getting worse and worse; I noticed my ability to think coherently tailing off, and I knew I’d be broken for a good few days.
Friday was bad because I woke up feeling lousyish, had a couple of hours of OK around lunchtime, then got worse again. Then I couldn’t sleep because every time I did anything other than sit bolt-upright I’d get a fit of painful coughs and have to straighten up again. In the end I wound up sleeping sitting on my sofa for at most 2 hours a time – after that I’d fall over then cough myself awake. When I get a house I’ll buy a tall old wingback armchair just to be ill in.
Saturday was definitely the worst; lovely weather outside, and the greatest distance I managed up to 5pm was the 5 or so metres to the bathroom. At 5 I thought I’d better force myself to go outside, so I ordered a pickup from the Indian takeaway down the road. Bad plan as it turned out – the best I could manage in mobility was a kind of old-man shuffle. When I got back I was seriously knackered. This was also the day I noticed I was grey, as grey as monochrome footage of John Major. I must have noticed that before I ordered the curry because I got a spinachy one to boost my iron content in case that was a problem.
Sunday was bad; appalling weather, feeling a little better but now feeling the effect of 3 near-sleepless nights. Hauled myself to the co-op and back through some fairly torrential rain as I’d run out of food. Still grey, so bought spinach/ricotta cannelloni. Managed to stay awake for Top Gear: was surprised to find myself liking James Blunt; and unsurprised to find myself awed by Lewis Hamilton. Determined to find some way to sleep normally: will spare you the unpleasant details of how.
Monday was bad, because I woke up still feverish, realised I hadn’t seen anyone I like or even know for 4 straight days. Log into work even though I’m not sure I’m up to it, because I needed to do something. Fixed a minor bug introduced in the fix to the major bug I introduced in the last couple of pre-whatever-this-is working I checked-in on Thursday.
Anyway, hopefully I can have a fever-free night tonight…
