The Single Man’s Guide to being sick—they still shoot horses, don’t they?

 

I can remember a couple years back when Deb (one of my former coworkers) was at her wit’s end.  She had just gotten off the phone with her husband, who was at home in bed, sick with the flu.   Apparently he wasn’t too happy that she had chosen to go to work while he lay there suffering, and wanted to prepare her for the likelihood of coming home and finding his corpse in their bed. 

Some other women quickly chimed in, sharing some of THEIR past experiences with ill boyfriends or husbands, and the consensus was that us guys were absolute wusses the minute we got the sniffles, and would probably be better off if we were just put out of our misery instead. 

(I protested, but being one of only two guys in our group, all I got was a couple blank stares before they continued their death-wish on all sick men.) 

I’m reminded of that now, because for the last few days I’ve been home sick with the flu.  It actually started Christmas Day; I was at my sister Shawn’s house for the holidays and the four of us—Shawn, her husband Jim, my niece Sophia & myself were gathered at the dining room table playing “Wheel of Fortune” while I kept attempting to “swallow away” a sore throat.  At first I just chalked it up to the drier air there (my apartment is muggy year ‘round) or from all the late night Christmas Eve jabber (I was doing most of the jabbering).  But after my eyeballs got hot, my spidey sense began tingling and I announced that I was coming down with something, so I’d best head home.  (It didn’t really hit me for another day or so, but by Tuesday night I was knocking at Death’s door.)

I admit I was unprepared for what was coming—but other than Wednesday night (when my fever broke and soaked my bed, I woke up shaking so hard my teeth were rattling & I may have whimpered for my mom, I dunno) I think I’ve “manned up” just fine.  Here’s some examples:

No medicine:   It’s been a long time since I’ve gotten a bug, and I know this because the Tylenol ‘Cold & Flu Gelcaps’ in my medicine cabinet have BEST IF USED BY MAR 2006 on the box.  (I had an expired bottle of cherry flavored Cepacol Sore Throat Spray in there too, but I tried some and it tasted like old pennies.)   So what!  That stuff isn’t fixing anything anyway, all it does is mask the symptoms for a couple hours—as for my sore throat, I gargled with Listerine-Mint & let a little trickle down my gullet; it did the job just fine!

No cold juice or hot soup:  Okay, some juice would’ve been nice but I DID have a couple Popsicles in the freezer left over from this summer—and while there’s no soup in my cupboards, I did find a couple packets of chicken gravy mix.  Add some hot water & grab a spoon!

No Kleenex:  This one’s a no-brainer, who needs a fancy box of Kleenex when you have 4 ROLLS of the stuff right under your bathroom sink?  Okay it’s Scott toilet tissue and got a little rough on my nose, but anything better & I would’ve felt spoiled.  Hmph!

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And finally, who needs someone hovering over you when you have TV to keep you company?  This morning I watched “A History of the Space Suit” on the Science Channel and was surprised to learn that when NASA put out the call for someone to design a moonsuit, who beat out the giants like Goodrich & the military?  The good folks at Playtex, who designed bras & rubber undergarments for women!

Kinda makes me wish I had one of these a week or so ago... then maybe I wouldn’t be sitting at home alone with the flu