My weekend with Pneumonia

Well happy Easter to me. I have pneumonia. Today was better than yesterday though, only because I was in the ER all day yesterday with a deliriously high fever. It's amazing how this illness crept up on me and smacked me down. Friday, I didn't notice anything too unusual... scratchy throat, a little extra mucous. I thought it was my typical New York allergies that have been working my last nerve since I moved here. I took some sinus medication, and the scratchy throat went away.

Later that evening, I felt strange. Didn't know why so I called telephone psychic Lorraine (remember she is the one who recommended I contact Rosie and remember she hasn't been charging me for her advice). She asked me if I'd been drinking. I said no, because I hadn't. She firmly asked again. I firmly replied with a no. Then she asked me if I had been doing drugs. I said no. She said, "Well, I'm getting the image of either drugs or alcohol." I explained that I took over-the-counter sinus medication. She said, "THAT'S IT!" She asked what I took and I told her (Mucinex D). She sternly said to me with a drug-intervention tone, "Those medications can have serious side effects. I hope you know what you're doing. What are you doing taking this pills? Have you seen a doctor about it?" I calmly replied that I've been having sinus problems and my doctor back in San Francisco recommended the medication to me, and it worked for me back in the day, so I'm using it again.

So she really didn't answer the question to my satisfaction: "Why do I feel strange?" So I asked again. She said I need to stop asking the question with that word "strange" because I am inviting in the negative. I said, "No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are," she retorted. So I pulled out my diplomacy skills and said, "Ok, I don't see that word as negative-"

"It IS!" she interrupted me.

"Okay, I will pick a different word. Foreign. Why does the energy around me feel-"

"That's just as bad," she interrupted me again.

"Different?"

"You are welcoming negative things to happen by using that type of language."

"But these words are not negative to me. I see them as neutral."

"Well, you need to be more careful."

So again, she managed to not answer my question for a second time.

About an hour later, I felt a bit feverish so I checked my temperature and it was around 99.3. I wasn't worried. I popped two Advil in my mouth and swallowed them down. I figured I could make it until Monday to see a doctor. Boy was I WRONG!!!

Early the next morning, I had to get up and use the restroom. I felt extremely feverish and my body ached. I used the restroom, came back to my room and tested my temp again. The digital thermometer started at the typical 97 degrees and kept going up steadily. When it got to 102, I thought it would stop any moment, but it kept going. When it got to 103.5, I decided the thing must be broken so I took the thing out of my mouth, popped in half a vicodin (couldn't find any more fever meds and vicodin has acetaminophin in it... or however it's spelled), and went back to bed. The next day I went to the ER and got my diagnosis.

Today was better though. After I pumped myself full of meds, I went to the living room with my big down comforter to watch some TV. I started watching a show that I thought looked interesting from the previews. "Little People, Big World." Or something like that. It's a reality show that follows a family of little people. Well, at least the two parents are and so is one of the kids (they have four kids in all). So I started watching it, and I decided it was an awful show. Those people were so boring... seriously. In the guide menu on the TV where it summarizes every show, this show was about "Amy (she's the mom) has a hard time adjusting to being pampered." PUH-LEEZE! She went to the "spa" (as she called it) with her daughter and they got manicures and pedicures. That was it. The dad is a loser. Everytime his family does something fun together, and he can't participate (he is crippled and walks on crutches), he just says, "I'm just going to sit this one out and let them have fun." You could tell he was sad, but he never would acknowledge how his handicap affects his familial relations. That's so much more interesting to me than putting up a front. So that show pissed me off. I quickly changed the channel.

Now, MTV was having back-to-back episodes of America's Next Top Model, and you can never watch just one. Episode after episode went by as I became more and more engrossed. I was so excited by this one girl who had amazing photos and an amazing personality. To me, she was the total package. But to my surprise, they let her go, and decided to keep the mediocre one. Yeah! They even acknowledge she was mediocre. They got rid of the other one because her personality was too firey, too strong, too in-your-face. This just goes to show you that mediocre people always win because those of us who are true to ourselves and shining bright threaten other people's comfort zones. So anyway, despite my disgust, I kept watching. Halfway into the second to last episode, some TIVO recording reminder pops up, and I assumed one of my roomies wanted to record something so I clicked "accept". It quickly changed the channel, and wouldn't let me switch back unless I canceled the recording. Moral dilemma. Cancel the recording and find out who America's Next Top Model is or begrudgingly allow the TIVO to continue recording Masterpiece Theatre's The Wind in the Willows? I chose the latter. That sucked. Now I will never know who won. I just know that it should have been that girl they kicked off a few episodes back.