SICKO DOs and DON’Ts

WAYNE’S WORDS
Volume 6 Number 01
SICKO DOs and DON’Ts

I actually WAS going to do a January blog MUCH sooner than this, but things happened. Mistakes were made. Speaking of mistakes, I JUST realized that I misspelled the word frak in my last blog. I had a C shoved in front of the K. It only has the K.

Anyway, I was going to write this edition on Friday the 13^th, which is normally my lucky day. As fate would have it, I awakened that morning to a badly misaligned spine! And you thought I didn’t have a spine. I spent most of that Friday, Saturday and Sunday flat on my back in the living room floor.

On Sunday (January 14), I did take time to go and TRY to play basketball against the Harlem Ambassadors to raise money for Big Brothers Big Sisters, but after taking a couple warm up shots I realized that my back injury would preclude me from participating. So, I became Assistant Coach.

The following morning (Monday) my back was still pretty bad, but getting better. However, just as that problem was clearing up… I ran into the next one.

There is still some debate as to who was actually Patient Zero at my office. To me, however, it matters not. Whomever it was still succeeded in giving me the first cold I have had in nearly FOUR years! Really! I have not had a cold or flu in forever and this one knock me right on my frakked up back! I suffered for almost 7 full days.

During that week I realized, because it had been so many years since I had been sick, that I had forgotten many of the things you should and shouldn’t do while you are sick.

• DON’T go to work if you are the first one sick – Patient Zero!
• DO go to work, if you have to, when several other people are already there sick. What are you going to hurt at this point? Patient Zero has already infected everybody!
• DON’T cough, sneeze or ooze on other people while you are at work. Gross!
• DO go home as soon as you can. Regardless of how many people are already sick at the office, no one wants to see, hear or be around you while you are coughing, sneezing and oozing!
• DON’T try to do stuff at home. You’re sick! Get in bed! The dishes, laundry, litter boxes, vacuuming, etc. will still be there when you get better. Just get better.
• DO get in bed. OK, it doesn't have to be bed, the couch is fine.
• DON’T forget to load your end table with plenty of tissues, meds, liquids, remote controls, cell phone and other necessary items BEFORE you lay down. You will NOT want to get up once you get snuggled up in the blankets.
• DO remember a wastebasket for the 10,000 snotty Kleenex wads you create. I forgot this part and did NOT feel like getting up. The snotty tissue pile was quite the sight to behold!
• DON’T watch Fast Times at Ridgemont High on regular TV while you lay there sick. It will sicken you even more realizing how bad a job the censor-editors did in overdubbing the curse words. It will also worsen your ills when you realize that, since it was censor-edited long ago, much of what was overdubbed is said on network TV now. At this point you will feel sick and old! Ugh!
• DO watch The Stand, The Walking Dead (TV series), The Andromeda Strain, Outbreak, 12 Monkeys, Contagion or any other movie about a plague or flu or disease. Tis kind of fun and, since there are so many sickies on the screen, you won’t feel so alone in your misery.
• DON’T answer your door unless absolutely necessary.
• DO keep a baseball cap and a robe handy in case you HAVE to answer the door or see someone. This is another one that I forgot. I answered the door after having been in a sweaty, snotty slumber. After shooing away whoever it was, I stopped in at the bathroom. What I saw in the mirror was a pale, snotty, nearly dead looking version of Randy (Nicolas Cage) from Valley Girl. As bad as his hair was in that movie I bested it by 100 fold!
• DON’T try to cook anything. Standing at the stove, stirring mac & cheese while doped up on Nyquil is just not smart. At best, you might wake up on the cold tile floor with the dog licking powdered cheese sauce off of your face while the cats are gnawing at your toes.
• DO let people drop food off for you! Thanks Hillbilly Mom!
• DON’T let anyone stay and “take care” of you. Face it: we are ALL babies when we are sick. No sense letting people experience your snotty childish ways. Just stay there all snuggled in your blankets. You’re safe. There is nothing anyone can do in the confines of your house anyway except watch you ooze snot and contract whatever bug you have.
• DO be nice to folk. If they offer to take care of you, be gracious – they care. What they CAN do is pick up something from the pharmacy or movie rental store for you. That is a big help to you and satisfies their desire to help you, but only if they offer and only if you actually need something. Do not fake it.
• DON’T drive while on cold medication. Contrary to how they look, airbags do not make good pillows.
• DO play driving games on your Xbox while on cold medication. It will prove to you why you shouldn’t try it in real life. Plus, tis big fun without getting hurt.
• DON’T get up from your sick nest too soon. Relapse is ugly, because you feel great and then you’re sick again later that day! You pushed it!
• DO take it slow. The best thing is to get better and THEN move on. You may want to and feel like you can go to dinner or a movie or whatever, but you can’t. Get better first.

I feel better. What an ugly way to start the year though.

Until Next Time,
Wayne