Phlegm Night

Not happy. The first of my 6 long weekends and I'm sitting here cold, sweaty, wheezy and having missed a mixture of new and enjoyable experiences. I haven't actually been 'ill' for ages, so Thursday evening when I started to feel really dodgy, I took the precautionary decision not to go for a beer; figuring that if I could head it off at the pass, my Friday and Saturday wouldn't be ruined. Unfortunately, my Friday dawned even worse - headache, sweaty shivers and a chest that felt as though someone had been dancing on a rake in it. The tell-tale signs were there and I called the doctor straight away and got a 6.30 emergency appointment.

The day time of Friday was spent curled up on the sofa watching episodes of the live action Tick from the early part of this century. After the initial episode, which I found very entertaining, I struggled to laugh at any of the subsequent episodes and only Nestor Carbonell (the immortal one from Lost) as the very funny Bat Manuel raised it above dull and repetitive. I understand now why it was cancelled after a half dozen episodes. I traded pints of Kingston Topaz for that...

The doctor confirmed my suspicions - I had a chest infection and he prescribed 500mg doses of ampicillin or some such antibiotic and I figured I'd start to feel human again by the evening.

Saturday started very early. I went to bed on Friday night, which is a rare thing as it's normally Saturday morning when I go to bed (between 1 and 2 as a rule), but by the time I normally hit the sack, I was awake. The lying down was tickling my throat, which in turn was aggravating my chest and triggering coughs, sneezes and snotty interludes. Not only did I have a chest infection, I seemed to have had a cold sneak up and infiltrate my defences without my knowledge. After keeping the wife awake for ages, I opted to go back downstairs, wrap myself up in spare quilts and watch some wee hours TV until my eyelids became heavy and sleep would again overtake me. That was about 4.20am.

I was supposed to go to my first ever live Rugby Union match on Saturday. A good friend and colleague had purloined two tickets for the Saints versus Saracens match - a very important game in the Aviva Premiership as the latter had sneaked into 2nd place and pushed the Saints into 3rd - probably the lowest place they've been all season. I'd been hassling my mate for about two years to go to a rugby match and now was my big chance and the god of mischief (and bad health) decided to fuck me over. It sounded like a great match by all accounts, unfortunately the Saints got stuffed - but they did have at least four of their stars missing...

The wife did the shopping as I sat and watched old Ren and Stimpy cartoons, and flipped between Sky Sports News and the BBC keeping up to date with everything going on. Which brings us to now, the evening and I've just woken up after a little nap and while the wife sorts out some food for herself (and a bowl of soup for me) I'm sitting up here catching up on an entire day missed. Did I mention I still had a headache too? It's been a really lovely day; I could see that by looking out of the window and noticing that people were not wearing Arctic gear. The wife said she had her coat undone while walking the dogs - a lot less eventful dog walk than it had been for her the day before, when one of them got lost and she didn't have me to help in the search. All ended well thanks to a rather butch girl, by all accounts, who found the miscreant dog and held her until the wife could get back with a lead and some stern words.

With the football all going right and my need to go and sit down, I shall return to the lounge to try some of the suggested cures for my ails left by friends on my Facebook page...