Saturday, February 19, 2011

At least We Have Our Health

The weather around these parts will be more like February this weekend than the late March days we had earlier in the week. Not that I had a lot from them as weeks after nursing a stuffy nose and post nasal drip I woke up Thursday morning with bronchitis.

Usually the first thing I do when this happens, and it seems to happen every winter, is start patrolling the hallways where I work attempting to plant a big smooch on the lips of all the folks I'm less than happy with (= everyone; but you knew that, right?).

This time around I was disappointed with how quickly people closed their office doors and no amount of blandishment or enticement could get them to poke their heads out. What's the point of having a virulent strain of pork-chop fever or brocolliitis if you can't share it?

Defeated, but unbowed, I actually took sick time to see my primary care physician (if I hadn't my wife threatened me with bodily harm). I have enough things medically wrong with me that I should have my own health insurance company, but one of the nicest things about the insurance I have is that my doctor is in their network.

Some thumping on my back and listening to me breathe with a stethoscope helped him arrive at his diagnosis. That and the fact that every time I coughed, it sounded like I was bringing up not only a lung but also a piece of my spleen and a small pony complete with a saddle.

I'm better today than I was yesterday though I think/hope I'm still 'hot' (or at least warm) because there's a meeting I'm hoping to attend this morning that might be improved through contagion, though I suspect the folks there will feel differently. Unless and until I tell them about Rebecca Wells in Downey (home of The Carpenters), California, who died at her desk in her cubicle and no one noticed until the following day. I'll leave you to do the math on what this may say about us as a people and a culture. I'm still a little too full of antibiotics to think straight-an excuse I intend to use until the late summer.
-bill kenny

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