I know that a lot of you out there are suffering from A Dearth of Bricks (see how I worked that in?) but I can assure you that it's for a good reason: I've had to spend the last few days preparing to watch The Amazing Race. I had to bone up on, well this is all a lie. Actually, I've been deathly ill. So ill that I have yet to make it to the doctor. I think I might die. Okay, well no, I probably won't die. Yet. But I do think I have mono (that's infectious mononucleosis brought on by an infection of the Epstein-Barr virus if you must know). I've had it before, much much worse, so I can recognize the symptoms: a killer sore throat and an all-encompassing feeling of apathy. Wait, no. Those are the symptoms of my job. Mono is more of a killer sore throat and an all-encompassing sense of exhaustedness, like you've been fasting for three days.
So, this bout with this stupid disease (I've heard that once you've had it, you'll be more prone to get it again. Yipee skippy.) has me thinking about the last time, and man was it funny. Let me tell you (long and mostly boring story to follow).
Back when the world was a more innocent place, back in the verdant spring of 1998, I was a senior in high school fast approaching that huge life change of graduation and moving on to the next stage in my life, umm, more school. I was flying high. Captain of the Coolest Apple Bowl Team Ever, beautiful girlfriend, 1st team All-State small forward. I had it all going on. I was even going to be on the varsity tennis team! But then I got sick with mono. I still don't know how I got it.
Being sick sucked. First of all, I almost died. I think at one point my fever was like, 105 or something. My proteins almost started (insert word here that means "coming apart like they do in egg whites when you cook them"). The future brickwife was pretty freaked out, but I was all "Oh, it's no big deal, just a fever." Little did I know that my spleen could almost have ruptured. Seroiusly. I truly could have died and I really probably should have gone to the hospital.
But speaking of the future brickwife, she got in trouble because of me being sick. She was skipping class to come to my house to take care of me. She saw me at my absolute worst, so I knew she was a keeper. I can't remember exactly why she got in trouble, or maybe it was me. But anyway, she wasn't allowed to come over for some period of time or something. It was kind of dumb I thought at the time. Actually, I still think it was kind of dumb, but what do I know.
So anyway, I was sick for two weeks. Well, really sick for two weeks, sick partially for about a month. But this is just where the story gets good. The most important thing to do when you have mono is rest (yes, writing disjointed stories on the internet counts as resting, so there), so what was the first thing I did after going back to school? That's right! I went on a 9-day-long interstate trip to Arches NP, Canyonlands NP, and Chaco Canyon, with a brief, rainy stop at Zion NP! Side note about school: I missed two weeks in March of my senior year with IB tests fast approaching and all sorts of other stuff, but I had more work to make up in my intro to photography class than in any of my "real" classes. THe trip was organized by my Theory of Knowledge (yes, it's a dumb as it sounds) teacher and terrible driver extrodinaire and general all-around weird guy, Mr. Capp. Who went on the trip, you might ask? A bunch of IB dorks, two break dancers and a few art students. It was pretty fun.
I kind of forgot where I was going with this story and why I thought it might be interesting. Hmmmm.....Oh yeah! So, after sleeping in the snow and hiking as far as I could (i.e. not very far at all) in Utah, we reached Chaco Canyon. It is like a magnet for freaks. On our first night there we met some annoying flute playing dude who told us all about his mystical experiences at the ruins. I almost said "Don't be so stupid, you stupid stupidhead," but I didn't. I hate it when people think that just because something is old and we don't know much about it, it must be spiritual! That's just, well, stupid. Like all the people that think the Great Kiva at Chaco Canyon was the center of the Anasazi's spiritual world. Couldn't it have just as easily been a sports arena? ANyway, back to the interesting part. The water at Chaco Canyon was non-potable. Being the straight-A student that I was, I used my large vocabulary to conclude that this meant "undrinkable." However, I assumed that brushing my teeth did not count as drinking. Now THAT was stupid. My already compromised immune system couldn't fight off the non-potable bacteria, so I spent about two days drinking blue Powerade and then promptly throwing it back up into an empty coffee can. I think it would have been cheaper if I had just re-used the stuff. I wasn't eating anything, so basically what came up was just blue Powerade with a little stomach acid mixed in. How bad could that have been, right? And the whole time the future brickwife is taking care of me like she really loves me or something. She's pretty great. Well, let's not let this devolve into a paean to her, nobody wants to read that mushy stuff.
Oh yeah, and this other time on the trip some people in the van were talking about pranks like filling all the keyholes at school with caulking and then the German foreign exchange student is all "what is a tube of cockhead?" And we were all "What?!?!" and everybody was laughing. Man, that was funny. But speaking of pranks, one of my friends back then, a certain Steve, pulled a good one: letting about 500 crickets go in the school library. Brilliant!
I think that some other cool things happened on the trip, but I really can't think of any. I took a lot of pictures and saw some cool ruins and got to take a shower at a truck stop, but other than that, well.
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9 comments:
I assume you now know the full and complete meaning of "nonpotable" ... as in don't go near the stuff if you want to keep your innards in.
Nice to have you back ... how long are you couch bound?
Ha ha ha. Yes I do. Kind of an idiotic way to learn a very simple lesson.
And I'm not couch bound. I'm at work right now. Chair bound is more like it. I'm not totally out of it, but my days are tending toward the short side so I can go home and sleep.
And look how far you've come! Your Theory of Knowledge cohorts must be so proud.
Hee.
Weird. I've always heard that with mono, like chicken pox, once you've had it, you won't get it again. And yet, I know multiple people who (claim to) have had it twice. In fact, I know one gal -- Matt's good friend's wife -- who thought she was having mono again, but it turns out she has Hepatitis A. (you see, she went to the doc, and that's what they figured out.)
Get thee to a doctory, my friend.
And what would be the point of going to the doctor, may I ask?
Scenario 1: I go to the doctor. He/She says, "Yep, you have mono. There's nothing we can do, just make sure to rest and drink lots of fluids."
Scenario 2: I go to the doctor. He/She says, "Yep, you have hepatitis A. There's nothing we can do, just make sure to rest and drink lots of fluids."
All that changed is that I'm out 15 bucks for the co-pay. Actually, I've given up going to the doctor for Lent. So there.
I've heard this is what happens when you don't get enough beer in your diet.
I guess I'm a fan of knowing which untreatable disease I have. Is that a chick vs. guy thing?
The fifteen-dollar co-pay is nothing to the colossal hassle -- time off, energy expended, waiting room germ exposure braved -- of just going to the doc.
And yet. You should do it anyway.
I had mono in high school. I got it from the valedictorian by chewing on her pen. Besides the lesbian jokes, it was said that she gave it to me deliberately because we were #1 and #2 in class rank all the way from freshman year up to the end (I was always #2). It was joked that she was trying to eliminate her competition. I was out for 4 weeks from school. My doctor said that if I didn't recover soon I'd have chronic fatigue. I remember trying to study algebra or something as soon as I returned to school and feeling like an LD student because my brain was in slow motion. To this day whenever I get seriously overtired, my spleen hurts.
Does mono permenantly damage your spleen? Anybody know?
Oh my gosh, Becky!
I had mono, too, but apparently a mild case, since I wasn't bedridden. Just REEEAAALLY tired for the first term I was in Wales. Not a good time to be sick. They called in "glandular fever," so I didn't even know that I'd had mono. And, likewise, I still have no clue how I got it. I don't recall doing any pen-chewing, and I know I wasn't doing any kissing.
Isn't it weird how many people have certain comparatively mild illnesses (I don't know that it's ever fatal, I mean), and yet none of us know much about it? It's not one of those things that people deem important to educate us on, I guess.
Actually, Kate, mono can be fatal. In fact, someone in Yakima died of mono shortly after I had it, which scared the crap out of me because up to that point I hadn't really believed Maggie that it was actually serious and I should have gone to the hospital.
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