It Could Have Been Worse…No, That’s Not True.
TWO WEEKS IN TEXAS. LET ME TELL YOU. It is a lot like two weeks inside a cement mixer filled with marbles…and the odd brisket…and every microbe in the known universe.
For the entire two weeks my sinuses were in a war of attrition. There were no survivors. My head geysered more extraneous fluid than the Johnstown Flood. I predict that the stock in the company that makes Kleenex will soar like a rocket.
Two weeks in any one location can be a challenge, but spend those weeks in close illness sharing proximity with a couple dozen other people can be a true purgatory experience.
One of the scheduled events for this trip was a visit to the Cineplex 87 Screen Movie Palace to see the new Mary Poppins flick. I was able to sneeze my way out of that one, but that didn’t mean I could escape its effect.
The dozen who went to the movie found themselves in the middle of a whirlpool of intestinal plutonium. Even before the final credits rolled by the theater was turned into a vomitorium. Family and strangers alike competed for volume and distance right there in front of Mary Poppins.
They were kind enough to bring that bug home with them.
For the next four days just about everyone, me included, got steamrollered by the nastiest “Dear Lord, let me die now” stomach flu I have ever had the displeasure to spew. Even my 98 year old Mother-in-Law got ambushed.
Two weeks and I never took a healthy breath. I felt fine before arriving there and I feel fine now, but for those two weeks, I was the sorriest looking and feeling organism on Earth. Put all of my mucus aside I don’t think I got more than 3 or 4 hours of sleep in any given 24 hour period. I was kinda hoping for a short coma to carry me through. I finally got some contiguous hours of sleep on New Year’s Eve. Perfect timing – the one night when you want to stay awake I’m out cold and motionless doing my impression of Jimmy Hoffa. 2018 left and 2019 arrived and I heard about it all when I woke up mid-morning on the first day of the New Year.
Well, that pretty much sums up my Christmas Holiday. I trust that yours was better. If it wasn’t any better than mine then obviously you are dead.
We are planning a return engagement vs. Texas in late March. It won’t be a Marathon-like event like Christmas to be sure. The hope is that it will be a more sedate and low key visit as opposed to the Masque of the Red Death Free-for-All we just finished with. I can get behind that.
Boy! Can I get behind that!
After all of the chaos, sickness, and absurdity of Christmas I was really looking forward to my return to Terre Haute and my Colonoscopy. It looked to be uplifting.
Terre Haute (That’s French for, “I don’t want to see Mary Poppins.”)
Down the Hall on Your Left 
I am laughing so hard at how you write this story, that I’m forgetting to feel sorry for you. Great post, John.
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