Luuuuurrrgh
Posted on January 10, 2018 Posted by John Scalzi 64 Comments
One of those days where my brain is aggressively stuck in neutral, probably brought on by bad sleep, early errands, more bad sleep and possibly on the road to becoming ill. Add it all up: No deep thoughts today, kids, sorry.
How are you? Are you one of the 90% or so of all humans who has been ill recently (including my kid and my wife)? Or have you managed to avoid that viral bullet?
Ill. Nasty stomach bug right after Christmas, followed by a cold and a pretty tenacious sinus infection. Yecch!
So far so good for me regarding the current flu virus hitting so many. But then I got the mother of all viruses when I developed shingles at World Con. Six months in and I’m still feeling it. Healing thoughts heading to your kid and wife, no virus is fun.
Would love to have the excuse of viral whatevers for the “brain stuck in neutral” thing. I don’t even think it’s Mercury Retrograde. And I’m not close enough to Vegas for the CES power outage to be blame-able.
But I TOTALLY get it, John.
And empathize.
Hope inspiration and energy return soon!
Just getting over our annual colds. I’m not quite 100% yet, but I’m getting there. So’s the better half. The cats, on the other hand, are as rambunctious as ever.
I had a cold for a couple days 2 weekends ago. But feeling fine right now, just got my courses straightened and paid.
Kind of a down day for me, exacerbated by poor sleep last night. Too, I’m anguishing over a story about disabled people (visible, invisible, and alien), fretting over whether it’s done or not.
As for the bug, wife and I have already taken that ride. Everyone’s different, but here in ‘Zoniland, it seems like the hacking coughin’ that made us pine for the coffin. (Yakkety-yak.)
Hope you and yours weather the storm quickly, and get well soon!!!
I think I am finally getting back to human. Been sick on and off since Christmas, with flu and/or cold, or both. I feel your pain. Let’s hope we all get back to whatever passes for normal around here soon.
Also stuck in neutral. Not ill. Just uninspired.
Sorry to hear that and get well soon. I’m going to hope my luck holds up after having said this, but luckily I’ve dodged anything serious this season. Anyway, seems like the older I get the harder it gets to differentiate between whether I’m coming down with something or it’s just “I guess this new ache is the new normal…” Entropy is a bitch, as someone once said.
So far so good. Been dodging bullets for a while now.
Got something after a visit to Baton Rouge, LA, to see our niece and her partner graduate from LSU. Then got something similar about a day after New Year’s. Or maybe it was the same thing coming back. Not totally debilitating, just upper respiratory crud and a reduction in energy. Never bad enough to skip work but each time took a week to get over.
Early flu shot seems to have saved me. [Knock on virtual wood: a beautiful, golden, birds-eye maple, lovingly rubbed with multiple coats of linseed oil to a perfect sateen.] Hope you get well soon.
I work with children and I’m going to Arisia this weekend, so getting sick is really only a matter of time, but as *yet* I’m not, and as long as I stay that way until Arisia’s over I’m good.
It’s been two weeks of ick but I think the flu shot kept it from being worse. I’m at Arisia this weekend so I hope not to pick up anything else and to no longer be infectious.
Nothing viral, but it’s peak allergy time here, which means basic functionality requires heavy medication and possibly multiple naps.
I did not catch the Influenza (having gotten my shot and knocking on wood just in case) but I did get a nasty cold and am still periodically trying to eject dead viral load and white blood cells from my lungs.
Ladylike? Who? Where?
Brain is a foggy mess with vision below 20 feet. Could be my father’s death last week left some craters. The smoke hasn’t stopped yet. Cough occasionally blood, especially in the morning. Got to get my mom through this somehow. Fuck the flu.That’s just a bonus on top of it.
Despite a flu shot in August, I came down with H1N1 (according to the fast viral test), which has been doing its usual evil pneumonic work. I’ve been sick for about a month. Still coughing and not up to snuff, damnit. :(
I can only console myself with the thought that if I’d not had the shot at all, I’d ‘ve had *no* immunity instead of merely partial immunity, which would’ve put me in hospital for a week. :( :(
But fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck, this sucks. I’ve had better Decembers, too. :( :( :(
Not sick, but largely confined to my house, car and office while I wait for back surgery (blown out disc pressing on the nerves, so it hurts to walk for any distance) in February. So I work on year-end tax stuff for my business, then I come home and try to get inspired to do anything. And usually fail. Bleh.
Avoided so far. Getting the shot tomorrow to totally avoid the flu, I hope. Since we’re starting school on Tuesday, it’s time.
I’ve been a bit sniffly for a few weeks, but it hasn’t surfaced as anything more. But I’m a bit of a shut-in these days, so I haven’t had much contact with, you know, people for a while.
Finally over the flu and starting antibiotics for either bronchitis or pneumonia. Not sure which, but the treatment is the same, so the Doc decided to save money by not doing X-Rays.
Yay 2018!
Good to go – so far. But then I have an immune system that acts like a Lernaean Hydra – if I get plenty of sleep, eat well, stay hydrated, and take immune-system reinforcing minerals, like zinc.
Zinc is essential. The split second I feel an illness coming on, I pop zinc. Could be a placebo effect, but I notice improvement within 15 – 20 minutes after ingestion.
And flu shots, I get one every September.
I am sorry that you’re having a “Luuuuurrrgh” sort of day, and I hope you can successfully ward off the viruses despite generous family members wanting to share them with you.
I have thus far managed to dodge any serious maladies this winter, though considering that half my colleagues are hacking up their lungs while the rest are fighting norovirus, I have zero expectation that I’ll get through the season without something clobbering me. I’d love to be pleasantly surprised, mind you, just don’t expect it.
Drink plenty of fluids and sleep as much as you can. Oh, and if you are developing upper respiratory symptoms, I’ll pass along my sister’s favorite remedy of steam. She boils a pot of water, drapes a towel over her head and inhales the steam through her nose for several minutes three or four times during the first twelve hours of cold symptoms, and she absolutely swears that either drastically reduces the symptoms or heads off the cold entirely. I have no personal anecdata to offer, just passing on her recommendation for whatever it is worth.
Its an alien plot! The retro virus will cause you to loose brain function. Alien zombies are rising.
Oh wait I just got a cold. One week of feeling lethargic followed by endlessly draining sinus cavities.
This sure has been a buggy season and I’m glad so far to have not gotten the flu too.
I recommend you consume two Big Macs, two Filet-O-Fish, and a chocolate malted. Afterwards it will be imposible to shut you up.
It hit here, my husband, one daughter, and me. The other daughter had her boyfriend visiting from out of town. They emerged unscathed. Probably all the time they spent away from us.
I had two sinus infections in a row and now I believe my husband has the flu. :(
The continual procession of grey and dreary overcast days which seem to all blend together have really hit my mental state hard. I have managed to avoid the flu though.
My second in command has come down with the crud, although I’m praying it’s not the multiple week long flu that has been going around. It’s tough because we are no longer permitted to ask for substitutes unless the projected duration someone will be out is longer than two weeks; plenty of things can go pear shaped in far less time, and it’s the old ‘How long is a piece of string?’ By the time you know they will be out for that long, you’ve already been shorthanded for 2 weeks.
Besides headaches I’ve been ok. I take a lot of vitamins and wash my hands a lot.
Definitely one of the 90%. I hope that your immune system knocks yours out before it can get a good foothold.
Just fine, ever since we got to Florida and out of the horrible weather we had in New York from Christmas on.
Try it, you’ll like it.
*sympathy*
TL:DR yeah.
Lurgy here, of the it’s-not-flu-but-causing-a-chronic-bronchitis-and-sinus-infection-flareup kind; don’t ask how long I’ve been fighting it (ME + fibro + COPD = things sticking around for too damned long). (lots of fluids; my own ginger syrup + soda; things from the doctor for the sinus infection; inhaler change from the doctor; generally just flattened. It’ll end, eventually.)
Other than medical appointments, one set of beginning-of-month errands (including the essential cat litter acquisition), and library trips to return things that have no renewals (so someone else probably has them on hold, which triggers my “I grok the waiting-too-long-already-for-this-book” thing, so I can’t deprive anyone else in that situation), I haven’t had to go anywhere. Need to be in decent shape next Wednesday, for Cosi fan tutti over on the Seattle side.
bleargh.
Fine. Just fine, here. Getting over the cold I developed just before the new year, but still expelling … stuff. I no longer frighten the cats, so there is that.
So far I’m good. I have not even gotten a cold this winter. I work in a nursing home and usually catch whatever the residents get so it is only a matter of time.
I have had a bad shoulder ( don’t know what I did to it) that has been bothering me. It was starting to feel better and then we got hit with all that snow so shoveling out my car didn’t help.
Hope you and your family are better soon. Lots of fluids and rest.
Checking in from the PNW branch of Head Cold Central, yo.
At my day job at least two other team members have been sick this week, and I started showing symptoms on the way home last night. Sneezing and watery eyes. I’ve had a flu shot this season so I’m _pretty_ sure this is only a head cold.
it is, nevertheless, _deeply annoying_.
yes. Ugh.
Hope you feel better soon
My family (except the cats) had an 18-hour stomach bug earlier this year, but I ducked it. Felt tired and sludgy yesterday because I stayed up too late shooting Nazis and their robots; writing input for a performance review cured that…ok, maybe not, but sleeping helped some.
Sleep is not additive; when my wife worked late evenings/early mornings and had to get up early, getting a nap didn’t help – she was always sleep-deprived. That probably isn’t helping you any. Hope you feel better.
Bad, phlegmy cough, then about two quarts down from the sinuses and out the nostrils; managed to keep the eustachian tubes clear this time so no secondary bacterial infection; no fever, therefore more likely cold, less likely flu. Still up in the air whether it’s going to kill my father. Not a happy time.
I have avoided the flu so far- thanks, flu shot- but did hit the hospitalization over Christmas jackpot with cellulitis.
Not sick. But I’m on the edge of something, because between work and family things I’m averaging about three hours of sleep a night the last couple of weeks. Last night was two hours, and I’m feeling it.
Been dragging around a cold of some sort since before Xmas, now entering that stage where it feels like I have always been low level ill and any memories to the contrary are an illusion.
No flu (got my shot this season) but the cold has morphed into a sinus infection…have reached the stage of being sick of being sick.
My wife, a children’s librarian whose immune system can usually withstand rampaging barbarian hordes and meteor strikes, had one bug that knocked her over last month for four full days, and has now been fighting another one for the last couple of weeks. Meanwhile, I’ve had nothing worse than a bit of sniffles.
I know it’s gonna get me, I just don’t know when. Probably the day we start our next vacation. I just hope it leaves her alone soon. She’s been miserable.
I started getting sick on Christmas Eve and spent Christmas and the next four days down and out. Now I am just hoping to kick the lingering cough. Hope you’re not getting sick.
I think I finally managed to kick the cold that had a halfhearted hold on me, but on the other hand my brain has felt distinctly weird for the past few days and I have been incredibly dizzy off and on. Here’s hoping this isn’t leading up to a seizure (it’s been more than 4 months! I can drive again in less than two!). :/
Missed the flu but got some impressively tenacious cold that attacked my throat and then decided to bunker down and wage a slow war against my immune system with siege engines full of mucus. I feel like I’ve coughed out things that make the pollywog from Stranger Things look tame.
Finally, finally managed to kick the bug I picked up over the holidays. It’s been nice to actually get a few hours of shut eye without waking up and hacking out a lung. Hope you dodge the cold bullet!
Ill. Been fortunate to just be dealing with colds, myself, unlike my kid (and most of the rest of his school) who has been stricken with the flu (actual flu, not the stomach bugs people erroneously refer to as the flu).
I’m just getting over bronchitis. I was sick for three weeks, including Christmas and New Year’s. Yay!
I caught cold so long ago I forget when; I know it’s been several weeks. I was almost over it when when I was exposed again to the same sneezy people I caught it from in the first place (yay for party season), so it’s back to the old coughing and sneezing and sinus drip,which for some weird reason stops when I’m asleep. No flu, though, fortunately.
If you can avoid the unpleasant fever-and-aches-and-exhaustion virus that’s going around, I suggest you do so. I lost my four-day Christmas weekend to it, and it was deeply unpleasant. Aside from that, my usual winter cough which won’t quite morph into something actually treatable…
Feel better. Sickness plus short days equals dreary (it’s true. I mathed it any everything).
Heh. Nobody likes to read about other people’s medicals. Everybody likes to write about their own medicals.
So since you asked, we all (two humans and probably one of the ferrets) had a cold a week or so ago, that was very mild all around. So far so good on the flu–both humans had the shot.
But my domestic partner just got his first chemo for pancreatic cancer, which is just a bit stressful all around.
There was a weird novel years ago by Anthony Burgess that had a huge asteroid or planetoid that passed close to Earth, causing all kinds of disruption. Then it moved on, swung around the sun, came back around and kablammo!
The exact same thing happened to me, except, you know, it was a virus, not a planetoid. And I didn’t explode. Well, in a way I did.
I was already hit by a double-tap, which pretty much killed my video production and blogging productivity.
Hope you’re feeling better, John.
I’m a bit draggy because this is my third straight day of 11.5 hour days at work. Normally you’d see a complaint here about co-workers who blow off the company’s free flu shot clinic every fall, but this time it’s not flu. Yesterday’s overtime was due to a mother taking her kid in for a tonsillectomy, and today’s is weather-related. (But I still think several of my co-workers are nuts for passing on the flu shot.)
No illness, just officially another bloody year older, grumble.
Two weeks of cold dry weather, easy to get dehydrated. (Dehydration in cold is insidious, because you don’t feel thirsty.)
I have noted that since my doctor had me started taking Vitamin D a few years back, colds don’t seem to be a problem.
I’m a nurse and it’s said that our immune systems are so strong that they’ve been known to go out on the back yard and kill squirrels.
Not ill, but busy enough with two weddings (one friend wedding, one family wedding, two different countries), and my sister’s pending delivery any day now that I’m sure my immune system will just pack it in.
All more or less healthy here.
I am compelled to condemn Eric Greitens’s behavior and express grave disappointment in him.
At the risk of depressing anyone, since going on a low-carb diet and sticking to it pretty closely (little starch, almost no sugar), I haven’t had anywhere near the colds or flu I used to have. It works for me.