A different kind of week

I spent the first two days of it sick. This means sick enough to stay home from work. It’s one of those typical sinus things I seem to get about every other winter. This one came with fever and deep coughing. It’s worse when I sleep, so I haven’t been getting much of that.

Wednesday, I got up and assessed how I felt. I decided I could return to the office. I tried to hit it hard in the morning, and got a lot accomplished. I probably should have stopped at noon. The shivering returned, but I had aspirin with me. After a couple of those it settled down. I think the fever broke for good near quitting time.

I probably wasn’t firing on all cylinders either day, but I managed to get more accomplished than I could have from home.

Today was my flex day and I looked forward to some writing. When I left Lanternfish, they’d landed in Giapon and stumbled into a dangerous situation. Today was the day to flesh out that situation.

It wound up being a section of dialog, and I felt pretty good about it. This exchange is supposed to take place over several days, and my goal is to have it come across like a verbal chess match with a very powerful man.

I’d like to break this up with some other goings on that involve the crew. This shouldn’t be too hard, but I’m going to try minimizing the root monsters. They had a pretty active role in the last part, and readers can get too much of a good thing.

All told, I was happy with today’s progress until I checked my word count. 676 words! That’s all I managed. I know low output days are part of the gig, but that’s pretty minuscule by my standards.

There are several reasons for this, one of which could be my cold. It may be that I’ve truly reached the middle slog, like happens on every book. It could also simply be one of those off days that happens to all of us.

Old What’s Her Face has to go in at midnight, then pull a double shift tomorrow. In theory, I should be able to accomplish a bit more then. However, I agreed to stay up until she goes to work. My coughing all night isn’t going to help her get a little sleep. I also need to get a haircut, but could do that any time tomorrow.

My goals are to nudge Lanternfish ahead in the morning, get the haircut in the afternoon, then my wife is alluding to date night in the evening. I don’t have faith that she’ll want to go out after that shift, but will stay open to the idea.

Sniff, blech, snot

I have a ritual of speaking to my parents every Sunday. First I get Mom, then I talk to Dad. It took me years to train them not to get on the phone at the same time.

Dad always manages to ask how everyone is feeling. I honestly answered that everyone was great. By noon, I was feverish and trying to cough up my liver.

Fingers crossed, my flex day was Monday. Maybe this would pass and I wouldn’t have to miss any work. Stupid human, microbes care not for your hopes and dreams.

I spent most of the day in bed Monday. Then I “went” to bed about 6:00. I never got up until 7:00 the next day.

I coughed most of the night, and had to get up hourly for various reasons, mostly involving spitting. A few involving shivering fever-like symptoms.

Last night wasn’t much better.

I went to the doctor today, but didn’t have a lot of hope. I know the drill with a virus. They gave me some nasal spray that ought to help. The pharmacist changed it out for a generic version of Flonase.

My MO is to check for the dosage. I flipped the box over, and learned not to take it if I’m addicted to certain substances, pregnant, have a bad attitude, or might ever have a cataract. When I reached the bottom, it invited me to open the box and read the paper inside to find the directions.

By this point, I was getting a little pissed off, but after passing muster with their lawyers, I figured I was home safe.

Turns out this paper has all of their corporate history, names of their future entitled children, and other information I really don’t need to know. Then it invited me to flip it over and look at the cartoons.

In other words, I’m sufficiently trained to read all of their disclaimers and corporate bullshit, but need a cartoon to explain how to blast this shit up my nose.

Turns out some kind of assembly is required. This thing was shrink wrapped so tightly, I couldn’t get it open. It did not come with the standard perforations that I’m familiar with to help remove the shrink wrap. I tried scissors, but this crap was so tight I couldn’t slip a blade under the wrap. Finally, I resorted to a knife.

Seems odd to me they didn’t have a disclaimer about using a knife and driving it through your hand while attempting to open it. Seems like they’re setting themselves up for a lawsuit. Heaven help them if I’d have punctured the bottle and sprayed this crap in my eyes. Probably causes cataracts.

I also got some kind of Pseudoephedrine pills that Old What’s Her Face had to sign her life away for. Honestly, I have more faith in these. Time will tell.

I still nodded off multiple times today. Work tomorrow is still questionable. I may have to get up, then decide.

It took several tries to write this blog post out. It may not even be good, but at least give me a handicap.

I haven’t written a single word of fiction this week either. That’s a double impact for me. My brain hasn’t been in the right place.

Does researching biological weapons for a story mean you’re going to come down with one of them? I can’t imagine Ebola feels any worse.

Honestly, if I surfed past your blog and hit the like button, feel honored. That’s about all I could manage.