I'm Not Sick But I'm Not Well

....except I am sick, but I wouldn't be able to reference a song I like then.

Some evidence of said sickness.  I would take a picture, but my appearance might offend some sensitive viewers.

Got sent home from work yesterday.  Never been sent home in the middle of the day during this job before. My guts have been conspiring against me since the weekend in a way that's best described as severe crampy bastard butterflies from Hell.

Until yesterday, all they had done was put me off my food, which meant I could afford more things. I love things. Hurrah for things. And stuff too.  But somewhere around my morning break, my body decided that to jazz up my working day, I required a headache, the shakes and intermittent dry heaving.

Evidently, my body has shit for brains.

Anyway, my manager clocked my sudden decline into pasty, clammy pre-barf mode and asked if I wanted to go home,  at which I bravely welled up and squeaked out a "no!"  Which is wimp for "yes, but I don't want you to think I'm being dramatic, and I don't want to let anyone down."

Fortunately, said manager is a surprisingly skillful mind reader, and he sent me packing anyway.  

It's now the following day, and I'm still on the sofa, dolefully gagging into a cup of tea.  And I've got to thinking that school-age me would be loving this.  If you have a sick day and you're still in school uniform, it is both a nightmare and a treat.  I recall thinking at the age of 11 

"Yay, my tonsils are so big that I might choke on them! I can't wait for the doctors to cut them out of my throat with a sharp knife so I can have a week off school!  AND I've heard that I get to eat ice cream for breakfast for a few days after! Score!!"

The only part of that attitude that remains with me to this day is the feeling that if food is the outcome, then whatever it is I have to do to obtain it is SO worth it.

So. Because I have nothing to do bar make noises like a poorly skilled beat boxer, I've compiled a short list if why being school-age sick is a much, much sweeter deal than being grown-up sick:

- Mum: This goes straight to the top of the list!  Deep down, all everyone wants out of life is to

be confined to the sofa under a mountain of quilts, in front of a selection of their favourite films while the person who already spends most of her time raising you pumps you full of attention, affection, Lucozade and chicken soup.

To this day, I can't even smell Lucozade without feeling instantly green in the gills, but allowing myself to be completely and wholly pathetic because mum's got this shit covered is something I remember fondly.

- Freedom!!: No responsibility, no early mornings, no to-ing and fro-ing between classes and no being forced to answer questions in German whilst Mrs Wesner throws Pedro the stuffed monkey at your head.  That's not code for anything. She actually threw a monkey at us and made us give her directions to the station and list all the family members we had.

Sure, you might get a bit more homework, but you know that once you've sweated whatever plague you've caught out in front of several viewings of Casper The Friendly Ghost, your friends will be waiting to accept you back into the fold.  Maybe even take a couple of monkeys to the face for you until you're feeling 100%.

But my reaction as an adult (in body at least) in full time employment? 

"Guiiiiiiilt!!! Already let everyone down! Someone's doing my work as well as theirs! I'm a terrible person! I can't afford to be off work anyway! Daytime TV sucks! Horrible, selfish Becky for being ill! Work's going to be busy today and it's going to be all my fault! Guilt, guilt, GUIIIIIIIIILT-AH!"

- Appearace: Ilness isn't supposed to be attractive, I know.  This is why, when we're perfectly fine and dandy, when someone has the gall to ask us if we're okay because we don't look very well, the only response that springs to mind is a swift punch to the throat.

When you're little, it's sort-of cute to be all helpless and pale. Sniffly and snotty.  It elicits sympathy in the clan elders.  Nowadays, if anyone were to see me perspiring on the sofa, mouth agog, fringe both pasted to my face and pointing to the heavens as I gag, I wouldn't be surprised at a quick retreat as they make the sign of the cross over and over to protect themselves from whatever demon has me in its clutches.

Well.  I'm off to feel sorry for myself and hope that Beelzebub gets bored of reruns of terrible American sitcoms and flees my body.  Wish me luck!

I AM LUCIFEEEEEEEEEEEEEEER!!!!! *projectile vomits*

...Come Again?

If this blog was one of them fandangled Youtube vlog things, I WOULD BE SHOUTING THIS POST AT YOU RIGHT NOW!!

But relax, chums.  Your auditory senses are safe.

...FOR NOW!!!

Reason for all the SHOUTING is that after last week's sexiness (translate: "lady flu"), all of my basic functions (i.e breathing, swallowing -not like that!-, making own cups of tea) have returned.... bar my hearing.  And so I've been talking overcompensatingly loudly while I forget that it's me who's having trouble hearing me and not the rest of the whole wide world (translate: office/ living room).

My hearing's not as bat-like in excellence as it should be for a laydee of my age (25) on a normal day, let alone when it's filled with all manner of fitty-making cold symptom debris ...because earlier this year I was told I'd need a hearing aid.

*waits for gasps*

*realises probably can't hear gasps even if they're happening*

Exhibit A(id) - Becky's robot ear

I discovered my (admittedly mild) handicap after booking myself in for a hearing test when I'd started to get pissed off at the fact that I was making up my own story lines to movies based on the odd few words I caught during them.  

To this day, all I recall from Brokeback mountain was some muttered discussion about "beans" followed by sudden, vigorous bumming.  Those crazy, non-enunciating Americans...

I'm only a casual hearing aid wearer - in that I don't really need it to hear most things and can usually get by without it.  I don't wear it at a carefree, jaunty angle or anything.... But I do hear (ha! Hear...) you can jazz them up with glittery accessories and the like.  I haven't a stab at being cool anyway, so if I'm deaf, I might as well be disco deaf. Might look into that...

Anyhoo, this week it's been marginally more difficult just Beckying through my day with one of my senses pretty badly if temporarily dulled.  And because I'm all about raising awareness and shit, I would like to give you a few examples of what being a-bit-sort-of-deaf-but-not-that-much-really is like for those who aren't mildly afflicted like little old me.

You learn that you're not designed to talk to grown-ups

According to my doctor, the pitches I am missing are from the mid range.  Meaning that I struggle to hear mid range sounds, but I'm average-to-ace at hearing high and low ones.  To quote Mr Doctor Man, I can

"...best hear children and Santa Claus." Funny bastard.

So basically, situations where I'd be at my best conversationally would also be the ones where I'd come off as just a bit fucking creepy... e.g at an under 14's disco (I could wear my jazzy aid!!) or on Santa's knee.  Awesome.

Certain aspects of office work can be tricky

...like when you're full of cold, have left your aid at home and your manager is talking to you from behind his PC monitor six desks or so away.  While it can be quite hypnotic watching his eyebrows dance as he "meehmehmeeh"s like Beaker off of the muppets, it's not so great if you don't even have a shot at lip reading whether his "mehmehmeeh"s are of the "do this or you're sacked" variety or whether he's just informing you about a curry he had last night.

You sometimes find yourself accidentally being "funny"

I've had this conversation at least 3 times this week:

Me: Sorry, just getting over a cold.  You might have to speak up a bit at me today.

Co worker: Oh, okay....so, mehmehmeeehmeh...spreadsheet?

Me: What?

CW: *thinking I'm hilariously playing up to the deaf thing and not wanting to not laugh at a deaf bird trying pathetically to be funny* ahahahahHAHA!

Me: *not wanting to feel I'm missing out on the joke I've obviously just not heard* hahahaha!

CW: Heee.... So mehmehmeeehmeh spreadsheet then?

Me: ...Yes!

CW: *confused face*

Me: ....no?

Sometimes you just have to guess

When I'm feeling too lazy to fully concentrate on involving myself in a conversation I can only hear snippets of, I tend to just stand there, hands in pockets, smiling vacantly and nodding at all the pauses.  I then wait until I hear a word I quite like and then wholeheartedly agree and hope for the best. Sometimes the outcome is good and I get something out of it. Sometimes I come off as inappropriate or rude and have no idea what I've agreed to. Full on fascist sentiments for all I know.....It's Yes Roulette!

I agreed to something A said that included the word "waffle" yesterday.  Still not sure whether I've got a waffle coming or whether I'm expected to produce one sometime soon.  Exciting times, people.  Oh, I do so love to live precariously! 

.... I'll keep you posted about who gets the waffles.  Fingers crossed it's me!!

Oh, while I'm on the subject...never EVER Google the term "blue waffle". I did once after being told not to, and I can never EVER un see it!

BYE, YOU GUYS!!!!!

Snot and Sexualness... But Mostly Snot.

Everyone stop what you're doing and get to my bedside, for I have a cold!!

I'm at the tail end of a week off work, during which my body has enthusiastically adopted the office cold as a take-home memento.

This almighty snot storm came about immediately after I decided to try out going for a "running streak" after reading about them in a magazine.

...............

... I left that gap there to allow you the time to jump to the conclusion that I've taken up naked running. Which, I guess, would be a good explanation as to how I've contracted a cold, what with it being November and freezing.

But nah.  Boringly, a running streak is just where you try to run every single day for as long as you can manage it.  I lasted a weak six days before my legs and brain threw in the towel and gave me something else to focus on.

"Look, Becky! Mucus!!" 

I would have preferred something that doesn't lead to me snorting and harrumphing into

 A's ear as I try to warm up in bed.  Not unlike an amorous pig.

Anyhoo, I've been on my arse for the last couple of days, slurping tea and troughing back fatty, comforting food.  

Fun fact - whilst running makes me feel all magical and immortal, turns out inactivity does the total opposite.  Here are some of the cheerier thoughts that have ridden the tidal wave of snot through my brain this week:

1. "I can feel my already just passably average body melting into a state of boneless lardification the longer I sit still."

....okay,okay. My self pity's not that articulate.  It was more like

" Wahhh, I'm turning into a fleshy bag of soft cheese!"

2. "Every second I sit here snivelling and internetting is a second where my friends continue to best me."

Or

"Waah, I'm poor and all my friends are more successful than meeee!"

3. "I look like a melty ghost with straw for hair and I can't hear Breaking Bad because I keep sneezing over it!"

<no translation necessary>

Oh. Oh! And to top off my general feelings of hideousness and total unproductiveness (... Unproductivity..?), I managed to embarrass myself in front of A - a rare thing, as in out almost-two years of living in sin together (hee), I believe he's seen me in all my stumbling, fumbling and bumbling glory.

So.  Curled up under a throw on the sofa, I'm wearing my best woe-is-me-please-bring-hot-beverages face and it's starting to dawn on my that amidst the gentle purr of gunfire from Call Of Duty, a hot beverage is probably not forthcoming.  

Because I'm an idependant wumman a-la Beyonce and co, I bravely decide to venture the treacherous few steps to the kitchen (I'd like you to imagine me doing so to the tune of Destiny's Child's Survivor, if you don't mind). I stand all the way up, super proud of my decision. Momma don't need no man to get her some peppermint tea! <insert poorly executed finger snap here>

I feel something tickling the back of my thigh.  Assuming it's my skirt being bothersome, I swat at it with my hands. The tickling quickly races down the entirety of the back of my legs, and in a rare moment of distraction from the Playstation, I see that A's mouth is aghast with horror.

...because I have a good metre or so of crumpled up loo roll hanging from my pants all the way down to the floor.  It looks like in my haste to get off the toilet and back to the sofa, I've neglected to dispose of said bog roll and have instead accidentally stored it in my knickers like a dirty squirrel.

...Or, that in the absence of coloured hankies, I was improvising and trying out a magic trick. My audience was not amused.

Anyway.  Turns out I'd just been sat on some tissue I'd initially brought downstairs for nose blowing purposes and forgotten it was there. 

Well, I think that's as good as any mental image to finish off a blog post on. Hope you've all had a better weekend than I have!

Lots of love,

D.S (Dirty Squirrel).