Saturday 04 October 1997 07:43

"The amazing part is not the speed at which it moves, but the fact that it moves at all."

Me, observing my body.

I have had a fucking relapse. I don't know what's going first, my mind or my body, and I don't really care.

I spent the night between patients worshipping at the porcelain thrown. The theory is, that you feel better after you throw up. Not this time.

This is going to be short, I need to go lay down. The blood that my brain needs to function is pooling in my nether extremities, and not the fun ones either.

I'm going to have Karen wake me about noon, see how I'm doing. If I'm not markedly better, I'm gonna

• Call in sick.
• Call the doctor, who will want to put me in the hospital; and
• Call off the cookout with Steve and Mary. I was really looking forward to that, too. This will be the second cancellation, and I feel really bad about that.

Karen woke me up at 12:20, and, since I still felt crummy, I called in sick. Then I called Steve and postponed... but I decided not to call the doc yet.

So, I thought that I would just go back to sleep. Well, that didn't work; and the longer I stayed up, the worse I felt. Finally able to get to sleep around 16:30, then woke up about 20:30.

And I felt better, except for I now have a sore throat. So, there is progress being made, of a sort. The people at work that have been sick lately report the gastroenteritis and cough first, then a sore throat, then a slow trend toward better.

I was finally hungry enough to chance eating, and had some english muffins with jelly and some excellent roast chicken. So far, so good. I have lost seven pounds since Monday, all of it muscle, the way that I feel. Weak as a baby...

But once again, the longer I am up, the worse I feel. So I am going back to bed shortly.

Brian is here, and Packy is spending the night too. They will both sleep in the spare bedroom, which Brian is now insisting is his room, at least when he's in town. He is a very cute kid, but we are seeing more evidence of his, shall we say, lower-than-average, upbringing. I have a low regard for his mother and family...

I will go back to sleep now. More tomorrow...