Archive for "Health"
My Poor Baby is Sick
Posted on March 23, 2009 by Ching under Health.
So Brian ended up catching whatever it is I had last week after all, despite his best efforts otherwise. Here’s how our conversation went on Saturday, the first day he realize he’s officially sick:
BRIAN: I hate you!
ME: Why?
BRIAN: You got me sick!
ME: It’s not my fault you caught my cooties. I suppose it is inevitable. We share the same bed, after all. Besides, you’re the one who started it!
BRIAN: What do you mean?
ME: You traveled to a foreign country and brought their germs back with you.
BRIAN: I wasn’t sick when I returned.
ME: No, but you had GERMS because you came from GERMany where they have MANY GERMS!
Bwa ha ha hah ha ha! Sometimes I just crack myself up. =P
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Spreading the Love.
Posted on March 22, 2009 by Brian under Health, Poker.
Friday night is usually poker night for Ching and I. This Friday though we decided to stay home because she had been sick for the last three days. Her fever finally broke Friday morning and after I came home from work she said that she just wanted to stay home and rest some more. We were going to go to the Invitational on Saturday anyway and on top of that we had Cory and April’s poker party Saturday evening. What we didn’t take into account was my hyperactive immune system letting me down.
Saturday morning, at about 5 am, I woke up in a puddle of sweat. I was so wet that I seriously thought I had wet the bed. I had to pee so I decided I should probably get up and go before I actually did wet the bed. This is when I realized that I was really sick. I tried to get out of bed and my body felt like I had been run over by a truck (and I actually know how that feels, another story for another time) and I was having trouble actually getting up and moving off of the bed. At this point I wished I had some Depends so that I would not have to get out of bed, since that was not an option I had no choice but to get my ass moving. Every step was agony, even peeing was uncomfortable. I finally got myself back to bed and decided that I needed to go ahead and pop a NyQuil and see if I could cut this think off before it gets started. I slept till about 11:30 but was in pain the entire time, my body ached all over. My fever broke at about 10:30 but I was so tired. However, I was determined to not let this illness ruin my plans. I felt like crap but I decided that I wanted to go play in the Tourney, I mean I worked hard to win that seat, I was determined to play.
We showed up and everyone immediately noticed that Ching and I were not our normal selves, after we told them we had been sick they wanted to know what the hell we were doing there. We told them that we were not going to let this illness get the best of us. Once we got started all I could think about was “man i want to go back to bed”. I just knew that I was not going to make it far. I figured that I was going to make some stupid call because I was not focused and was not paying attention to what was going on. Well the poker gods had another plan for me. Instead of getting knocked out early I ended up taking third place. It was unbelievable. I mean here I am sicker than crap, feeling like someone threw me off a cliff and I take 3rd place.
Later that evening I went to Cory and April’s. I was getting tired and was running on fumes. I figured that I had used up the last bit of mental energy for playing on the Invite. But no, the poker gods saw fit to bless me again with a second place finish. I was told that I should play sick more often. Cory said that it was hard to get a read on me because my expression never changed no matter what hand I had. I played my normal game but because I was sick and was not in my normal psychological state I just kept this expression of “I want to go back to bed”. I need to remember that. Maybe I will go farther if I just remove all emotional facets from my game play.
So it ended up being a profitable night. I got to play in the tourney, I proved to myself that I can play in any condition and I proved to my friends that my skills are not limited by my health. I am looking forward to next Friday now. I am going to practice this emotionless play, see if i can throw a few people off by making them think that I am still ill.
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Ching is a Cough Syrup Junkie — NOT
Posted on March 21, 2009 by Ching under Health, Life.
Your body CAN and WILL go on strike if you don’t take of it. I had this tickle in my throat for over a week that I didn’t do anything about. Finally, my body gave me the finger and took matters into its own hands. My body hit me will full force and gave me everything — coughing, sore throat, fever, congestion (loogies lots and lots of loogies), headache, muscle ache — all at once and took me out of work for three days. On top of it all, I had no sense of smell or taste so being sick took all the fun out of eating. Brian forced me to eat all of my meals, though. He came home for lunch each day to supervise my medication (he is afraid that I might get addicted to Codeine) and ensure that I didn’t miss any meals. No such luck on losing weight the three days my body was on strike, unfortunately. No thanks to Brian.
I don’t understand this medicine-rationing, though. I have a whole freakin’ bottle of it for cryin’ out loud! Although without Brian coming home for lunch each day, I’m not sure I could have taken the medicine every four hours as directed because I haven’t mastered the art of opening the stupid childproof medicine bottle. Actually, it was more like every five to six hours in my case: in the morning before Brian leaves for work, at lunch, and then at night when he arrives home. I normally ask him to wake me up for medicine before he goes to bed around 10/11 pm. That’s pretty much right on schedule, about four hours after my last dosage.
The weird thing about the medicine I’m on is that I can usually feel it wearing off after three hours. My throat feels sore again and I get really congested. At three and a half hours, I’m already begging Brian for another dose. Although he always makes me wait until he comes home for lunch or for the day, or at least four hours if he’s already home.
On the first night, I woke up around two o’clock in the morning. I didn’t want to wake Brian so I administered it myself. I don’t know how I managed to open the bottle that time. I haven’t had much success or luck since (except for about an hour ago when I took some). I guess it’s pretty hit and miss. The more frustrated and impatient I get about not being able to open the bottle, the less like I am to succeed at actually opening it — much to Brian’s satisfaction.
He thinks I’m going to turn into a cough syrup junkie. I have no idea why. That stuff is nasty. The only reason I take it is because it makes me feel better. I wouldn’t take it at all if I were well.
You know, I wonder how much of its effects are psychological? I took some over an hour ago and I’m still awake. I should be passed out right about now. I took the medicine in the dark though (Brian is still fast asleep), so I didn’t get the full visual of the plastic bottle and the yucky orange liquid it contains.
Then again, I’m almost well. I have some throat tickle and congestion, but nothing at all like what I’ve had the last couple of days. I was mostly taking it for the purpose of getting knocked out so I can go back to sleep. Before you worry that I’m turning into a junkie as Brian feared, let me assure you that I took a regular-sized dose of one teaspoon. I didn’t take half the bottle in one chug so don’t go calling the cops on me. Anyway, no luck on the sleep part. That’s why I’m awake and typing away at the computer.
I think it is safe to conclude that a regular dose has zero effect on someone who is well or somewhat well. I’m guessing that’s why the junkies have to take the entire bottle in one sitting. It’s still a pretty cheap fix. My prescription only cost $5 at Walgreens. It may be even cheaper if you go to Wal-Mart, I think they have $4 prescriptions there. You’ll never find me abusing that stuff though, because I think it’s gross. It’s better than taking medicine in pill form, I’ll grant you that. I hate taking pills. And, I will take as much of it as I can to get me better. That’s it, though. As soon as I’m better I’m done.
I believe I am at that point. I still have some congestion and I don’t sound like me, but I think I’m well enough that I don’t need to take the Codeine any more.
The worst part of this whole ordeal is that now that I’m better, Brian is sick. He’s been coughing all night and is running 100.3 temp. Whatever it is that I had and am getting over, he now has. I wish that we could have gotten sick at the same time and just had it over with. Then again, when I’m sick he takes care of me and when he’s sick I can take care of him. If we are sick at the exact same time, who will take care of us? LOL.
[ Okay, the worst part of it is that we missed our window of opportunity for nookie. We had a small window when I was almost better and before Brian got sick, but it coincided with the two-hour series finale of Battlestar Gallactica and we all know what happened. Prior to that I was too sick and too gross to engage in any kind of amorous activity. Besides, Brian was trying to stay away from me so as not to get himself sick. Though it was all in vain it seems because he got sick after all. Now he is too sick and weak to do anything. Alas, we have another dry spell ahead of us. ]
I suppose everything happens for a reason. I’m grateful that I didn’t get hit with anything serious and that I’m on my way to being myself again. I hope that Brian recovers in less time. Get well soon, baby.
I can’t believe you’re reading this. Since you insist, let me begin by saying you were warned.
I hocked up this huge loogie in the shower yesterday. When I say loogie, I don’t mean like a spit ball. This thing was all phlegm and was the consistency of pudding. It actually felt like tapioca pudding coming out of my mouth. Brian says that it’s a good thing when you expel loogies because it means that you are getting rid of the bad stuff in your lungs and throat. This thing was really scary, though. It was the size of a large grape and was so big that it couldn’t go down the drain all at once. I thought it was brownish in color, but since I don’t smoke maybe it’s just a gross yellow color that I mistook for brown?
Anyway, I had to look up loogie on Google because I wasn’t sure how to spell it and stumbled upon this interesting blog entry from 2005. Almost four years later, loogie still remains in the slang realm. People use the word loogie all the time, but it’s not an actual world.
I suppose I should stop using the word loogie (since we’ve just determined that it’s not officially a word) and use the word phlegm, which is what I really mean when I say loogie. Check out Wikipedia for more information about phlegm. By the way, mine was bigger than the one shown in the photo (if you can bear to picture it) and is kind of like that color. Is that yellow or brown?
Why does the color matter? Well, supposedly the color of phlegm you expel is a good indication of the type of illness you’re suffering from. I came across helpful information about what the different colors of phlegm mean on Answers.com so I thought I should share it with you guys. I know that this blog entry has been gross, but I hope it has been educational as well. Until then, stay healthy and be safe. =)
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Stuck
Posted on April 16, 2003 by Ching under Health.
I got stuck in the dress from hell for almost two hours. It would have been funny — if I didn’t feel so ridiculous. My regular workouts deluded me into thinking that I can fit into a SIZE 3 again. In my dreams! The reality of it was a total nightmare..
I was having a hissy last week so I ended up buying these two Ruby Rox party dresses from Dillard’s. I’m partial to strapless dresses (if I could only count how many I have — different styles from different stores — yes, I’m a clothes whore — err, clothes horse) so I bought two of the same style. I got the periwinkle one and the black and white print pictured left. I had seen similar dresses in the Victoria’s Secret catalogs last season but they cost twice as much. Naturally, I thought the less expensive Ruby Rox dresses were a steal!
To tell you the truth, the material isn’t that great — the black and white print one is actually a white screen-print (seemed like screenprint anyway) on black fabric — it wasn’t even woven. The material on the periwinkle dress is different and, I think, is much better quality — although I haven’t taken it out of the plastic yet, so I haven’t inspected it all that well. I can see why they are selling for a much lower price.
So anway, anytime I get a package in the mail I get super-excited (I get three times more excited these days because my mail order shopping has become less frequent due to financial woes) and I feel compelled to try on my new outfits. I did a quick eenie, meanie, minie mo as I undressed. The black and white print dress won the toss up, so I eagerly took it out of the plastic, slid it off the hanger, untied the belt and unzipped the back. I stepped into the dress and pulled it up only to find out that my hips were too wide. Rather than risk tearing the dress by forcing the issue, I decided to try putting it on the other way — through my head. I couldn’t just slip it on because the opening wasn’t wide enough (frankly a longer zipper in the back would have worked wonders) so I had to force the dress on, sliding one arm at a time. Getting the dress on wasn’t even nearly as challenging as getting it zipped up. Not even close!
I finally just gave up on it because I couldn’t get it zipped. But then I couldn’t take it off! I couldn’t slip it down to my feet because my hips were too wide and I couldn’t take it off through my head because it was too tight. I was stuck! I really wished that Brian would come home so he could help me get it off (I own a couple of other dresses that require collaboration between Brian and I to get on and off so he’s used to it) but he was running late coming home for his lunch break tonight.
Alright fine, I thought. Since I can’t take it off, I might as well wear it. After struggling for almost thirty minutes I finally had it zipped up almost completely in the back. Looking at the glass as half-full, I thought I might as well forget about working out tonight because I can’t take the stupid dress off but at least I had a thirty-minute workout out of the whole ordeal.
Brian finally came home for dinner (on his lunch break) at a little after nine and he helped me out of the dress before he returned to work. Whew! What a fiasco!
I really love the dresses and I want to return them for ones that fit better but the SIZE 3’s are just a teeny bit tight (they fit as long as I don’t wear a bra and someone else has to zip them up for me and help me take them off at the end of the day) and I’m worried that the next size up (5’s) will be too big. It’s a strapless dress so that’s a big no-no. I wouldn’t want them falling off (specially since I have no boobs to hold them up). I guess just chalk this up to even more motivation to lose weight! ~sigh~
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