Sick and tired of being sick and tired...

So... Once again an unfortunate illness has roundhouse kicked me, throwing yet another monkey wrench into my theory that I am invincible. Despite some extraordinarily unpleasant food poisoning a few short weeks ago, I haven't been sick since December '06. What the balls happened? I know what.

Despite being exceptionally tired and generally burnt out, I partied hard last week. I mean, like, hard. It was all whiskey and beers and cigars and concerts and throwing cabbages at people... The usual St. Patrick's Week kind of stuff. In fact, I woke up with a sore throat the day before riding in the Irish-Italian parade, but I still had to ride it in anyway. After all, I had three whole pounds of fava beans to throw, as well as all of the produce I bought for the occasion.

I woke up with much more than a sore throat the day after said parade. No hangover, which is probably what you're thinking. Nope. Fort Awesome doesn't roll that way. Fort Awesome fears no beers. Except for Keystone Light (water, or maybe "used beer", i.e., "urine") and Hoegaarden (disgusting, pure liquid evil). I did, however, have the same sore throat, a sunburn (the kind that truckers get, where you're only burned from the shirt sleeves down), chapped lips, burned tongue (from post-parade pizza), bruises all over my body (stupid gravity) and a giant gash on my leg that seems to have occurred during a demonstration as to why I think pole dancing is good exercise. Plus some residual weirdness over a pseudo-argument with a friend that I feel a little guilty about. I guess I was sort of mean, even though I don't really remember much about it. More on that another day, if I think it's interesting enough.

So the past couple of days have been pretty shitty, and not at all Awesometown. Someone I know tried to help me out by giving me one of those Emergen-C packets that you mix into water and drink for immune-boosting super powers. Except that she gave me a kind of awesome-tasting, special flavor for kids that is incredibly hard to find. I have to order it off of the internet, in fact. I looked for some this morning on my way to work, but all I could find were crappy grownup flavors like Tangerine, which is stupid. I bought it anyway, because I really want to feel better. My chest hurts and feels all tired, and that concerns me because whenever I get sick, I get sick. See earlier The Awesomeness entries for examples on that.

I went off to court this morning, and drank one horrible Tangerine Emergen-C in a bottle of water. After court, I bought another bottle of water and decided to make what shall henceforth be known as a very bad decision.

The directions on the Emergen-C packet say to take 1 packet 2 to 4 times a day. But I think it's too nasty for that, so I decided to be more efficient. I poured two packets of the Tangerine crap powder into the bottle and shook it up. I could hear it fizzing. The same sound that you hear right before you die when you mix Poprocks and soda. Except that might just be (really is) an urban legend. What happened to me is definitely true, but scary nonetheless.

I tasted the mixture, which was pretty nasty. And fizzy. I decided to just go for it. What the hell... I have chugged worse! So I chugged the whole bottle, without stopping. In my head, for self-motivation purposes, I silently chanted "Go! Go! Go!" When it was finished, I had three thoughts: 1) I think I might vomit, 2) Ouch! Brain freeze! and 3) I have to pee. Right now.

Later, I made another poor decision. I decided to try and put the powder in my mouth dry, and then wash it down with Coke. Except that it fizzes. And makes your mouth feel like it is on Tangerine-flavored fizzy fire. And then later, you find out what happens to your body when you take too much Vitamin C. It doesn't hurt or anything, but it will make you panic. I won't go into too much detail, but if you are considering taking a large dose of Vitamin C, please click on the link provided. You'll thank me later.

So now I have been sick for 5 freaking days officially. I don't know how much longer I should expect to feel shitty. I should go see a doctor like the nice lady in India told me today. It turns out that if you call Allstate's website tech support, you end up talking to some lady in India who is very concerned about your voice and cough. If you're lucky like me, she'll recommend specific drugs and then she'll tell you to take the rest of the day off to go home and get some rest. I have noticed that a lot of Indians (dot, not feather) seem to end up as doctors. Maybe she is paying her way through medical school by assigning people new passwords on Allstate's website.

Sorry, but I am too goshdarn sick to come up with a clever ending to this post. I can't even come up with something that gives it any sense of closure. It's almost like The Sopranos writers just took over and...