Typhoid Mare-eesa

It seems that after reading blogs of other people who have been sick, I too have succumbed to an infernal, tortuous viral coup.

I do not suffer illness stoically. I am whiny and annoying. I want my mommy. Or someone who will give me equally selfless and abundant TLC. I want to be in bed with lots of blankets. I want movies playing that I can drift in and out of without missing anything. I want soup and tea brought to my bedside, and the empty dishes to magically disappear. I want a glass of room temperature water that never empties. I want to rise from bed only to take a steamy shower and change into a new pair of jammies. And I want a warm dog curled up close to me, happy to lounge with me, even as I hack and wheeze.

Ogden gets it...

Go hang yourself, you old M.D,!
You shall not sneer at me.
Pick up your hat and stethoscope,
Go wash your mouth with laundry soap;
I contemplate a joy exquisite
In not paying you for your visit.
I did not call you to be told
My malady is a common cold.

By pounding brow and swollen lip;
By fever's hot and scaly grip;
By those two red redundant eyes
That weep like woeful April skies;
By racking snuffle, snort, and sniff;
By handkerchief after handkerchief;
This cold you wave away as naught
Is the damnedest cold man ever caught!

Give ear, you scientific fossil!
Here is the genuine Cold Colossal;
The Cold of which researchers dream,
The Perfect Cold, the Cold Supreme.
This honored system humbly holds
The Super-cold to end all colds;
The Cold Crusading for Democracy;
The Führer of the Streptococcracy.

Bacilli swarm within my portals
Such as were ne'er conceived by mortals,
But bred by scientists wise and hoary
In some Olympic laboratory;
Bacteria as large as mice,
With feet of fire and heads of ice
Who never interrupt for slumber
Their stamping elephantine rumba.

A common cold, gadzooks, forsooth!
Ah, yes. And Lincoln was jostled by Booth;
Don Juan was a budding gallant,
And Shakespeare's plays show signs of talent;
The Arctic winter is fairly coolish,
And your diagnosis is fairly foolish.
Oh what a derision history holds
For the man who belittled the Cold of Colds!

You should probably go wash your hands now.
I hear there's something going around.