6 posts tagged “illness”

Maybe coq au vin has restorative properties after all.  I had a pretty good plate of it last night (though I restrained myself from ordering any wine to accompany the meal).  I woke up suddenly this morning at around 4:30 and for the first time in weeks my head, nasal passages, and throat felt completely clear.  I soon fell back asleep again and when I got up I felt that I had regressed slightly, but I still feel significantly better.

Or perhaps it was laying off the coffee, as someone suggested, that has been a good idea.  I haven't had any for almost a week now (and have some more loose change floating around as a result too).

I am not sure that I will ever get into any sort of holiday frame of mind by Christmas (or if I particularly care).   I still have some shopping to do, but it all seems more or less under control.  A friend came across with an offer of free tickets to a performance of Messiah (Handel's, of course) at Carnegie Hall over the weekend.   I haven't been in the main auditorium in quite some time.  And I probably will be going to The Nutcracker as well.  You can't get more "holiday" than that, can you?

It will be nice to be able to do something in the evenings and weekends other than putter (and cough) around the house, watching too much television.  I've not been cleaning.  Nor taking care of the 300 billion other things that need doing.  I haven't even been reading all that much. 

The other addiction I have developed during this extended period of recuperation/hibernation/withdrawal (whatever the fuck it has been) is Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares.  The original version, that is, as shown on BBC America.  Although I've only seen a few of the episodes of the American version, on Fox, I don't find it nearly so enjoyable.  The concept definitely has been dumbed down and the interactions seem more staged than the British version.  There is a decided shift away from a focus on the food itself towards playing up a more phony "human interest" angle.  Plus, the producers pick these awful places (in strip malls in suburban New Jersey or Long Island) that you never could imagine yourself going to.  The would-be restaurateurs and staff are so clueless or annoying that you find yourself rooting for their businesses to fail; the typical clientele are so obnoxious that you would want to give them food poisoning if you had to serve them.

New year's resolution: eat more vegetables.

Ah, I'm glad I remembered my password after all.  I've been lost in the fog of bronchitis for over a week.  Too tired and out of it to even spend much time in front of the computer, much less try to blog.

Today, I was feeling a bit better (though not great) and went back to work, which, so far, has been rather pointless.  It was the first time I had been out of the house at all for a few days, but it didn't take very long upon hitting the pavement for me to remember just how annoying people are.

Yes, I realized in my little world of isolation, interrupted only by occasional visits from the super (who has been attempting to fix the malfunctioning bedroom radiator, but that, as they say, is another story), I at least had been calm.  With TCM my boon companion, I even thought about a few things.  More to follow.

Or is it time lost?  Either way, it hasn't been time all that well spent.

I believe I have decisively entered the getting-over-it phase of this cold, meaning I don't feel like absolute crap today.  I still have a lingering post nasal drip, however.  Also, an immense regret that I stayed up to watch the disappointing finale of Dancing with the Stars last evening when I could have been sleeping instead.  Once again, America's bizarre idea of "likability" triumphed, as Baby June helped yet another dubiously butch male athlete take the trophy home. 

I still wonder why I get so caught up with the whole thing.  There's precious little dancing on display.

I've been feeling physically crappy the past couple of days.  Not quite sick enough to stay home (though undoubtedly rest would be of great benefit), but very rough, especially in the mornings.  Aside from my standard fatigue, I first began to feel really sick during a meal at a Greek restaurant on Saturday night.  The food tasted fine, I think we just ordered too much of it.  Also, both myself and a friend across from me were seated right next to the radiator and it was unpleasantly hot throughout dinner.  Between the heat and the overindulgence, I felt a wave of nausea while we were sitting around waiting for the check.

I felt a little better when we hit the cold air outside.  We stopped in at a deli on the way home and I bought a bottle of ginger ale as a form of insurance.  Petting the cute little cat in the deli made me feel even better.  Imbibing part of the bottle of ginger ale that evening and the next morning seemed to stave off any additional nausea or major problems.

I still felt pretty seedy in the morning, but I perked up during the day.  We went to a program by the American Symphony Orchestra, which I enjoyed, even if the New York Times didn't.  My boyfriend had the sniffles and a sore throat.

Still maybe it was something at the restaurant, in which case I feel especially guilty since I suggested the place.  I noticed yesterday on his facebook profile that the friend who had accompanied us had been feeling sick on Sunday and stayed home from work yesterday.  I should find out how he is.  He was closer to a table near by where there was a child coughing ceaselessly.  So maybe those were the germs.  Or maybe something in the food?  My boyfriend's cold has gotten a bit worse.  And I certainly feel weird.

My throat doesn't exactly hurt when I swallow, but it feels tight.  I also feel extremely thirsty and congested.  And alternately hot and, while not exactly chills, a sort of chill-like sensation occasionally.

Unfortunately this condition does not make me anticipate tonight's gala opening of the New York City Ballet winter season as I typically have in the past.  I barely had remembered it even before I got sick, so something's off there as well.  It's the usual gala excerpts and premieres, which I guess is tenuously conceived as a wrap-up of the yearlong tribute to Lincoln Kirstein.  Petipa, Balanchine, Robbins, Martins (he gets the premiere), and Wheeldon are all represented--do we see someone's line of thinking here?  To me, the film of Robbins's Opus Export: Jazz  is the most interesting element of the program. For Balanchine we get only the 4th movement of Western Symphony, which, much as I love it, has been trotted out at a few too many gala occasions in recent years.  The Martins' piece, Grazioso doesn't exactly fill me with dread, but I can pretty much imagine what it will be like without seeing it.

At least it gives me an excuse to miss tonight's results show of Dancing with the Stars.  I have a feeling I'm not going to like those results.

What a strange week.  I've been sick with a cold that never completely developed into the more epic event it threatened, at times, to become, yet it still has not completely cleared up.  I've definitely felt out of it much of the time.

It all began the night before I was supposed to leave for Washington.  I started getting chills in the afternoon at work and after yet another crap commute, when I got home I was feeling slimy and practically delirious.  After a few hours of writhing around in discomfort (I was even thinking of calling off my trip), the bad feeling evaporated almost as mysteriously as it had started.  I quickly packed, got some sleep, and awoke early the next morning feeling reasonably OK.  I got down to D.C. without a hitch and found it was considerably warmer there than it had been up in New York all week.

Soon after arriving, my friend and I headed out to take the Metro to the zoo, where we saw the pandas (as usual) lying around and eating bamboo.  I hadn't been to the renovated Asian trail exhibits, which are near the main entrance, and I was really excited to see a fishing cat (even though he wasn't up to much at the time). 

Fishing cat

We took advantage of the sunshine and strolled across the zoo, leaving by a different exit on the other side that led to Adams Morgan.  After getting a bit lost, we asked a couple for directions, and wound up at the same French bistro (La Fourchette) we had gone to once before and had brunch.  I admired their bathroom tiles yet again (but this time had my camera to take pictures of the tiles, which don't really do them justice).  We caught a bus downtown, ending up just shy of the mall and headed over to catch a show on gardens in Asian art at the Sackler, followed by a quick jaunt over to the National Portrait Gallery, to take in a small show on Josephine Baker (interesting in many ways).  We hung out at the nearby Teaism (yes, over tea) for a while, until it was time for me to head over to the Kennedy Center for Carnival!

I was stunned to find my seat (booked, more or less, at the last minute) was actually in the front row center (behind the conductor) and thoroughly enjoyed the perspective.  Overall, I was impressed with the production, though it did not have the kind of emotional impact I expected.  I know I always says this, but yes, I will write more about the experience at length.  I'm still thinking it through and trying to read some of the source material.

Aside from a few sniffles while I was indoors, I felt pretty decent the rest of the night and woke up the next morning feeling a little tired, but basically well.  When we hit the sidewalk, however, we quickly discovered that the temperature had dropped about ten degrees since the previous day and it was really, really windy.  I started feeling a chill again, which I really couldn't shake off.  We stopped at nearby Annie's for breakfast, but I couldn't finish my food and felt pretty groggy as we headed on to the museum.  I enjoyed the special exhibit (on the relationship between early motion picture imagery and contemporary art) at the Phillips Collection, but never really warmed up even once we got inside.  We went back to my friend's place and I decided it would be best if I just tried to rest up for the remainder of the day, so I could get through the evening's ballet performance.  I begged off dinner (had a few slices of toast on my own), and my friend and her boyfriend were gracious enough to pick me up and drive us all over to the Kennedy Center, which made a big difference.

It turned out to be a good performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream, after all, though I thought the second half seemed in better shape than the first act.  I got a few hours of sound sleep (despite some anxiety about not hearing the alarm) left her place incredibly early the next morning, caught my plane, swung by home (after an all-too-predictable contretemps with the bus), and headed into work for several hours that passed by in a fog.  And then ended up calling in sick the next two days.

Friday was the first time I felt fairly close to normal, but I suffered a slight setback last night after having an unfortunate meal with friends at an Afghan restaurant out in Elmhurst. ( Will I ever have a decent meal at a restaurant on that barren stretch of Queens Boulevard?)  Very disappointing, the food was so greasy and tasteless that you came away just feeling grateful you hadn't gotten food poisoning.  We did stop in at a bubble tea cafe afterwards that made up for it a little.  Now I am just tired, having gotten up very early to do the laundry (even earlier, since it was the beginning of daylight savings time).  This promises to be a long week ahead, but I have hopes it will be a better, more productive one.