Being Sick Sucks

I don’t think there are too many people who enjoy being sick, but sometimes it can signal a moment to stop, and rest and let your body heal. I am way past that moment! I don’t get sick very often, and generally, if and when I do it lasts a few days, and I sleep a lot and then get back to work. This time has been a bit lot more challenging. I started feeling lousy on Monday, no, not Monday a few days ago, Monday October 6th, and I am now ten days in, and sick of being sick. All I want to do is sleep, and complain, I really like complaining, but I hardly have the energy to complain, and frankly that would involve a phone conversation, and talking on the phone is a real challenge because part of my illness involves having lost all hearing in my right ear, making all verbal communication tough.

What I have also discovered is that like seeing, there is a dimensional aspect to hearing. Many years ago I had an eye infection and had to wear an eye patch for a few days, and was shocked at my loss of depth perception. My loss of half my hearing is having a similar effect. I can’t tell where sounds are coming from. Yesterday my phone was ringing, and yes I could hear it, but I had no idea where the sound was coming from. I’m also having trouble distinguishing real from virtual noises. And cooking. Yes, for some reason all this is affecting my ability to cook. (Sorry it took me so long to get here.)

Naturally when you feel lousy it impacts your appetite, and in my case, my desire to cook anything more complicated than a scrambled egg, or heating up a can (horrors) of soup. The odd thing about this is that it all seems related to my ear, and the right side of my head which since last Friday has felt encased in plaster, including a very exciting (though mercifully brief) episode of vertigo. Ordinarily even when I’m sick I can manage to drag myself to the store, gather the necessary ingredients for chicken soup, and throw some together. But for some reason this ear thing has nearly paralyzed me. I am not inclined to cook anything, and though I am eating, it isn’t as much fun as usual. But apparently my brain misses all the cooking I usually do.

Last night I had a very funny dream, and I will share it with you with the understanding that my dream though fascinating to me, may be quite boring to you, but to pique your interest I will start by saying my dream took place at Food Network, and stars Bobby Flay and José Garces.  I was involved in a cooking competition, and it was down to the last two contestants, me, and another (faceless) woman. For the final event each of us was going to be paired with one of the star chefs, and we had to compete to see who would get first choice of Bobby or José. It was pretty tense. For this competition we had several plates of French pastries, each plate held six of the same pastries cooked to varying doneness, and we had to identify which pastry from each group was cooked perfectly. The pressure was intense, and I know that in haste I made an error on the French apple pastry, choosing one that was slightly underdone, damn!

When we were done however, it turned out that I had won! My opponent had gotten almost all of them wrong. Then in a turn of events, the chefs were going to choose us, not the other way around, and Bobby chose my opponent, which really hurt my feelings. As far as I am aware, in my own reality I have no particular preference for either chef, and can’t say either one figures into my thoughts maybe ever, but dreams are funny. The dream goes on a bit, but after this it gets fuzzy, and mainly personal in a way that would be excruciatingly dull for you (I swear). Thanks for letting me complain, and  also reading this far. Clearly I need to get better and get cooking!