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more hungry than nauseated
Friday, December 19 2025
Last night Neville had managed to bring a deer leg in through the pet door, and he'd spent all the time since then guarding it, menacing even the cats if they strolled by too closely. That leg was his, damn it, and even if he had no interest in chewing on it right then, nobody else could have it. As is always the case, Neville eventually came to feel burdened by responsibility of guarding the leg, not liking the sort of dog he becomes when presented such a windfall. He then lies half-asleep, watching everyone out of an open eye and wishing he could sleep the way he normally can. This morning I managed to get up enough energy to go downstairs, where I collaborated with Gretchen to get that leg away from Neville. While she distracted him with a treat, I sent out my arm like a bolt of lightning, grabbed that leg, and threw it out in the garage. Neville could go back to being the dog he likes being!
I realized as I was doing this that the teeshirt I'd been wearing was drenched in sweat, just another unpleasant side effect of the kind of illness that can keep you in bed all day.
Gretchen had me take another covid test this morning just in case the negative result from yesterday's test was false. But I tested negative again, indicating that whatever I had was not covid, despite its many covid-like symptoms (particularly the long initial period featuing only a dry, unproductive cough). This was good, because it meant Gretchen could probably work at the bookstore despite possible exposure to whatever I have. But this disease is pretty bad, and I'd rather have my last case of covid than this.
At some point this afternoon, I decided to see if taking a bath might make me feel better. All that humid air rising off the water might help loosen the phlegm in my lungs and make coughing it up less of a chore. I managed to take the bath okay, and the water was plenty hot. But when I finally decided to get out of the water, I wasn't quite healthy enough to handle the huge drop in blood pressure that happens in that moment. All your blood has fled your core and gone to your skin, and standing up then further reduces it in your brain. I started feeling a combination of light-headed and nauseated, and there was no way I could towel off completely before passing out. So I staggered out to the teevee room couch and collapsed on it while still drenched in bath water. I didn't even bother to pull a blanket over me; the coolness of the air felt good. But I still felt so nauseated that I called for Gretchen to fetch me something to throw up in, since vomiting seemed inevitable. So she got me the small plastic tub I'd salvaged from her medical stay in Albany back in 2017 and the plan was to throw up into that if I had to. But that feeling passed, and I decided maybe the problem was actually that I needed to eat some food. So I had Gretchen get me another peanut butter sandwich. There was also apparently some lemon cake in the house which she brought up too. That lemon cake almost had me feeling normal again, aside from the sore throat, body aches, headaches, and general malaise.
As I experienced yet another night of fever dreams, I noticed I was having unusual pain coming from my bones, particularly the parts of my femurs that turn horizontal before widening into the balls that sit inside my hip joints.
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