Oh, geeze… Again?

I was happily sitting at work this morning, when my cell phone tootled it’s happy little “Your Wife Is Calling” tune. “Hi, Snookums,” I said. “How are you?”

“Oh, my,” she said. “I feel just awful. My head’s burning up und I can’t breathe and I’m so dizzy… I’m on my way home now. Can you come home now too?” I looked at the clock on my computer. It was just eleven, and I’d shown up late for work.

“Gosh, Honey,” I replied. “I’d better stay here for a while. We’ve got lots to do, and we need the money.” I looked at the clock again, willing it ahead to, say, five. It didn’t change. “You just go home and get all comfy in the bed and I’ll be home soon for lunch.” She agreed that going to a nice warm comfy bed sounded good and hung up. I turned back to my computer and tried to concentrate on my work. It’s hard to concentrate on a repetitive task when you’re wife is ill. I’m kind of happy I wasn’t trying to be creative at the time… The phone tootled again. Dagmar.

“Hello,” I said. “What’s up, Chicken-Butt?”

“I tried to stop at the store around the corner from our house to buy some bread, but I almost passed out. I bought the bread, but can you stop at the grocery store for some ginger ale and some nice lemon water? I’m so very thirsty…”

I agreed that I could, yes indeedy, stop at the store and buy aforementioned beverages for my beloved Hunny-Bear. I made a deal with my boss – “Is it okay if I go home,” I asked. “My wife isn’t feeling well. If something comes up, you can call my cell phone…” The boss was okay with that, so off to the store I went.

Forty-five minutes later I was unloading cans of chicken soup and applesauce into our “pantry.” (I’m not sure what to call the shelves upon which our food rests. They’re just shelves, really, but it sounds kind of silly to call them shelves. Oh well.) I took the water and ginger ale in to my beloved so she could slurp on those whilst I heated up some nice chicky-soup.

“You sound terrible,” my beloved called from the other room. “That cough just isn’t getting any better.”

“I’m fine,” I said. “I’m just getting over pneumonia, that’s all.” We sat to eat the soup. It was good soup. I smacked my lips appreciatively. “I think I may take a little of that cough syrup the doctor gave me,” I said. “It makes me a little groggy, but it did keep me from coughing so much.” Ten minutes later I was happily sedated on the couch. Five minutes after that I was asleep.

At five in the afternoon I woke up in the bedroom. How I got there is a mystery that I’ll blame on the cough syrup. My poor sick Austrian Snowflake was looking at me. “I don’t feel well,” she said. “Und you have that wheeze back again and you’re hot. We’re going to the doctor-man.” I half-heartedly protested, but it sounded pretty feeble even to me. “But the last time I went to the doctor I was fine until I got there,” I said. “But when I left I had pneumonia. The doctor gave me pneumonia! I don’t want to go back…”

Half an hour later I was sitting all by myself in that lonely little room where they park you until the doctor finishes his dinner. My only consolation was that Dagmar was in the room right next to me. I tapped on the wall a few times and heard her tap back. That made me happy.

Fast-forward an hour.

“You have an upper respiratory infection,” the doctor-man told Dagmar. “I’m going to give you these antibiotics…” He scribbled on his little pad. “And you,” he said, turning my direction, “I don’t know what to do with you. I don’t know if you have pneumonia again, or if you still have pneumonia from two weeks ago, but you have pneumonia.” I sighed and rolled my eyes. “Not again,” I wheezed. (It was supposed to be a wail, but it was in reality a wheeze.)

“You have to take these thirteen-dollar pills for ten days. I’m also gonna give you a shot of antibiotics in your keester. You need to come back in again on Wednesday,” the doctor-man told me, scribbling on his little pad. “After I give you this shot in your butt you have to sit in the waiting room for at least twenty minutes, just in case you have a reaction – it’s pretty potent stuff.” The doctor poked about in his charts for a second. “You know, you’re both pretty ill. You have a fever of 101.1, and you have a fever of…” he flipped back and forth a few times in his notes, “101.1 too. You both have the same temperature.” He flipped his notes again. “That’s odd. You guys must spend a lot of time together, huh?”

The nice nurse-lady gave me a pretty sticker for being so brave when I got the shot. That made me proud.

So I have pneumonia, still. Or again. Whichever. The X-Rays ratted me out. Only this time I also have a very sore rump from the shot and a very ill wife. The next few days are going to be interesting!

I’m really worried about Dagmar. She’s been ill for over a month now without any relief. At least the pleurisy pain in my chest went away – she’s been feeling poorly the whole time. I’m sure I’ll feel fine tomorrow, but gosh I hope Dagmar feels better! It rips my little heart out to see her so sick.

Reaction

Some day I’m going to write something so startling and provocative that I’ll get a reaction from people. So far I’ve gotten a few e-mails from friends about my blog – usually the political stuff – but I’ve yet to write anything that got me TWO comments or e-mails. I thought for sure that my last post about religion would do it, but I only got one e-mail. Oh well.

So now I’m going to ponder and think and reflect until I can find a topic that will get people riled up. Maybe a nice fictional piece, a satire or something. Wish me luck! But for now I’m going to take my poor ailing lung and go to bed and snuggle with my poor ailing wife.