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I woke up this morning and my fever has broken! Hooray!

Though, you may not know it by looking at me, I feel better. Of course, I go through phases during the day where around 6:30pm (not-so-coincidentally the time as I write this) , I feel the best I’m going to feel all day. The worst I feel is usually mid-morning. I went home early today so I could rest, but tracked through the doctor’s office on the way.

She checked my heart-rate. Fine. Temperature, 101. Not so good. Blood-pressure, high, but not surprising considering my temp. She listened to my chest, and heard the rattling I was complaining about. “Oh!” she said quickly, “you may have pneumonia!”

Great.

Turns out, though, that it sounds worse than it is. She gave me an antibiotic (which normally I wouldn’t accept, but I’m not fucking around with pneumonia), and said to keep up the tylenol and guaifenecin (Robitussin) and I should be okay in a week. To be safe, I have a prescription for a chest-film, which I’ll try and do tomorrow.

I was exceptionally tired all through the day today, which was really getting in the way of my film projects at work. Tomorrow is going to be relatively rigorous, so I need to get my energy back up.

I thought I’d be well enough to go out on Sunday for family Easter festivities. I felt good enough to go out and visit, especially after a big hit of cough medicine and advil. In fact, I made it through the day pretty well, until I got home. 

Everybody gets sick from time to time – it’s only natural. You can be Jack-frickin’-LeLane, and still get sick. Still, ever since I moved back to DC, I seem to get sick very very often. It could be a function of several things. 

First and probably foremost, I’ve gained weight. A lot of weight. When I left Austin, I was tipping the scales at 179. I was really happy there, but my middle was still a teeny bit jiggly. I had been as heavy as 206, so 27 pounds was a huge deal for me.
Moving back, the biggest difference in my lifestyle was my job. I had a 45 minute to an hour commute, each way, which limited the amount of time I was able to spend in the gym. It wasn’t much time, but it made the difference between an almost entirely sedentary lifestyle vs a mildly active lifestyle. Plus, my old coworkers and friends were very supportive when it came to the social side of eating. When we got together, we ate well, but we ate healthily.
Now, my friends and coworkers love to overindulge. Often, someone brings cookies or cupcakes into the office, and when I’m having a stressful day, which happens quite often lately, I get all snacky. That’s bad. That, coupled with two hours on the road every day cutting into my workout time, means I ingest more than I work off. So, now I’m about 198.

So that’s my weight problem in two paragraphs. 

Secondly, where I work is, to put it mildly, filthy. We have about 20 people in our little space, and because we manage returns in our office, it tends to get junked up with broken gadgets, flattened boxes, dust and packing peanuts. We’re always so busy, we really don’t have a lot of time to clean it up. Because lots of boxes of stuff from all corners of the globe move through here, and gets handled, we’re always picking up whatever bug gets smeared onto the boxes. If the killer bird flu ever burned through the USA, I’m certain we’d be a lovely little petri dish for the DC area. 

About three days ago, I started noticing our Photographer, and our lead programmer started hacking up a lung. I was certain I was about to get nailed by some kinda SARS. Last night, I started to get a little scratchy throat. This morning, I woke up with a painful hacking cough, aches and congestion. 

So, is it exposure to additional virii? Is it a weakened immune system that stems from overall poor physical health? Is it both? Either way, I feel like poo, and am loving my chair right now.