Tis the Season

That could be a picture of our Christmas tree this year, but isn't.

We don't have one yet, and won't for at least another week. Bernie found an article about respiratory illness spikes during the Christmas season, and how they're apparently often linked to the mold spore content of the air around cut Christmas trees. The longer the tree is up, the higher the mold spore count, and thus the more likely to trigger respiratory illness.

And that, O World, is something this household does not need any more of. Four out of the five of us have been treated for pneumonia this autumn, so we're going to wait a week and some before setting off to cut our tree.

I have the dubious honor of being the final Coughing-The-Lungs-Out victim in this latest germy import. The doctor, when I saw her today, pitied me greatly, but informed me it was "just" a horrible hacking, wracking, nauseating, achy virus and that I'd live through it, bitterly perhaps, but in time I'd feel like a human being again.

Good news, eh?

Unlike some friends, who can turn sick-time into productive channels, I'm too much of a bitchy baby when I'm ill. Writing and art work are far from whatever side of my brain I use for those things, and all I can think of are mean things to say about the person who passed this freakin' bug on to me. (Hint: He had the gall to chuckle at me when my voice disappeared today.)

I did, however, find that the time went by more quickly when I had something to read. I'd ordered Lisa See's Snow Flower and the Secret Fan and The Prestige by Christopher Priest a few weeks ago, so I picked them up, turned on my reading lamp, and had at them. I won't do a review on them here -- I'm really not a good reviewer of books. It's enough to say that I read them through, and enjoyed their distraction, though I probably won't read them again.

The only other new books I have at hand are too creepy and depressing. Someday, but not on a rainy winter night when I'm alone in the house feeling like crap.