Muh Muh Muh My Corona (virus)

@OscarMadison, please don’t wear a hairshirt on that carrot bed.

 

Get better soon @OscarMadison !

 

I feel like I'm getting some unexpected (but ultimately good) perspective on COVID-19 -- or maybe it's just the latest, more cold-like strain, given my experience. I don't know. But it's making me look and think back, and wonder, to be honest.

Here's the situation: I and everyone else in my house has been fully vaccinated, and boostered, for a while now. I, perhaps stupidly, have missed traveling terribly and decided to finally go on my first cruise since January of 2020, and the others in the house came with me. Although just a short jaunt to Cabo San Lucas, it was a nice getaway and we all felt good and were happy we went. But it seems we all came back with COVID-19, because after returning to work for two days, I began not feeling myself -- not awful, but just...not right. Another who'd gone on the trip also started coughing and unbeknownst to me, tested himself and found he was positive for COVID. So, the next day, I did the same, and also came up positive.

I've had to put in for a five-day-at-a-time COVID-related leave of absence and have been laid up the past few days, as have, now, each of the other two people in the house, as we've all tested positive at this point.

But here's the thing: Although I've felt at times as if I've been hit by truck and am, frankly, thankful I haven't actually had to go to work, it has just felt like, well, a cold. And that's been the experience for all of us.

And honestly, I can't imagine people actually dying from this. To think that hundreds of thousands have done so, well, now it really is almost inconceivable to me.

That tells me to thank God for the vaccines, which, despite the fact that people are catching COVID-19 even though they've had them, they must be working -- rather well, I guess. Or else, this variant that we have is just not at all what the first iteration was in terms of deadliness. This gives me hope and makes me thankful, particularly on behalf of my elderly mom, who is vulnerable, particularly, because she already has heart and breathing issues.

I tested myself again yesterday, and am still positive, even though I feel, mostly, pretty good now. But I cannot return to work without showing a negative test, so now I am even actually getting a little worried as to how long this is all going to take to resolve, particularly as I start feeling like I'm really not even that sick. (Walmart had a lot of employee abuse of its COVID-related absence system early on, with associates taking advantage of it to just be off for what amounted to long, or repeated, vacations for people who weren't actually sick. The system has been changed a bit to prevent that, but I don't want to be seen as "one of those.")

Anyway, it has been somewhat surprising, and anathema to my expectations, given the horror of the past two, nearly-three years. I can't believe I went all this time without suffering anything close to COVID, or even just a regular cold, and that I'm only dealing with it now. So, we're guessing it had to be because of the cruise, where vaccination status/cards were checked upon embarkation, but masks were optional and not many passengers wore them. (We didn't, either).

 

It's not really me they want to get at. They don't know me beyond possibly recognizing me in our big/little suburb. Even though I have never said a word to anyone who has gone maskless and quietly backed away when people got too close, they see people like me as an indictment of their choices. No. Let me rephrase that. This adherence to the cult is their identity. By not toeing the line, I am casting aspersions on what they hold dear and see as their identifying label. They do this without realizing there may be a compelling reason someone may have made a different choice about the precautions they take. What I look like is what they parse as representative of people who don't follow their cult. It makes them irrationally angry to see someone doing what they don't want to do. I don't get it, either.

Holy hell, pneumonia hurts and it's scary. So is CHF and hearing the word "rales," used just outside of my ER bay. I'll be damned if I have to go through that again, especially because someone couldn't respect another person's boundaries. I might not have been able to rip out an internal organ, but scare me enough and a person might find out how hard I can hit. Irrational anger brought on by fight or flight impulse can do that to a person. I was with a male friend who snapped at him that I'd just gotten out of the hospital and what the hell was wrong with him, etc...

"Whut's rawng with her?"

"None of your business. Now leave us alone!"

It's not actual rednecks I loathe, it's the fauxnecks who gravitate to Middle Tennessee because they think they can act like jackasses here with no consequences.

Thanks, man!

Thanks for letting me rant it out.

 

Rant away, Oscar. That's what we do here.

 

We've been so good at tamping down covid that all the other typical winter respiratory illnesses — cold, flu, RSV and the ever-pervasive "crud" — are spring-loaded and bouncing back with a vengeance. At least for a season, covid has a crowded field.

 

feel better

wear a mask

 

I had a similar experience at the end of October. I had received four vaccinations. I was touring Canada. I visited Montreal and the weather was beautiful, about 68 and sunny, so I rode around on the top of a tour bus with a only wearing a button up sweater.

I woke up Monday planning to drive to Ottawa, which is about 3.5 hours. and on Monday morning was going to drive to Ottawa, which is about a 3.5 hour drive. I had a really, really bad cold and felt incredibly tired. I never thought about having COVID but instead blamed it on stupidly sitting on top of the bus. I dragged myself to the hotel and crashed the next day.

I then decided to drive back to Northern Virginia. It was about an eight hour drive and my goal was to drive halfway. Instead I actually felt healthy enough to drive the entire distance. When I got home my wife insisted I take a test and I was positive. I continued to feel like I had a bad cold for a week and a half but that was the extent of my distress.

 

From your post to God's ears.

I do whenever I'm out. A KN95 underneath my stylin' cat print cotton mask.

@WriteThinking and @LanceyHoward Your stories make me grateful (on your behalf, and yes that is presumptuous as all get-out) there is a vax and it seems to work.

 

We all just got the booster recently. I felt incredibly tired and sore and would’ve called out if I had to be in at work, I would’ve called out. But, I’ve been lucky and was able to work from home.

My daughter went to school and fainted during band practice. Most likely a combination of things, the booster, not eating much and she doesn’t drink enough water. But she got a long weekend out of it and is fine.

 

Eight days since the last post and no Mom's Warm Pi in sight. Just the same old repackaged Omicron.

Maybe covid *is* over, or at least now endemic. The tell will be when covid deaths drop under flu deaths.