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June 18 1998, Thursday

     

W

hat with the pain that wracked my body, I slept badly to say the least. I remember the first light of dawn growing brighter and brighter through the Chinquapin Oak boughs. Then, after more delirium and what passed for sleep, I remember opening my eyes and seeing the full brightness of morning. I decided I needed to do something about the problem in my gut. The only solution seemed to be vomitting. Last night I'd tried sticking my thumb down my throat (I'd never done that before!) and I managed to puke up a little intensely acidic yellow fluid. This morning I carried it further, puking several times. This may have helped a little, since I managed to fall asleep fairly rapidly afterwards.

What with all the mirrors glued up everywhere, I can see a lot out the door of my Shaque, and later after I'd woken up again, I could see my mother riding one of her horses.

At noon I took another bath in that brown funky water that passes for potable down in the house. I was too weak to clean the tub first and had to endure the vision of lots of things (bits of leaves, insects, strands of hair) floating around with me, something that would have caused me apoplexy had I been more healthy. My fever had dropped significantly, so despite the hot water, I didn't lapse into delirium.

During the rest of the day, I gradually recovered my strength. By evening I was strong enough to sit in front of a computer and check my email.

The only problem was constipation. It seems that my digestive system had entirely ground to a halt. It wasn't making any of the usual grumbles and growls. My nausea was gone, though, and I was able to drink fruit juice.

Meanwhile, my mother test-drove a 1983 4-wheel-drive Chevy pickup and decided to buy it. Parking spaces are getting kind of limited around here, but she evidently aspires to be a great horse rider, and this is just one of the things she'll need to haul her horses off to those infernal regional cross-country horse events of which she is so fond. She also wants to get a horse trailer, of course. It's her hobby, what am I to say?

My ill-health experienced a bit of a relapse at around sun down. My fever crept back up and I had to retreat to the couch to relax. But my mother made me cream of mushroom soup and even brought it up to the Shaque for me. She's being very kind to me, even if she is a horse nut.

I

'm watching a show about miracles and the Catholic Church on ABC News Thursday Night teevee. The joys of watching grown men talk endlessly about what they couldn't possibly believe! The thing about broadcast teevee (which I've been away from for two years) is that you have to be tolerant; there's only two channels in this rural area.

In other news: there's a new place you can go when the musings start getting just a bit stale. It's called the Random Gus Generator, and it's like a better version of what I was trying to do over at off c e n t e r while Nancy Firedrake was away.

     
 

one year ago
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