Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Fresh off a 10-hour bender of sleep, I will tell you–confidently–that there can be too much of a good thing. At 10:30 PM yesterday, a wave of weariness struck me, and in my best approximation of what responsible people do, I decided to call it a night. Bad decision. I kept waking in the wee hours of the morning, which I took to be my internal clock saying, “Never do this again.” It seemed like a good idea at the time, though, especially with the recent cold spell. There’s something about freezing weather that makes you want to hibernate like a bear, if bears were called to commute each morning to things far less delicious than honey.

There was even sleet on Friday, in the first true taste of winter, and it reminded me of Chicago. A few things have evoked the Midwest recently, in fact. On my drive home from work, I saw a woman pull to a complete stop in the right lane, put her hazards on, and wipe ice off her windshield with her sleeve. Now, that debacle was pure Charlotte. But there have been other manifestations of Chi-town as of late: calls from 847 numbers, for instance, what I can only imagine are solicitations for alumni donations. A headhunter–not the Aboriginal kind–based in Des Plaines, of all places, reached out about an opportunity.

Mainly it’s been the weather, and when you pair the cold with the flu pandemic, you start getting really cautious. I’ve persisted without a flu shot so far, and in its place I’ve enacted a strict regimen of not touching door handles, keeping my mouth shut outdoors and breathing primarily through my nose, and pounding back vitamin C drops. I don’t know how medically sound the drops are, frankly. I could’ve sworn someone told me vitamin C helps fortify the immune system. Or maybe I’ve been really been warding off scurvy all this time, and dumb luck, rather than vitamin drops, has inoculated me against the flu.