I wish I could say that I’ve been off researching the peculiar habits of hallucinogenic tree frogs, or scaling mountain peaks to gather the last of the world’s Fairie Floss Edelweiss (there is no such thing. I think), or developing new recipes for customized dreams. Sadly not. I did have one fine fall day of fishing for deep water lake trout (trolling, not downrigging, fyi) before it all came crashing down.
For the past week+ I have been doing my bit to support the world’s tissue manufacturing companies. Mr. Man and I caught a truly unpleasant virus and proceeded to blow our way through not one, not two, but three boxes of tissue.
I lost weight, lost energy, and struggled to finish basic tasks (like cracking open yet another bottle of cough syrup). Writing was suddenly out of the question. Unpleasant. Poorly timed. And, in it’s own way, interesting.
I’ve learned that I have two scales on which to measure illness. The first involves books, and the second, food.
A typical cold is tedious and congested but I can still read. This past week I was lucky to be able to focus on a few pages at a time. Very bad.
Feeding a normal cold involves lots of liquids and spicy food. Whip up a quick Thai shrimp soup with glass noodles, lime, and chili sauce and enjoy. (It’s an excellent rehydrator and decongestant, by the way.) This past week, I could not cook. Flavors tasted off, my timing was a disaster, and I made (I pause here in shame) bad fried rice.
Bad fried rice! Unpossible! I’ve been making some version of this dish since I was in the single digits, and while it may not have always been great, it has never been distasteful. (Ok, there was that one time in junior high school but I still have questions about those bean sprouts.) That streak is over.
So, not the best week here at the chateau but! quite a lot of celebrating now that the end is in sight.
That’s where I’ve been and what I’ve learned. I hope you all had better days:)
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