everybody hurts

warning: unpleasantly scatological blog entry:

bobby vomit posted on friday that he & his family have taken ill. then saturday night, my young nephew ian became ill and was up all night vomiting. then i got an email from connie, who is flying out to visit on wednesday, that she too is sick. and now i seem to be sick as well, cursed with nausea and diarrhea. that three geographically separate households have all been infected at about the same suggests that there are some really nasty germs floating around this season.

i went to bed a bit early last night, after watching the simpsons and american dad after the super bowl. at first i thought i was simply tired from doing various cleaning & tidying around the house (and especially the attic). but quickly it became clear that i was actually ill, as my stomach began to turn. eventually i got out of bed & crawled over to a trash can to throw up.

here's where living in the attic gets to be a pain. as i hunched over the trash can, spewing forth liquid, my bowels loosened slightly from the convulsions. and because the germs had struck me with diarrhea, i couldn't hold it back. i have since soiled three pairs of boxers and pajama pants in that fashion, to varying degrees. at 4am it happened bad enough that i had to hop in the shower to clean up.

i don't feel too bad right now. it has even been a few hours since i had to go downstairs to the toilet (compared to last night, when i'd awake every 90 to 120 minutes with more diarrhea). but i'm not brave enough to try eating anything just yet; i had literally two bites of dry cereal earlier but couldn't hold it down. later i'll probably try to have some soup.

i expect everyone to be mostly recovered by the time connie actually arrives wednesday night. but this still cuts into all my preparation time. i had been counting on having all night tonight & tomorrow to clean up the attic. but i figure i won't have any energy tonight, & possibly not tomorrow night either. so the place won't be as clean as i'd hoped. so be it: connie will understand. i just hope we're all feeling better by then. what tragic timing!