Over Here! Over Here! Can You Explain to Us Just How Long You Plan on Being Ill?

Don’t let ‘em fool you: it’s hard work being sick. My second day in a row of not having gone to work and so far I’ve vacuumed, made my bed, washed the dishes, and bleached both cats.

Against their will.

I have also, of course, continued to evade the make-believe press intensely interested in my health and the status of my next book.

Miss Pearl! Miss Pearl! You’ve not worn pants with a zipper for almost a week now! Can you let us know how the elastic waistband has affected your eating habits?

Their shouted questions are drowned out by my second bath of the day.

The problem is that I’m not from people who “take” to being sick. My mother, for example, the woman who went grades 1 through 12 with perfect attendance, has missed exactly two days of work in her lifetime: both days following a roll-over accident during the height of rush hour, a bit of heart-flipping excitement that nets her a spot on that evening’s news.

She moans from the couch, arm in a sling and a bruise the size of a Rottweiler on her back. The image of her on a Gurney being loaded, head first, into the back of an ambulance fills the TV screen. “For cryin’ out loud, Paul,” she cries, “would you look at that angle! Look at how big my hips are!”

There is no footage, no hip-heavy perspective of my last few days, but even if there were, I believe I’ve made my ancestors proud.

I'm on the mend, productive, and clean. Just how we like it.