Not strep

So it must be bubonic plague (despite the continued lack of visible buboes), right? I am seriously baffled as to how I am the one still the sickest around here. Everyone else gets it and recovers a couple of days later. Me, I'm still in viral purgatory. And yes, since it's a virus (albeit one that clearly intends to kill me), that means no good drugs to combat said awfulness, unless you count the doctor's suggestion that I snort a saline spray to give some relief to the "clearly visible rawness" at the back of my throat (which was very much not helped by the scraping involved for the ultimately worthless rapid strep test). Now I know how addicts feel. I darn near broke into sobs at the news it wasn't strep and therefore not subject to modern medicine's miracles. Not that I didn't already know that, but well, when it hurts to swallow your own spit, hope springs eternal that it'll be bacterial. ::whine, whine, whine:: I may never feel human again.

After the marathon was over and the final mupdate written (they can be found on the blog starting in May 2008 for those who missed that cheapest of all entertainment), several people mentioned they would even read my grocery lists if I would just keep writing. Curse them if you like, but here's your chance. On the way home from the doctor, I needed to stop and get milk for the cheerfully healthy around here (damn their eyes!) and I decided I would indulge my sad, sick self. The ultimate contents of my grocery cart? 2 gallons of milk, deli-made mashed potatoes, 2 cans of Campbell's chicken noodle soup (cause nobody wants the grown-up kind when they are sick and need their mommy--including me!), 2 six packs of Jello cups (I stayed reasonably decent and went for fat free/sugar free, which only worked because the idea of chocolate pudding residue on my raw throat made me tear up in the dairy aisle--otherwise it definitely would have been pudding, hands down), 1 avocado (chilled, these are nice and smooth and creamy sliding down a raw throat--who cares if they are packed with 9 trillion grams of fat; I got fat free Jello so I deserve the avocado), a small thing of potato salad (for when I feel a bit better), and my own personal "I'm sick so humor me" indulgence: Chef Boyardee mini ravioli. Frankly I'm shocked the cashier didn't take one look at the contents of my basket and ask me to breathe in a different direction. Or maybe to find a different line. Or even to take a break to pop an entire bag of echinacea before she touched anything that had touched my germ-infested hands. Could my shopping have screamed "dying of the plague" any louder? The only thing I was missing as a comfort food was my grandmother's mac and cheese. And well, the local grocery store certainly can't pull that off.