of green beans and cleaner basements

you'd think that after you religiously took your vitamins and worked out like crazy in the gym that the probability of getting sick would be reduced to nil.

in the dark, early hours of wednesday morning, my nightmares told me i swallowed a bean as big as a needle's point. and i awoke, shivering under two layers of blanket and comforter, convinced that if i retrieved the green-glowing stone which intruded my system then all would be back to normal. i was curled up the whole time, attempting to preserve self-generated heat by keeping my surface area minimized so that what i gave off, i absorbed back. the cold air blew down steadily and my bed continued to heat up as the nightmares persisted long after breakfast had been served and offices had considered in-transit employees late for the day. the stone remained unseen and i called in sick (which extended -- welcomely -- to the weekend).

if my memory serves me right, this had been the longest time i had to stay in bed, not counting the chicken pox and measles attacks of my childhood. the four days saw me fast asleep, watching TV or catching up on some overdue reading.

while it was terribly unpleasant for my body to experience rapid fluctuations in temperature throughout my brief vacation from work (swinging two degrees up and down as easily as punching the numbers on an a/c remote control), i was quite entertained and rather pleased to be in the company of harry potter, an ecstatic italian crowd, a rather disappointing portuguese football team and the superb lineup of finalists from wimbledon.

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moving to some good news, G is finally back. and we welcomed him to a much cleaner and organized basement this time. he returned last wednesday, the first day of my undesirable flu. so i had to watch them work together from a slight distance. he's still a bit disoriented, but definitely better. welcome, home, bro!