Doctor: There’s nothing wrong with you that an expensive operation can’t prolong. -Monty Python

Well folks, I was kinda sick today and yesterday, but it was nothing that a day off work, a three hour nap and a two hour shower couldn’t fix. Antibiotics were a help too, and my mom made cream of mushroom soup. I sorta got food poisoning, and since the friend I went out for ice-cream with got sick too (Hi Sonia...glad to know you’re feeling better!) we think it was the ice-cream. She wasn’t too badly off, but me, my immune system is made of second-rate materials, so I got pretty ill- I had a fever and nausea and other fun stuff.

I’ve decided that my least favorite feeling is nausea, though there is an upside to being sick. You really start to appreciate your health, in a warm, fuzzy, sappy, Hallmark type of way, in direct proportion to how sick you were.

Ya’ni, the sicker you were, the happier you feel about being healthy. I know this is true for me, because after a day and a half of nausea, being able to eat a piece of cake without retching is almost ecstasy. It was the same for me when I had my appendix out in 2001, when rebel bacterial forces had staged an insurrection, and the appendix took advantage of the situation and tried to secede from the Union. They were winning the battle too, so I called for reinforcements and the first Battalion of Doctors from Aga Khan Hospital, Karachi, rode in and crushed the mutiny with an iron fist...errr...scalpel.

I learned three things from that experience, the first being, never trust your appendix, the treacherous little worm....

The second being: you never really appreciate your body, especially your arms until suddenly you can’t move them because they’re jabbed full of needles. Your legs deserve extra thanks for not going all jelly-like on a daily basis like they do after a surgery. It’s the same with all of you, every single part of you that doesn’t ache, throb, pain, or torment you on a daily basis.

The third, and most important thing of all is: Thank Allah for your health before you lose it! Most of the time people take being healthy for granted, don’t do it! It’s such a major blessing, and you’ll never know what you had until you’ve lost it.

I must clear Aniraz’s name. Before we realized it was the ice-cream, she thought (and I thought so too!) that it was the chicken she made for dinner that made me ill. It would have been pay-back for the time that I made chicken and we both got salmonella from it. Boy, was that exciting. There’s nothing like an ER visit at 4 am to spice up your life. I’m not going to go into the gory details, but it was basically a severely horrible experience. If Aniraz made me sick it would have been a fitting retribution.

Well since I’m in an internet cafe, I’ll cut it short here. One thing you gotta love about Pakistan: I’m sitting in the Mr.Net Cafe and Islamic IT center, and there’s a section of the cafe for women only. And they’re playing na’at and nasheed in the background. Gotta go to work now. I apologize cuz I don’t think I’ll be in Blogistan as much in the future...at least not until I get my paycheck and can buy more internet hours. :P

Hey...one of my real-life buddies got her blog up! Visit her at www.chaiandapplepie.blogspot.com !

posted by Abez @ 4/16/2003 11:14:00 PM