I was over at the medical labs this morning to get my blood tested. The past few times I’ve gone in I was able to get in an out within 10 minutes. This time the lineup was ridiculously long. I had to wait for an hour and fifteen minutes just to offer a vial of blood. Craziness. The waiting area was packed. When I looked around I noticed that half of the people there had coughs or colds. It was kind of disgusting. I realize that I was one of those contributing to the general cloud of illness in the labs, but still. I was working hard to suppress the cough, but I slipped up on occasion. My coughs sounded kind of loaded.

By the time I got out, it was about 9:30 or so. If I went to work, I’d arrive there by 11. So, because I was still feeling generally crappy I decided to call in sick. I popped online and asked my manager if he objected to me taking a proper sick day. He said he didn’t. Last week, yes, I stayed at home, but I had no time to rest because of all the work. That’s why I didn’t consider it to be recovery time, you know? Now that the release is over, I feel like I can take time off in good conscience. And I did. I slept away the work day. Right now, I’m a little light-headed but the cough is dry and isn’t happening as often. I’m going to switch meds and take some flu-related pills because of the light-headedness. No more waiting for things to get better: I’m going to battle harder.

There must be something about this time of year for me, eh? Over the past few days, I’ve been looking at that “Around this time…” widget on the left and I saw a lot of entries related to illness popping up. It’s almost strangely cyclical. I think next year, around this time of year I should actively try to beef up my defences. Maybe a lot of echinacea or something like that. Any home remedies or recommendations? How do y’all stay healthy? Or do you?