Sick, Day #2

Here’s a visual for you: Ben and I, now both ill, sitting on our couch, eating Chinese takeout, watching Lake Placid on cable, and still feebly attempting to get work done on our laptops before the day ends.

With the small exception of the takeout, life is bad. Real bad.

And, unfortunately for him, Ben has to drive to a generic New Jersey hotel conference room tomorrow to tape a grueling 12 hours of fighter interviews. I plan on hanging out in my sweatpants all day and eating his leftover General Tso’s chicken in his absence, but only out of love.

(Oh, dude, an enormous and ancient crocodile just ate a bear in Lake Placid. It almost makes up for the poor acting.)

Being mostly sick is weird because you can still do stuff, but you don’t really have the energy to do real work or concentrate on anything too important. Add this to the fact that I discovered a bunch of old high school people on facebook - yes, facebook, the enormous and ancient crocodile of procrastination and time sucks - and you have a strange, wasted day indeed.

Since I missed my high school reunion a couple of years ago, I hadn’t really seen many people except for the small circles of close friends that I’ve kept in touch with, and catching up with many of their lives was downright weird, even more so considering my fever. A jock turned sensitive photographer? People holding down real jobs? People with babies? Everyone is fat?

The fat thing is especially weird. I mean, I’ve put on 20 pounds since graduating high school too, and I think to strangers most people are still considered normal-weighted. But the last time I saw them, they were at the height of their youth - 18, tanned, unjaded, beerbellyless. Now they look like regular people. And sometimes wear things like turtlenecks.

What I’m trying to say is, it makes you take stock of your life. I guess other people are probably shocked that I’m married. Or still wearing that same t-shirt.

Well, Lake Placid is over, after a less-than-thrilling 79 minutes. Don’t worry, they left plenty of room for a sequel. I think I’m going to take a Tylenol PM and shiver in bed for a while before the drugs kick in. Hopefully I won’t have night terrors about my misspent youth or large, digitally mediocre reptiles. And hopefully I’ll have an update worth reading tomorrow.