Nurse the Hate: Hate the Fever

I became sick with a fever.  This wasn’t a case of slowly feeling slightly off.  This was a dark cloud thunderstorm that powerfully moved in with considerable force.  I sweated through clothes and bedsheets swinging on a pendulum over to bone chilling shakes.  Slept came in little bursts but was marred not so much by dreams as visions.  At one point I had a consistent run of flash cards rolling through my head of English to some Chinese dialect.  As I have no education in Chinese whatsoever with the exception of walking through San Francisco’s Chinatown last weekend after dark, I can’t really explain why I suddenly know that “yah” means “duck” and “muqin” means “mother”.  High fever is a strange thing.  It wasn’t how I planned to spend my weekend.

The last time I got a fever like this was when I lived in my crummy duplex.  I lived on the top floor and got sick in a thunderclap like this.  I remember at one point having a fever so badly my muscles were cramping and I started to hallucinate.  For some reason I felt like I needed to get out of bed and get outside to cool off.  I wasn’t able to walk.  I started to crawl across my floor.  I woke up a few hours later on the floor of my dining room in my underwear.  It is odd to be embarrassed and all alone.  I slunk over to my couch and had the good fortune to find “Rock, Rock, Rock” on cable.  I spent the next day almost comatose on the couch until making a soup and ginger ale run late that night.

Yesterday was a day on the couch where my 100 degree fever made me feel almost crisp and refreshed by comparison to the previous evening.  It was very much like that day in the duplex watching “Rock, Rock, Rock” except I gambled on the NCAA Tournament games and let them wash over me.  I did go 2-0, yet wagered almost nothing on them as I wisely noted my judgement was perhaps a bit compromised.  I am actually showered and dressed today, so I’m almost human once again.  Still, it feels like Recovery Couch Day Part 2, and that means NCAA Gambling.  What else can you do?  I’m sure as hell not going to watch a “Jack Reacher” movie.

The first game is Florida v South Carolina.  Florida is, as usual, stacked with blue chip players.  South Carolina is the feel good story of a bunch of guys playing great team defense.  Everyone loves a Cinderella story.  South Carolina has been so good in these last three games, it must mean that this is a team that has locked in to some magic, yes?  Nah.  I am going with the team of blue chip guys that are bigger, stronger and faster.  Florida -3.

The late game is one of these Darth Vadar vs Darth Vadar games.  It is hard to root for either North Carolina or Kentucky, though by proximity I have been closer to the obnoxious Kentucky fans than Tarheel fans.  As far as I know the Tarheel faithful might be terrible as well, but the waves of self important Kentucky fans with their revolving door of hired gun players is too much.  I am going to go with my heart on this one (and even give up the points) and taking North Carolina -2.5.

Somebody bring me medicine.