Back once again

Alright, I’m vaguely back with a status update. As I emailed a friend today when she asked if I was ok: “Ok is a relative term.” I’m now at the point where I no longer feel like absolute crap, doctors have decided what my problems are if not quite given me a clean bill of health, and my overall soreness has decreased to the point where I can function again. And if you are wondering how a fever can cause someone to injure their back, well, if you know me you know that is a surprisingly common occurrence.

(It’s strange telling a new doctor your full medical history and discovering that he is not believing a word of it. Or more like “How the hell did you break that?” My regular doctor back in Chicago would just shake his head every time I came in to see him. He was stunned the one time I actually came in for a physical as opposed to the typical disaster.)

I’ll tell the full story at some point, especially as it may impact a good portion of my life for the next couple of months. Luckily it looks like I did no serious damage but I’m reaching the age where these types of misadventures have gone from freak accidents to things to be concerned about. Welcome to middle age I guess.

Something else I have to say. I’ve given the state of Kansas a lot of crap over the past few years. And while some of it they deserved (banning The Catcher in the Rye) I’ve probably been a little too harsh. I really owe a great deal of thanks to everyone at KU Med who did excellent work helping me figure out just what the hell happened over the past few days. As someone who has been in emergency rooms in several countries it was a definite nice sight to see. Just wanted to say that before the bill arrives.

Since it’s Wednesday (and I want to post something that I’ll enjoy after a rough couple of days) here is Neko Case’s video for “Maybe Sparrow”.

Fever In, Fever Out

Best of 120 Minutes: It surprises me that I can remember anything from the 1993/1994 time range. I’m not talking about the fact that there has been a lot of Jager under the bridge between now and then. It’s not because pretty much my entire life focused on incomprehensible circuit diagrams and things being measured in nanometers. It wasn’t even my attempt to date one girl, then abandoning that plan to date her roommate and then nicely blowing the entire thing. No, the main reason is that due to the hundreds of CDs that I’ve bought since then I can’t figure out how I can recall videos from bands I never even really listened to.

Like Jawbox for example. Here is what I know about Jawbox. They had a female bass player like every other band in 1993. I think they were from Washington D.C. That’s it. Oh, and this video about the freakiest children’s birthday party ever. For some reason I always forget the present of the stuffed dog (not stuffed as in the carnival prize meaning of the term) but always remember the bass player looking up at the camera at the end of the song. Still dig the song though.

I wish I had a whole bunch of stories about my sordid life to share from this weekend but sadly this entire weekend was basically spent lying on the couch sick. I started feeling it Friday night. I went out to see Mark Olson (formerly of The Jayhawks) in concert and had a good time. Even as the show was coming to an end I could feel my body trying to shut down. Got home and pretty much went straight to bed. Got up on Saturday and was feeling pretty decent. Did some shopping, had breakfast, started laundry and was all set to attack a pretty large to do list. Then, I discovered that I have ESPNU and could actually watch Illinois-Syracuse and decided to lie down on the couch and watch the first half. That may have been a bad choice.

Basically my body decided to complain about the fact that I have been going full throttle for a good month now with no break. Not even on the weekends where I have had some late Saturday nights on top of long weeks in the office. So while watching my Illini play really good ball I could start feeling myself get the chills. And then I started to sweat. Then every joint in my body, including a few I didn’t think I have, started to ache. It was at that point I realized that I probably wasn’t going to be able to go barhopping last night.

This happens to me once or twice a year where I just get worn down to the point where my body forces me to stop. Fever, aches, headaches, general overall feelings of crappines. Not something that typically hits me in September but there is always a week in January or February that follows this exact same pattern. My treatment is the same, sit on the couch and watch television, Advil for the pain, soup for my meals, and a lot of whining in general. It’ll break in a day or two and I’ll be fine, though I should probably take a day off in the near term so that I can get back on track.

(At some point in the next few days I should write about the fact that I could probably take Advil every day and be perfectly justified (other than it would create absolute havoc on my body). It’s been ten years since I had my first injury that has resulted in constant pain and I really should tell that story. It explains why I stand with a noticeable tilt and why I no longer golf.)

Anyway, I have one football story I need to post here. Obviously, Notre Dame was pitiful and even I turned it off at halftime. I played as ND on PS2 and I couldn’t score there either. Here is what bothers me. Charlie Weis is in his third year. Ron Zook at Illinois is also in his third year. After watching both teams on Saturday there is no doubt in my mind that Illinois has a better team. True, Syracuse is bad but this Illini squad really should have beat Missouri and almost did with a backup quarterback. Notre Dame just looks pitiful out there. The defense is slightly ok but the offense honestly looks like it has no weapons. The fact that the Illini are better than the Irish really bothers me. Ron Zook had a hell of a lot less to work with than Charlie Weis in terms of players and attention for recruits. After two straight two win seasons I can see Illinois going six and six and making a bowl game, which would be a huge accomplishment. I can even see an upset of Michigan due to the spread offense. For ND to go from BCS bowls to a team that seemingly can’t run any offense and doesn’t seem to have any talent is really frightening.

The five random CDs for the week:
1) Buddy Miller “Midnight and Lonesome”
2) Lyle Lovett “My Baby Don’t Tolerate”
3) Various Artists “Down From the Mountain”
4) Kelly Willis “Easy”
5) Kelly Willis “Translated From Love”