Disease, Continued

If I have been sick in the last two weeks, and you have been sick as well, then God help you.

Our conversation goes one of two ways:

You: *Sneezes*
Me: "OH DO YOU HAVE A COLD?" (Makes Sign of Cross, leaves)

or

You: "Ugh, I just got over the worst cold last week."
Me: "Oh! I just had a cold. Did it start with insomnia, and then the next day did you have congestion for a few hours, but then that night your nose started running non-stop for the next two days, but only on one side, and then you puked and had epic diarrhea and then you felt better?"
You: "Yes!" (or sometimes, "Noooo ... ?")

I will always try to see if we had the same virus, not to find which of us is Patient Zero, but to bond. 

One time I had this conversation:

Him: "Sorry I missed the meeting last week, but I was out with the stomach flu."
Me: "Oh! I just got over the stomach flu. Did yours start with distinctive, echoing gut noises, and after that did you keep getting dizzy because all your bowel contents, like, repositioned really fast?"
Him: "Yes! It was just like that!"

And you know what, I forgave that guy for almost certainly giving my that stomach flu, because the enemy of my virus is my friend.

Comments

[KC]

I tend to have comparatively little crankiness towards those who unintentionally infect others... but the people who show up to work definitely-contagiously-sick with something hideous, proudly? Those ones I am cranky towards. It is not good for the company to have a plague pass through the employee base, so unless you're literally the last person that a specific something has hit, or unless your while-sick half-productivity is absolutely vital and more useful than a bunch of other peoples' full productivity for multiple days the following week, then maybe *stay home* while contagious and don't knock down the productivity of everyone else?

(That said: when I was in my early 20's, I did not know as much about contagion and the economic/productivity effects thereof and had not considered The Viewpoint of the Infectee, so I totally showed up to work proudly if it was at all physically possible. Not brilliant, younger self.)

Anyway, I am glad you can view Potential Patient Zero as "us against the virus" - that seems like a good thing!

[TheQueen]

KC - a Mom at work has me convinced I caught RSV - evidently to a healthy person it feels like a cold, but babies, the elderly, and immune-compromised people get it worse. Her convincing arguments were that the regular cold medicines didn’t touch it and that the incubation period can be 8 days.