I’m sick. I don’t like it.

Most people don’t like being sick, though I’m sure there are some who do (twisted bastards). My biggest problem when I get sick is that I don’t do the right things to hasten recovery, so I tend to get sick for long periods of time. When you get sick, I was always told, the things to do were: 1) get lots of rest, and 2) drink lots of fluid. I can’t even seem to do that properly, or at least consistently.

Saturday I woke up extremely early — four o’clock in the morning, for those who don’t watch my Twitter feed carefully — and felt like absolute garbage. I had taken a new medication to help me sleep, which failed utterly and also had the side effect of giving me horrid dry-mouth. It also seemed to have affected my sinuses (or so I thought) because I had a terrible sore throat. I was congested and one of my ears was so clogged up I could barely hear out of it.

So what did I do with my day? Stay in bed and drink plenty of orange juice? No, I went out with my son to bowling, took an excursion to the library, went out for lunch and then, later in the day, had a rich meal at a Mexican restaurant. Basically I was active during large chunks of the day and I definitely didn’t get the rest and liquids I needed. Is it any surprise that I still felt bad on Sunday?

Now truth be told, I was feeling slightly better Sunday. I slept late and felt cruddy when I woke up, but at least I had slept and the sore throat hadn’t returned. Because I had learned my lesson, or so I thought, I didn’t go to the grocery store with my wife and confined myself to bed for the day, eating little and drinking steadily.

By evening I wasn’t feeling half-bad. Still sick, for sure, but not at death’s door. My ear had even become mostly unclogged, restoring some of my hearing. To celebrate, I ate a big, rich meal of pizza and followed it up with dessert. Why? Because I’m an idiot.

Now it’s Monday morning. I feel rotten all over again, and if the pattern holds, I will start to feel better as the day progresses until I feel just good enough to do something stupid that will prolong my suffering. I know this will happen, and yet I am as powerless to stop it as I am powerless to stop the sun coming up.

There was a time when I took better care of myself. Ironically it was when I was much younger and my body could stand more abuse. Maybe this is my way of reminding myself again and again that I am not 22 years old and I should stop acting/eating/drinking like one. I only wish I would hurry up and learn the lesson so I can stop being sick, because being sick really blows.