No, Really, I Feel Perfectly Fine!

I broke a serious rule today. And I might have to be sent home because of it.

I came into work with a cough. I didn’t even try to hide it. In fact, I strode into the building holding high a bottle of cold and flu medicine, the DayGlo orange stuff. You know, the stuff that tastes like a nurse’s station.

People who know me well know I have absolutely no guilt using my sick days. That’s what they’re there for: If you're sick, stay home and be sick. In fact, I’ve been rather pointed, even virulent, on the topic of people who go to work sick. They expose their coworkers to illness. They are less productive than if they simply didn’t show up at all. When taken into account others they infect, they cost more in lost production than if they simply stayed home for several days.

So why did I feel the need to be a hero?

That’s overstating it because honestly, I didn’t feel sick. All weekend I felt fine. I had an itchy throat since Friday but I figured it was an early appearance of my March allergy, which often feels like a chest cold. All I needed to do was clear my throat occasionally – you know, a conspicuous ahem like when you’re embarrassed after discovering you have cookie crumbs all over your shirt after giving a presentation.

Sure, I sounded like Don LaFontaine after a weekend of rooting for the Bears to cover the spread but I didn’t feel sick in the classic way: nausea, achy joints, fever. I admit feeling a bit lethargic but if you were to poll me at random times on any given day, there’s probably a 50 percent chance that I’d complain of feeling sluggish.

On Sunday, I started hammering back the fluorescent orange stuff, and then switched to cool, icy blue stuff at night. I was going to sleep my way through this itchy throat if I had to drink my weight in primary-colored dextromethorphan.¹

By the time I got to work on Tuesday,² the tickle in my throat had bloomed to a full-fledged cough. Now I am getting suspicious looks from coworkers, including one assistant director who said, “Go home! No one will notice anyway!” I’m sure he or she meant it in the nicest way possible.

I was convinced that my lack of symptoms ruled out influenza. Then I remembered I hadn’t gone to medical or nursing school this month, so maybe I should consult a professional.

People have stopped putting on their brave face and coming into work sick, and have started giving the stink-eye to their coworkers for coming into the office with a cough or complaint, and I’m glad. I’m usually the one chasing someone away from me with a glare for coughing in my vicinity while they fiddle with a tissue in one hand, and now I know how it feels.

I thought I did my due diligence by being aware of the signs to stay home. I’m beginning to think the next sick day I take might be worth it more to other people just to put their minds at ease. Either way, it benefits me. And it's the right thing to do.

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¹ Do not rink your own weight in cough suppressants. That would be silly. Almost as silly as me feeling the need to write a disclaimer saying, “Do not rink your own weight in cough suppressants.”

² I don’t work on Monday but that day is lost to me in a fog anyways. The gist of it is I was feeling a bit sick.

Have You Seen My Sandwich Come Through Here?

It’s my week to blog and my first thought was “I haven’t an idea what to write about.” That’s not to say things around the office aren’t moving at their normal “get it done yesterday” pace; they are.

From there I started thinking how I wanted a turkey sandwich like the ones I used to get at the diners back in Pennsylvania – one with turkey oven-roasted that day, lettuce, heirloom tomato and real mayo on fresh bread. And then … WHAMMO … REALITY CHECK! I live in Arizona and have leftover whole wheat spaghetti packed for lunch today.

Devastated, racked my brain for a silver lining – you get turkey on Thanksgiving and Thanksgiving is in November. Comforted by inductive reasoning, my mind turned to last November and how we (the ADEM PIOs) spent all of it downtown at the Department of Health Services (ADHS) helping with the H1N1 response. “I could write about that,” I said. I actually said it out loud. I sometimes talk to myself.

Coincidently, my morning sweep of the “Tech” page on CNN.com revealed an article about some cool needless injector that uses a “high-velocity liquid stream to deliver meds” in like 1/3 of a second. The article said that the devices were used to give seasonal and H1N1 shots at a smattering of clinics in New Jersey last year. Needle-free injectors aren’t new, but this one is plastic and priced for commercial use. Read the article at http://bit.ly/cZoJm5.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one. Getting a flu shot is one of the best ways to prevent … What? You say you have?

But do you know where to get a flu shot? Google and the Flu Vaccine Finder do. Plug in your ZIP and you’re redirected to a Google map dotted with nearby locations offering flu shots and/or nasal spray.

Flu prevention is also about good hygiene, which means washing your hands and doing the “Vampire Cough” (did you see last week's episode of The Office? … capital “C” Classic!). There’s lot of fine flu preparedness and prevention information on the ADHS and Flu.gov websites.

Flu.gov includes an extensive frequently asked questions section with information on everything from vaccine to bird flu, which brings me back to my original observation. Anyone have a suggestion on where to find a proper turkey sandwich?