The Swine Flu Days

For the past 4 weeks the delights of swine flu have been circulating within my house. First down was husband, followed by girly a week or so later, followed by boyo & eventually me. Now let me say... on the 'not' so overly helpful government website swine flu is defined by:

A raised temperature & 2 or more of the following:-

- sudden cough

- sore throat

- aches & pains

- general tiredness

- sickness

- diarrhoea

a true case, as we have all suffered to find out is actually every damn one of those symptoms following in slow progression & an everlasting lung damaging, incontinence inducing cough!

Husband being first sufferer - I valiantly offered to go & get Tamiflu - when eventually found all relevant identification for sufferer & self, negotiated the on the door security, queued up leaving the appropriate 1/2 metre gap between queue occupants, for what was such a long time, I felt a sense of camaraderie & spirit of the Blitz with my fellow queue'rs

Once back home with the prized Tamiflu, glass of water in hand, have quick glance through safety information and decide that the A4 list of common & rare side affects including, hallucination, heart irregularities... etc... etc.. which maybe fatal... sickness... nausea... nightmares.. Decide after all won't bother & will ride it out.

And many sleepless nights follow as continuously checking children are still breathing, not suffering complications, haven't lapsed into coma, have fevers under control & haven't dropped dead!

Being a sufferer of swine flu completely inhibits ability to carry out any normal life functions i.e. cook, clean, sleep, walk, shop.... and house thus ends up practically needing a visit from Kim & Aggie, and weeks of super noodles, waffles, take away food & packet soup with the occasional carton of orange juice, litres of ice-cream & bloody lollipops start to take their toll! Particularly when combined with diet of daytime television.

And what have I learned from the experience:-

1) highly likely daytime television & convenience food are root cause of depression

2) swine flu renders one absolutely unable to order anything like the correct food shopping due to huge brain issue with thinking

3) people avoid you at all costs! & thus end up a hermit with a serious Twitter-holic condition

4) after 4 weeks of either being ill or suiting ones self because mummy is ill, children are

notoriously difficult to bring back into any sort of routine or discipline!!!

5) finally Calpol only comes in ridiculously tiny bottles, which are disallowed to buy in bulk as

you are viewed as a neurotic idiotic careless person unable to administer 5ml as oppose to 5 bottles

dramatic ..... me .... Never!

Swine Flu

Now fear one or all of the following my ensue:

• all in world will catch swine flu
• most will die
• Britain will go to war with Czech, Russia & Germany in order to seize our vaccines
• Britain will disengage the coalition with US on war on terror
• Britain will become vulnerable to terrorists as 200% of us will have swine flu at any one time
• Schools will remain closed & mothers may have to spend time looking after their own children, in their own homes
• Economy will grind to halt as all mothers will be at home
• Crosses will be painted on doors to indicate a death as per 1918
• Supermarkets, will not only be unstafffed (as mummies all at home) but looted
• General civil unrest will occur & not enough armed forces personnel to deal with resulting riotous behavior as scantily fighting numerous wars.
• People will be forced to cook wholesome, bolstering broths to nourish their families and won't know the best way to set about combining pot noodle and microwave only chilli.
• The only people left in Britain will be those over 70 who have some immunity from 1918 apparently & then they will have to sell their homes to each other so that they can pay for nursing home fees.
• Armageddon

Now, when everyone has succumbed and is dead in pre prepared mass government graves, don't say I didn't warn you!