Pseudo-Flu

It's important for me to get a flu shot because Durwood has COPD and getting the flu would be very, very bad for him. I avoid it and keep forgetting why. I got one Friday and remembered yesterday when I dragged myself out of bed and off to work. For a couple days after getting the shot I get a sort of "flu-lite." The site of the injection is hot, swollen, and hard, and I am slightly feverish, sleepy and a little achy. It's nowhere near the magnitude of the real flu so I'm not swanning around wishing to die and lying limply on my couch swathed in afghans and shawls with Kleenex tucked in my pockets and sleeves. In fact I intend to take my new snowshoes to the local park and tromp around a bit because it's sunny and not very windy out there, besides I'm not really sick just pseudo-sick.

January 22--Turkey, Ottoman Period, Dish.

Polychrome paint
under transparent glaze,
the museum tag says.
Pale words for the riot
of colors still bright
after nine-hundred years
of meals and dish water.
~~~~~

It's no easy feat to make up a story about a dish. I kept looking at the picture trying to muster up something about it, reading the tiny printed info below the date, and not coming up with much beyond "wow, it looks really good for its age." So that's what I put in my notebook before zonking out with the pseudo-flu. I'm going to call around to find a playmate but I am going snowshoeing even if I have to go alone. Go, Pack! (I'm not much of a fan so I hope I haven't jinxed them.)
--Barbara