Salmonellasis sucks. There are no two ways about it. I have mental acuity right now that has been sparse and fleeting since I got sick~my words weren’t coming, I was having a hard time remembering things that I otherwise *know*, and I have had an icky “foggy” feeling that really reminded me that I was still not well.

I do think I’m on the mend. My hope is that tomorrow I will realize that I’ve turned the corner and will feel markedly better, because the healing of the bacterium that has infected my gut has been incremental, at best. I was brave yesterday and ate more than just soda crackers and chicken soup; I actually ate some turkey, a small amount of mashed potatoes, and some fresh green beans. Very tasty, but also somewhat nerve-wracking, as things still have a tendency to go through me pretty quickly.

But through all of this, I made a connection as to *why* I got sick when I have never had a problem with raw eggs in the past. I’ve even eaten sukiyaki, a Japanese dish where the meat and vegetables are cooked and then dipped in raw egg right before consuming. Not quite “Rocky”-esque, but certainly more than the average American dares with raw egg. Anyhow, apparently the link is my asthma inhaler (Asmanex). It has a dose of inhaled steroid that (oddly enough) makes me susceptible to the varicella virus (chickenpox), despite the fact that I’ve already had that virus. Regardless, the trade-off that comes with easier breathing through steroids is a slightly depressed immune system. I knew that it was possible to be “more prone to infection,” but I had no idea exactly *what type of infection* that meant. Apparently, it means all sorts of infections. And the salmonella bacterium is a vicious one that took advantage of my immuno-compromise.

I’m a tad annoyed that paying $405 to the pulmonologist who prescribed the medication for me didn’t get me any sort of warning about the suppression of the immune system or anything more than a 10-minute visit, but I guess that’s part of the problem with the state of medical care in the US these days. I will have it noted in my file when I go back in February, but there’s precious little I can do about it at this point.

Mark has been a rock through all of this: I honestly don’t know what I would have done if he had had to work during this ordeal. I think Brendan and the house would have fallen apart, but thanks to Mark’s valiant efforts, neither has happened. He cooked the Christmas turkey and cooked the other things yesterday, and he’s been incredibly supportive. I’m very blessed.

I can’t wait for the day when I realize that I feel SO much better that I *am* better and appreciate what it feels like to be well again. I hope that’s only a day or two away. 

My Christmas Eve and Christmas Day haven’t been nearly what I intended, but I realized yesterday that it’s okay. Allow me to backtrack a bit…

I was baking hunklich, a Transylvanian (Hungarian) dessert that was favoured by my maternal grandmother and became a family tradition. It’s a pie-type dessert with a baked (not terribly sweet) custard and sour cherries and nutmeg. It turned out well and I turned my attention to the cheesecake.

My cheesecake recipe is tweaked somewhere between my mom’s recipe, Alton Brown’s recipe, and my own little modifications. It’s delicious and although I *could* bake it year-round, I just don’t. For whatever reason, I bake it most often at Christmas and New Year’s. It’s heavy on eggs (just like the hunklich), and unfortunately, my egg-lady up the road ran out before I got there. Dang. So I had to get (more expensive, significantly inferior) grocery-store eggs. Oh well~Mark tried to convince me that my family wouldn’t know the difference, but I surely did~the yolks broke on impact in the bowl, the shells were thin, etc. But I’m spoiled. Fresh eggs are SO much tastier and better.

So I’m making the batter and it’s creamy, smooth, and just the hint of sweet in it, and like I’ve done for years and years, when I was done with the scraping and the beater on my mixer, I licked it. I commented to Mark that I could skip the rest and just eat it by the spoonful. The cheesecake bakes for 1 hour, and then gets residual heat from the oven for 1 hour and chilled. It looks perfect and was ready for our trip to Grand Rapids to be with my cousins and aunt & uncle the following day.

I woke yesterday and thought my blood sugar had dipped, because I felt a violent emptiness in my stomach that also gave me a nauseous feeling, so I munched on some rice crispies and thought I’d be fine. I ended up back in bed feeling as though I was on board a ship in a hurricane and not quite sure I was going to make it without going down like The Poseidon.

Mark decided to google salmonella poisoning and between how I was feeling and the number of symptoms listed on the CDC’s website (6) and the number of symptoms I have (5), we think it’s a case of salmonella bacteria from the raw egg in the cheesecake batter, which I thoughtlessly licked off the beater.

It’s weird~I’ve licked beaters forever and have never had any compunction about letting Brendan do the same. But all it takes is one bad egg, as I painfully figured out. So with not brining my turkey for today and not making it to the family gathering yesterday, I had lots of time to sleep (this really has taken it out of me, because I slept a lot yesterday and still slept all night long last night) and think.

It’s not a huge surprise to read that someone has realized what Christmas is *not* about, and I thought I knew where my priorities were. But I was disheartened to realize that my intended trip to GR yesterday was not going to happen and that the effort I put in to the desserts wouldn’t be enjoyed, and moreover, that I had screwed up the Christmas celebration I intended for Mark and Brendan.

My realization yesterday was that despite all of the trimmings and effort, and family gatherings, it’s really *not* about that. Despite all of the delicious cheesecakes, pies, turkeys, etc., it’s not even about that. Because there are many in our world who would be grateful for the opportunity to have even a smidgen of what we have and what we will do to celebrate. Christmas comes whether or not I’m “ready” for it, and whether or not hunklich and cheesecake are made, whether or not the gifts are wrapped, or anything else. The First Christmas didn’t have any of those things, and although the trimmings are nice, it’s certainly not *required* for a joyous celebration.

I was vertical yesterday for about 90 minutes in the evening~we went on a “light drive” and saw beautiful decorations on homes and the path of luminaries set out in the Village, and that was good. Despite going out in my PJs and coat and feeling quite icky, it was truly lovely and the simplicity of the community coming together and putting out the luminaries was breathtaking. I just love it.

If you’re celebrating Christmas today or any time this week, may it be peaceful, joyous, and just what you want it to be. Whether or not I’m truly up to it, I’m headed out tomorrow for the after-Christmas sales and Ikea’s annual clearance sale.

Oh, and take the note to self to heart: if you’re going to lick cheesecake batter, make sure it’s from fresh eggs from a farmer you know and whose hens are healthy. Otherwise, don’t risk it.

Okay, so it’s not exactly what Weird Al Yankovich sang about in the parody of several years ago, but tomorrow has this “ground zero” feel to it. And I’m still ducking and taking cover.

The baking is done (the limited amount I did this year), the cards are gone, the candles are poured, the “elfing” is done, and most of the gifts are wrapped. Mark finished up his shopping today, and all I have left to wrap are a few things for Brendan. But tomorrow the turkey comes out of the fridge (whether or not it’s completely thawed), the brine gets made, I head to the grocery after church to make sure that I don’t have to go out on Monday morning, and one last sweep of the floor with the vacuum, picking up kid-droppings, and making sure laundry is clean and done, and I should be good.

I hope.

I’m waiting on a package that will (hopefully) arrive Monday morning with a sweater for Christmas Eve, but we have to leave for my cousin’s house by about 12:30-1:00pm. Well, I’ve got to google-map it, but I’m anticipating a good 90+ minute drive from here. I had ordered a beautiful square-necked red ensemble, but it’s on backorder, and a call to the company this week didn’t help me that much: I found out it may never come off of backorder.

So I’m scrambling last night, trying to decide if I should wear red or just make due with what is in my closet. Did I mention I purged most of my closet this fall? Urg. And I’m trying to decide (at about 11pm last night, when I was tired, my back and feet were killing me, and oh yeah…I was tired) if I should wear long pants or palazzo pants, and did the palazzo pants hit me in the wrong spot to not be weird-looking? Oh, and what sweater? The long tunic-one that Mark says makes me look shorter, or the fitted shorter one that I would be tugging at and feeling self-conscious all night long (even though Mark says my self-consciousness is unfounded)? And I realized at that moment…where’s Jenny when I need her? She can talk me through a fashion crisis like nobody’s business and be honest and encouraging at the same time.

I ended up ordering a sweater from Coldwater Creek in red, mostly because there’s a CC store in Brighton that I can return it to if I don’t like it, and because they had “guaranteed by Christmas delivery” for $5. So if I don’t like it, all I’m out is $5 and a trip to Brighton. Which is a gamble I can take. Hopefully it will be perfect, and I’ll decide on the long pants with the over-jacket and it will all come together admirably.

If not, Monday morning really WILL be Ground Zero here.

As a bonified Tolkien-nut (albeit a late-bloomer), I was so happy to read the headline in Business Week: “Ring up The Hobbit, Times Two.”

The best part for me is that Peter Jackson (director of the LotR trilogy of films) has settled his suit with New Line over disputed profit-portions, and has signed on to direct these two movies. I am so absolutely nutty for Jackson’s rendition of the stories (even though they disturb the Tolkien-purists) that to think anyone else could do justice to Hobbiton and the four-foot-tall characters made my heart sink.

This makes me want to put all gift-wrapping, cookie-baking, and other holiday preparations on hold and go start the trilogy of movies all over again, just to celebrate and soak in Middle Earth.

Yes, I really am that much of a geek.

I popped in to Kroger last night to get a refill on a prescription and fill a new one for albuterol. Albuterol is used for rapid-response breathing treatments, and I puff on it before going out in the cold to shovel snow, to walk or jog, etc. It’s a longstanding medication and is quite old~and generic. So I expected that I would have a $10 copay on it.

I poked about the store while the prescriptions were filled and meandered over to pick them up. Imagine my shock when the expected $10 copay was $38.14!

I inquired about it, figuring they didn’t file the insurance, but they did. The increased cost was because the formulation changed: not the actual medication, mind you, but the PROPELLANT in it. Which increased the cost from $10 to $38. Lord only knows what it would have been if we didn’t have prescription coverage.

As it turns out, the propellant was changed to “protect the environment.”

What the heck…?

I cannot believe it. I don’t give a WHIT about the environment when I’m shoving this stuff IN TO MY LUNGS. The absurdity is that the environmentalist whackos would sacrifice HEALTH and PEOPLE for the environment’s good, when people are far more valuable (as is their health) than the nebulous concern with which they try to control our lives.

Besides the economic impact of such a change, there’s the impact of those who cannot afford the switch not using the medication as needed/directed, detrimentally affecting their health. And what happens when there’s an asthma attack that is bad and someone cannot afford their medication? They head to the local hospital. If someone cannot afford albuterol, can they really afford a breathing treatment at a hospital? And what happens if they cannot get to the hospital quickly enough? Asthma is, after all, a deadly condition!  All because CFCs are ‘bad’ and the tiny amount that is used in an albuterol inhaler might increase the size of the ozone hole over the south pole.

What a fantastic illustration of absurdity…not to mention a frustrating one.