Happy new year!
Oh god, I have Influenza A!
I got my flu shot, but it's apparently not a precise fit for this year's dominant strain of flu. I do recommend reading that article, because it's pretty interesting!
Last time I had the flu, around 14 years ago, I was hospitalized due to complications from my Type 1 diabetes. This time, I'm way better equipped to deal with the diabetes side of it... but I'm also dealing with an insurance switchover related to my layoff/the end of my COBRA coverage, and the fact that I'm currently very inconveniently located in Arizona. So now we're trying to figure out how to get home so we can be sick there instead.
I guess this is your warning to be careful about the flu! Influenza is very shitty and it is entirely different from the common cold. Americans like to call any cold "the flu," which drives me absolutely insane. The actual flu can put you in the hospital or kill you. It's worth reading up about if you haven't ever had it, because it does feel quite different from the common cold. The first time I had the flu, it made me throw up so much that I started to vomit blood. I did not enjoy that!!
I'm doing a lot better this time. The reason it got so out of hand for me 14 years ago is that I was under the impression that I simply had food poisoning, so I didn't take any fever reducers or do any of the other things you'd normally do to deal with influenza. Because severe illness tends to make a diabetic's blood sugar run quite high, my blood sugar got totally out of hand, which led to some diabetes related complications that put me in the hospital. I was so dehydrated that I started hallucinating. I specifically hallucinated that I was interviewing at Double Fine, and that Tim Schafer was asking me questions about my career. I was trying to explain my way around my poor CV while the nurses were searching for a vein in my extremely dehydrated arm.
I am currently avoiding all that because I am no longer a dipshit and I actually used a covid/flu test to figure out what was wrong with me instead of just guessing. (When people joke that their 30s are better than their 20s, this is the kind of thing that they're often talking about, haha.)
Good luck in 2026!! Avoid the flu!! It's not a great experience!!