Invalidding for beginners; draft 1
OR:
How to be Sick and Make Sure the World Knows It.
STAGE ONE: HAVE AN ILL
This is important. This is not ‘Skiving for Beginners’, which is a seperate chapter that will come later on, being far more important and useful to real life; this is ‘Invalliding for Beginners’ meaning that ‘Having an illness’ is the very important first stage in the proceedings.
The type of illness is also key to many things, particularly to your health and wellbeing.
- How ill?
You do not want to be too ill, because that hurts.
You want to be just ill enough to justify a duvet on the sofa and a stack of DVDs, to make everyone feel sorry for you, and to earn some time away from whatever you should be doing instead of sitting with a duvet on the sofa next to a stack of DVDs.
Which ill?
- Some kind of ’sicking’ ill is alright, as long as it doesn’t hang around too long.
- A cold is ideal, as long as it is NOT low-level enough to bother ’struggling through’ or ‘being a trooper’; these things are almost the exact opposite of our intention. The only ‘trooping’ we will be doing is to the bathroom and back, and the only ’struggling’ will be the struggle to whine loud enough to be heard in the other room.
- Pregnancy is a reasonably good ill, because people let you have your seat, which periods don’t get you (periods being similar but shorter, and producing a less cuddly/photogenic run-off)
- The gold prize in the world of invalliding is something extremely infectious, but not painful in the slightest. As long as you have someone completely immune to the infection on hand for kettling, duveduty and on-demand-biscuitage, then it is good.
If you are on your own and very infectious for a long time with no biscuits, then things look bad for you. Very bad indeed, my friend. Very, very bad.
*shakes head, slowly*
Very bad.
When ill?
- The most popular time to be ill is at Christmas, or over Bank Holiday Weekends, on Birthdays or whenever you have booked time off from your workaday pursuit in order to have fun. At that point, no matter how rude it has been previously, your health will spectacularly nosedive into a large pool of phlegm mixed with the fluids that come together to manufacture stomach noises.
- Basically, whatever time you do not want to be ill, that is the time that you will find that the ill wants to be you. It is the law, sorry.
STAGE TWO: BE THE ILL
How to ill
The first thing to perfect is your ill noise.
This needs to be a noise loud enough to be heard in the kitchen from the sofa, but not too loud as to drown out the daytime television. Some form of groan-slash-whine-slash-creaking noise is ideal, really, perhaps a ‘NYYYYIIIIIIIIEEAAAEEURGH?‘.
The upward-inflection at the end indicated by the question mark is, of course, incredibly important.
To merely gurgle ‘NYYYYIIIIIIIIEEAAAEEURGH’ monotone carries the meaning: ‘My head/throat/stomach: ow, woe be upon us, yea: though it be unfortunate, it seems that death is nigh, goodbye, cruel world, goodbye‘
While ‘NYYYYIIIIIIIIEEAAAEEURGH?’ - upspoken - clearly carries the meaning: ‘My head/throat/stomach: ow, woe etc, yea, though it be unfortunate, it seems that death is nigh, goodbye, cruel world, goodbye oh and can I have another jaffa cake please? And a lemsip? And can you change the DVD while you’re up?‘
Once your noise is perfected, you will need to work on your public persona and bearing. Remember, you want to inspire outpourings of love, and pity, but never disgust. So as a simple rule, smiling winsomely with watery eyes and sneezing: GOOD; Smiling winsomely, sneezing in someone’s cereal: BAD.
Coughing politely (like a nun with TB) then excusing yourself is GOOD, coughing politely (like nun with TB) excusing self and then admitting the cough has caused you to follow through, meanwhile: BAD.
If you are lucky, people will phone and ask how you are. They will not come round, because - to be honest - they don’t want to catch something and ill people are boring. But they will phone. Generally when you are just slipping into your most restful nap of the day. However annoying this may seem, this is good, as it allows you to sound at your most meek, sweet, and pathetic.
Especially if it is work phoning to check on your recovery and return. In these circumstances;
You SHOULD say
“Oh, I am glad you phoned, I was just thinking about you…”
You Shouldn’t say
“…Because I’m eminating this really funny smell, and I was trying to think what it reminded me of”
You should say
“yes, I’m deperate to come back to work … because I’m bored”
But never…
“…because the idea of infecting you all - and all our bastard customers too - makes me cough with joy. Cough. Cough.”
You should say
“I must go … I need the bathroom”
But shouldn’t say
“I must go, my beer’s getting warm and I think the pizza delivery guy’s just arrived. Oh, and the prostitute seems to be getting bored.”
And as previously mentioned, these points will be covered more comprehensively, and somewhat condradictorally, in our skiving section.
In general, no matter who is on the phone,
Always mention:
Boredom, lack of entertainment, availablility of medicine, unavailability of doctor’s appointments, sleep and lack of it, and ALWAYS remember to cough occasionally, so they remember to feel sorry for you.
Never mention:
The colour, texture or odour of any fluid matter being expelled from within you.
No one wants or needs to know that. No, not even your mother.
DAYTIME TELEVISION…
… is a very important part of the illing experience.
Though unwilling to burst your bubble at this point, as one who has illed in the recent past, I feel compelled to inform you that it is nowhere near as good as you remember it to be, even, and this is key, even if you (correctly) remember it as not being that great in the first place. It’s worse than that, and there’s more of it.
You can now flick through almost endless channel-upon-channel, finding up to three simultaneous episodes of Diagnosis Murder that you can’t remember if you’ve seen yet or not.
Or watch in despair as celebrities the magnitude of which you’ve never seen before (or, in fact, heard of) try their hand at cooking, watersports, teaching, or dance, all of which will make little difference to you as you’d need a the internet or a child to tell you if that wasn’t the area they happened to be ‘famous’ for in the first place.
All this is much of a muchness, of couse, as you’ll often as not find yourself dozing off during the actual programmes and being woken only by the adverts, which, between the hours of 10am and 6pm are Exclusively for Insurance and Consolidation Loan Companies, and Make NO Mistake About It - They’re Unreservedly Shouty About The Matter!!!
CONSTRUCTIVE CREATIVENESS…
… is something you can hope for all you want, but you will never actually achieve.
You may think ‘I’m housebound for a few days, at least I can get some writing/emails/composing/nuclear fission/reading done’, but you are neglecting the fact that your brain has turned to kalimari and where usually words, ideas or beautiful things come rushing from your firmly toned frontal lobes, you suddenly realise that the only thing eminating from it now is a low-pitched drone that fills your head, and goes ‘Ummmmmm…‘ (or , if you have watched too much Diagnosis Murder or are actually American, where it is a real word, then, ‘Duuuhhhhhh‘.
WEIGHT LOSS…
… may seem to be a natural and bonus side effect of many ills, and in fact, is the main intention and cause of Some Ills, but they are not funny ills, so will not be mentioned here.
You would, of course, think that losing the equivalent weight of a lower leg in poo, snot, or sweat every day would, at the end of a reasonable sized ill (3-6 days) lead to a newer, slimmer you, but you would be wrong. Though you might shed pounds through the actual ill, any benefit is immediately lost the moment you lose your nausea, and suddenly gain the desire to eat something the size of a horse. Including, should anyone be fool enough to wave one around near you, an actual horse.
STAGE 3 GETTING BETTERER
At some point, invalidding becomes a bore. The heady mix of duvets, sofas and daytime television lose their novelty, and even oozing bodily matter the colours of Spring just isn’t as fun as once it was.
At this point, you need to recuperate. Recuperation is easy. You just need to stop illing, and take all the drugs. All The Drugs in this case should include anything the doctor has given you, anything you can find in the medicine cupboard, enough Lemsips to almost reconstruct a real lemon (you’ll need about 400,000) and all biscuits, Anywhere.
After taking all the drugs, and pulling your socks up, you should almost immediately discover that healthy life is yours once more.
If you notice no difference at this point, you were possibly never sick in the first place. Or it’s, you know, a bit terminal.
Sorry.
[Please note, this guide is intended for beginners at their attention-seeking/illness game. I will write a separate Advanced version for people with penises. Erstwhile sufferers of man-flu will not find anything here they do not already know]
Genius. I await the ‘Advanced’ version, and may be able to contribute! LOL
Comment by Gordon — 28 September, 2006 11:07 pm
Fantastically timely, as I have spent this very day illing. I have duvets, DVDs (lots of Eddie Izzard), audio books and blackcurrant lemsips, but sadly lacking in cakes and biscuits. Being wheat-intolerant, I’m thinking pavlova. Hoping someone I know will read this and recognise this as a very serious cry for help. Raspberry pavlova. With hundreds and thousands. Or angelica diamonds.
Comment by Bob — 28 September, 2006 11:09 pm
Raspberry pavlova is indeed the best type.
This is brilliant writing.
I think I’ve worked it out. The secret of why LRB is so good, that is. It’s that either:
a) You can either just dash off stuff like this and it is funny and wonderful and leaves the reader thinking ‘Christ - here I am sweating away over something a bit funny, and she just dashes stuff off and it’s brilliant. I give up.’
or
b) You actually sweat for ages over writing something, but manage to make it look as if you’ve just dashed it off between trips to the toilet. Even brillianter skill to have. I believe PG Wodehouse did that, although he pretended otherwise all his life.
Sorry. That was a bit gushing for me. Carry on.
Comment by JonnyB — 28 September, 2006 11:33 pm
Raspberry Palova crucial!
It is good writing but raises the question “How ill you really are?” if you can rattle off work of this standard! :)
Get well, in your own timescale, not anybody else’s!
Comment by Tattieheid — 29 September, 2006 1:04 am
*hangs head* I have not yet tasted a pavlova, raspberry or otherwise.
Excellent post, Anna. I may very well save it for future reference.
Comment by Marie in Kourou — 29 September, 2006 1:57 am
bloody fantastic, you should be getting paid for this excellent entertainment
Comment by nzinauzzie — 29 September, 2006 3:03 am
Ach, you guys - a bit of extra formatting and you’re anyones…
Thank you, though - I really enjoyed wrinting this, and do intend to do more, though when, we’ll see - reminds me of days when I *had* time… Maybe I could be a student, again! That might improve my blogging/writing! PHD, anyone?
In other news:
I managed to sleep through the night!!! Six hours, no fluid jetting from ANYWHERE!!!
I therefore declare myself better, although my stomach still disagrees a little. We are not listening overly much to her.
Hurrah!
Comment by anna — 29 September, 2006 8:38 am
A PhD absolutely does not improve your blogging. Take it from me, whose only writing of note these days is that peculiar high-falutin’ but essentially vacant academic kind you do when you want to impress your supervisor but haven’t actually read anything since Easter.
Comment by Jack — 29 September, 2006 9:36 am
I’m sorry, I see where I’ve gone wrong all these years. I have printed Invaliding for Beginners and stuck it on my noticeboard and highlighted bits.
Most of the man-flu I’ve ever seen was either pneumonia, or the very least TB, and they never stick to the rule about not telling the colour of the fluids.
PS. I’d love some pavlova, definitely with raspberries and double cream. Please?
Comment by mhari — 29 September, 2006 10:04 am
nzinauzzie, can I direct you to the “make a donation” button rightwise?
(usual percentage, Anna, OK?)
Comment by AndyB — 29 September, 2006 10:43 am
well i was going to email this directly to anna but it hasnt worked, meaning one of three things:
a. my computer is sick
b. i am stupid
c. the email offer is but a carrot dangled in front of any donkey foolish enough to look upon it.
so now, i suffer the embarrassment (i’m new to this blogging game) of knowing a collection of complete strangers might read this, maybe not even get this far, maybe think bad things of me. ach well.
so here we go: anna,
i don’t know exactly how i stumbled upon your blog, i simply don’t remember. i think i was googling the origins of that little ditty ‘find a penny, pick it up, and all day day long you’ll have good luck’ (incidentally, clearly A Big Lie).
anyhow, i am a fan. i’m in the process of fastening my life back together in yamagata, japan, after three years at edinburgh university, spent mostly reading and drunking and all manner of reckless things, interrupted only by a year in amsterdam, spent reading, drunking and all manner of incredibly reckless things.
i thought about emailing after your post railing against the, ahem, common greeting of ‘hey guys’, since my name is guy (skip to the end and you’ll find verification) and if i don’t mind my name being bandied about like some kind of stinky hot potatoe, then why should anyone mind it? but then i got scared that in all your writing experience you woud probably be able to extinguish all remnants of self esteem i have with one fell cyber-twitch of an e-mail. so i didnt write. then you got ill and i thought, the moment for my email, has long passed.
but now, it seems you’re well on the road to recovery, prosperity, yadda-blah and feeling better! so, thanks for the postings, enjoy reading them and patching together snippets of blighty. cheers, ta ra,
Guy
(told you my name is guy)
Comment by Guy — 29 September, 2006 11:21 am
So very glad I had today off work and got to read this one in peace otherwise I would been sprung for sure with my constant tittering. The bit about the cuddly/photogenic run off completely slayed me. So sorry you have had an ill, but grateful for the fantastic post. Thank you.
Comment by BrizzieL — 29 September, 2006 11:29 am
“Christ - here I am sweating away over something a bit funny, and she just dashes stuff off and it’s brilliant. I give up.”
I’m with him.
Well no, I’m not. I’m at the other end of the country. I hear he’s quite cute though, so if he wants my phone number…
You really did just dash this off though, didn’t you? You cow. ;o)
Comment by Clare — 29 September, 2006 11:32 am
You’ve started a plague.
I was at the doctors for a routine check up only to be told I have an unspecified infection of unknown origins (NOT STD….some people!)that is going to be difficult to shift. 4 weeks supply of Penicillin at a fairly high dosage - Four weeks..I’m not allergic to penicillin but it’s the one antibiotic guaranteed to upset my stomach and also give me the trots. Four weeks.
To make matters worse I forgot to buy toilet paper while I was down the town.
Glad you’re feelin better though.
Comment by Tattieheid — 29 September, 2006 1:54 pm
Yaxlich was feeling particularly down earlier today. No reason. He just was. Having read your latest post, though, he has cheered up a little. Thank you.
Comment by Yaxlich — 29 September, 2006 1:55 pm
Tattieheid - live yoghurt is really good for counteracting the effects of antibiotics, really nice with a spoonful of honey.
Comment by mhari — 29 September, 2006 2:13 pm
Brilliant writing Anna! really enjoyed that.
Could you also write a manuel for how to find out if someone is really having an ill or just pretending?
Reason for asking is that I have my hen party this weekend and one of my best, or should that be better, friends has ‘called in’ sick. She is the type to feign illness but when I called her back she sounded terrible… What is one to think…
CeeCee
Comment by CeeCee — 29 September, 2006 3:15 pm
I was ill recently, so snuggled down in bed during the day - which I never do normally. I was reminded that there is something quite wonderful about huddling under the duvet with a slight temperature, and maybe your dressing gown on, and simply going to sleep. Of course I had to field seven phone calls between 9am and noon, which seemed timed to wake me up just as I hit REM sleep. So I finally got up, and fielded no phone calls for the rest of the day. It was a fundamentally disappointing ill.
I hope you feel better soon. Of course it will probably be Monday when you feel better - just in time for work.
Oh, quick, it’s raining. If you go to bed now you can lie in bed listening to the rain. That’s good whether ill or not.
Comment by Damian — 29 September, 2006 4:22 pm
Thank you mhari I will try that, sounds nice anyway. Four weeks!!!
Comment by Tattieheid — 29 September, 2006 10:02 pm
December 2001, meep. A classic I still remember.
Comment by Debster — 30 September, 2006 12:08 am
Ah, you are thinking of this, Debster? - And blimey, thank you for saying so, and hello, hello…
Yes, me too, although I admit I was also thinking of this story, during the post (I draw a lot of my writing style from the speech patterns of three year olds…) but it was just Too Damn Cute to include.
Would have ruined the mood, damn beautiful innocence…
Comment by anna — 30 September, 2006 12:42 am
Can I ask which DVDs were in your stack? I’ve managed to come down with a cold (boo, although, sore throat = excuse to eat ice cream!) and am thinking an evening with a DVD might be a suitable ‘feeling sorry for myself’ activity. Any inspiration?
Comment by flechesbleues — 30 September, 2006 6:39 pm
Actually, to be fair, Flesches, I didn’t have a concentration span enough for DVDs this time around;
I watched some - two bollywood films, four dvds of Loony Toons, and half a series of Waterfalls, a series so classic it was cancelled on American television after four episodes.
Not - possibly - a selection you might have hanging around.
But I recommend series. If I’d had the presence of mind I would have just started the West Wing from the very start, but I didn’t know I’d be out so long…
Comment by anna — 30 September, 2006 10:35 pm
Best way to avoid desire to regain lost weight by eating when better is to lose the equivalent weight of a lower leg IN LOWER LEG. Blogging in bandsaw tragedy: “Littler Red Boat” (or “Plus Petite Anglaise”, “Truncated Diva”; possibly just “Boing”).
Comment by Rob — 30 September, 2006 11:25 pm
Oh do not mock, Good Rob - it does happpen. and to the very best of bloggers too...
Comment by anna — 1 October, 2006 12:40 am
The ill seems to be going around our office at the moment. Its a high level ill so I hope i don’t get it.
Comment by Invader_Stu — 1 October, 2006 12:42 am
No, you’re right, not things I have hanging around (I can’t even seem to find Waterfalls on Google!). And my collection of series isn’t that great as yet. Mainly consisting of Allo Allo or Fawlty Towers. Oh, or that one with Ewan McGregor and his mate on their motorbikes. Maybe a trip to Amazon is in order… that might take my mind of the hacking cough for a little while.
Comment by flechesbleues — 1 October, 2006 9:34 am
ah yes, sorry, that’s because it was actually called Wonderfalls.
See, I enjoyed it so much I couldn’t remember for five minutes what it was actually called.
Comment by anna — 1 October, 2006 11:27 am
hahaha (*croak*)
Comment by flechesbleues — 1 October, 2006 12:19 pm
i’m pregnant AND i have a cold. i printed this out for reference.
Comment by the other other Karen — 2 October, 2006 3:23 pm
Dear Ms Pickard. I hereby notify you that I am holding you solely responsible for my current malaise. I read your post on Sunday - jolly funny it was too. 24 hours later my nose exploded, snot everywhere, evening, night, most of this morning. Not even industrial quantities of said recommended, imported Lemsip seemed to work.
So, having found some toothpicks to keep my eyes open and practised typing with only the hand that isn’t holding the hanky, I have now updated my blog, replied to many overdue emails, found my passport for next week’s trip, and generally put my private life back in order.
Many thanks!
Comment by Harry — 3 October, 2006 2:29 pm