Intestinal Decrepitude

July 16

1:00 p.m.

Hello. I am Peter Rabbit's little-known brother, Pukesy. Sure, Flopsy & Mopsy get more attention, but I've been here all along, quietly hurling up bits of carrot and lettuce...

Which is my way of saying, hi, I'm nauseous. I woke up feeling queasy yesterday, too, but I went to work anyway (though I wound up dry-heaving in the bathroom -- I had an empty stomach, or it would've been worse), and by lunchtime my stomach had settled down. This morning I felt much worse, though; just getting out of bed and walking around made my tummy lurch. So I called (actually, e-mailed, since it was too early to call) in sick and went back to bed, where not moving seemed to help my unhappy stomach. Now it's the afternoon, and while I'm still a little oversensitive to smells, the nausea is no longer active. So. I'm getting nauseous in the mornings for no discernible reason. Heather jokes that I've caught Holly's pregnancy.

Now I'm trying to overcome the urge to utterly waste the afternoon. I should take this rare at-home opportunity to run errands, or clean house, or write, or something. I must overcome my sleeping-too-much ennui.

11:00 p.m.

Nauseous again. I was okay for most of the afternoon and evening, but a couple of hours ago it hit again, just as bad as it was this morning. I have no idea what's wrong with me. I'd think it was stress-related, but I've been feeling much more relaxed and less anxious the past couple of days, so I tend to think it's not that. It's too long-running to ascribe to something I ate. I really don't know. I normally have an iron stomach. I guess it's just some sort of bug. Unless I'm actually throwing up tomorrow morning, I'm going to go to work -- I have stuff to do, and it's not like I was totally physically incapacitated today, I could work.

And now, moving away from the visceral... I wrote my review of Last Things this afternoon, and I'm very pleased with it; one of the better reviews I've done, I think. I also read about half of Owl Goingback's Breed, which I didn't like much at first, but which is growing on me. The prose ranges from middling-to-bad, but I appreciate Goingback's attention to detail, everything is very locked-down and plausible-seeming. Tonight Heather and I watched about half of Godfather II, which neither of us has seen, and then Heather turned in; she's been staying up too late the past couple of days, and she didn't have the opportunity to recoup lost sleep today like I did. So now I'm up, drinking peppermint tea and choking down saltines, because I feel I should eat something -- I haven't had anything since this afternoon. Bleah bleah bleah. Sorry this is such a one-note entry...

I think I might write a short story this weekend. I've had a couple of ideas for short things, and I think the sense of accomplishment that comes with writing a story would do me good. Writing the novel is nice, but the payoff is still a bit in the future. I could use the jolt of finishing something.

I'm going to read a bit -- currently rereading Blaylock's "Thirteen Phantasms", because it's such a nice, sweet piece -- maybe fool around online a bit, and go to bed. Ta.

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Tim Pratt
P.O. Box 13222
Berkeley, CA 94712-4222


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