The ear infection

Since I mentioned my ear ache in the previous post, I figured it warranted some further explanation.

I haven’t felt great most of this week. I felt like I picked up some kind of bug, but it manifested itself in an unusual way: I felt tired, sluggish, had pretty bad headaches and got the chills from time-to-time but developed no fever. I chalked it up to just some late fall bug,

Yesterday, Kelly took the kids out to a party at around 4pm. I had the chills pretty bad. Nothing I could do seemed to keep me warm so as soon as she left, I put on a heavy sweatshirt and crawled into bed and under the covers. I remained there for the next 4 hours or so until she got home. My throat was sore by this point and a few hours later, I felt a twinge in my right ear. Another hour or two and that twinge had built into a full-blown ear ache of epic proportions. I couldn’t sleep, not even come close to sleep. (That explains why I ultimately did the domain cutover in the middle of the night last night.) I was just waiting for the light of day and when it finally showed up, I headed to the local urgent care.

I got there at 7am and I was out by 7:20. Diagnosis, a pretty bad infection in the right ear. The doctor gave me a numbing agent while I was there. She also gave me three prescriptions: antibiotics, steroid drops to reduce the swelling in the ear canal, and pain medicine for the exquisitely sharp knifes driving through my ear drum and into my brain.

This morning, I took those prescriptions and got them filled. I then took the first dose of everything. Eventually, the pain meds kicked in and the pain in my ear has indeed, temporarily, subsided. But the ear still feels clogged and there is an incessant ringing that is driving me mad.

The worst of it is that I can’t really focus for some reason, which means I can’t write. I may try later. Part of the problem may be simple lack of sleep. In the meantime, I’m watching more episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise.

This is only my second adult ear infection. I’ve been told that adult ear infections are more painful than kids ear infections. I don’t remember my ear infections as I kid, but based on the way this thing feels, I’m not going to dispute that assertion.

So, I’m likely to be behind on some things this weekend. For instance, I haven’t gotten any of my Golden Age reading done since Thursday. Luckily, I felt well enough yesterday to write revisions to a story that were requested and get them off to the editor before things started falling apart.

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