The Backroads — Like sands through an hourglass
By Sean Hart
Saturday, November 28, 2009 10:06 PM PST
Terrible luck, agonizing irony, bad karma? The only thing worse than a Thanksgiving meal with no sense of taste is watching daytime television.
Since the time of the Pilgrims, no American tradition has elicited such a collective mouth-watering response as the turkey-centered feast on the fourth Thursday in November. With stuffing and potatoes and rolls and pie, the annual supper usually seems worth waiting all year.
Imagine my chagrin, then, when I awoke a few days prior to the holiday with an ever-increasing noxious presence in my nose and lungs. I was headed for sickness on the worst possible day of the year to be under the weather.
I fought like the patriots in the American Revolution to avoid the illness, but it was futile. Vitamins, herbs, medication, zinc-loaded cough drops, all in excess — no help. Like struggling in quick sand, I continued to slip further into the malady.
Embrace it, I thought; maybe rest would give my body the upper hand against the viral or bacterial infection plaguing it. I might be able to beat it before turkey day.
Bed rest was all I could really manage at the time anyway, but it didn’t do much. I did, however, catch up on some midday TV.
I’m not sure if it was the drugs, the out-of-touch feeling from the sickness itself or the fact I left the remote in the kitchen when I was whipping up the last batch of some super-vitamin concoction, but I woke up from a nap to crazy drama on Days of Our Lives and actually watched it for at least 15 minutes — a personal record, one I’m not looking to beat.
Somebody swapped babies, one of them died, somebody was still not forgiven for killing someone, someone wanted to kill somebody, someone else was plotting to kill him and somebody cheated on someone while thinking of someone else who lied to the baby-swapper before rummaging through his lover’s purse, or something like that, if you were wondering — quality programming, really. You know, if I didn’t have to work, I might actually beat my record.
But I digress.
In the end, nothing I tried cured what ailed me, but I was feeling a little better by the big day — well enough, at least, to get off the couch.
I spent Thanksgiving as loaded on DayQuil and vitamin C as I was when the sands poured through the hourglass, though with a little less drama.
I saw the great feast spread upon a table and managed to imbibe a whiff through one nostril with a little effort, but that was about as close as I got to tasting the delicious-looking array of entrees and side dishes. I still ate — and heartily, at that — but I didn’t get to savor the flavor.
All in all, though, I suppose I should still be thankful.
I could have had a sore throat and been stuck at home with nothing but a remote control to pass the time.
And I can only imagine the turkey-poisoning, stuffing-stealing, holiday-fling drama on the tube on that Thursday afternoon.
Lifestyle Editor Sean Hart can be contacted at SeanH@argusobserver.com. The views and opinions expressed in this column are not necessarily those of the Argus.
