Monday 11th August – Moonfest & The Supermoon
Day
I drove into work, and worked. I didn’t feel fantastic—there’s still something wrong with me—but I didn’t feel terrible either.
Night
I drove to Bronwen’s work, and from there we drove out to Moonfest at Shorncliffe. It was a “Supermoon”—and it did look impressively big as we drove towards the coast, though by the time we got there, and without the backdrop of buildings, it didn’t look so impressive.
There weren’t a lot of people at Moonfest. Bronwen and I bought some chips and ate them while a few people played some drums and guitars, occasionally twirled a few burning things, and hooped a few hoops.
Tuesday 12th August – I catch the bus/flu
Day
I caught the bus to work, and again home from work—surrounded by people who had been to the Ekka, and were even now harbouring evil, evil flu viruses busily multiplying in their effort to take over the world.
Night
Bronwen and I had pizza for dinner.
Wednesday 13th August – I become sick
Day
Today was the Ekka Show Holiday, so I wasn’t going to go to work anyway, but I woke up terribly sick and stayed in bed until 4 PM. I have what I call “Ekka Flu”—every year people travel the world collecting the worst strains of flu, and bring them to the Ekka, and then everyone who goes to the Ekka goes on my bus, and coughs on me, and I end up sick.
Night
Having slept (or at least, lazed about in bed in a semi-delirious daze—I remember remembering that I’d driven somewhere at 153 km/h because I was sick and not thinking straight and got a speeding ticket, and being concerned that 53km over the speed limit might lose me my licence, and it wasn’t until tomorrow that I realised it had never actually happened) most of the day, I eventually got up and Bronwen and I rushed down to Woolworths (who shut at six o’clock today) to buy some cold salads and vegetarian sausages, which we had for dinner. This was made more difficult by my inability to imagine things backwards—meaning that I couldn’t reverse out of the driveway and had to stop and drive back and think about it for a while before I could figure out which way the car would go when going backwards.
Nevertheless, we did eventually get to Woolworths—alive and all (I had no problems going forwards, but unfortunately, due to a terrible misunderstanding, instead of putting salt into her mashed potato, Bronwen put it into the baked beans, which made them inedible. Then, to make it even worse, the tabouleh we’d bought from Woolworths turned out to also be inedibly salty.
Thursday 14th August – I remain sick
Day
I was again sick, and again stayed in bed until four o’clock—that seems to be the magic time at which I need to get up and feel hungry. I spent the day mostly feeling very cold—even though I had a huge doona which even in the coldest winter is quite warm enough. I had to fold it over double and tuck it in around myself. When I wasn’t preoccupied with feeling cold, I spent my time figuring out some of the difficulties of living in a zeppelin (which wasn’t entirely because I was delirious—I often think about how one would go about sailing the world in an airship). At some stage I also worked out that I hadn’t driven anywhere at 153km/h yesterday, so I couldn’t have got a ticket doing that, which made me happy.
Night
Fortunately not that long after I got up Bronwen got home from work, and we went to Woolworths to return our salty tabouleh, then had roughly what we’d had for dinner last night, minus the incredibly salty parts.
Friday 15th August – Bronwen becomes sick
Day
I wasn’t sure if I was well enough to go to work, but after walking around in circles a few times and eating some coco pops I felt quite alright, so I decided I should drive into work. I figured I’d probably get lucky and find parking near to work (being sick and fragile, it seemed like the kind of thing that should happen) but of course, there wasn’t any anywhere and after wasting heaps of time driving around I ended up having to go park in New Farm, by which time it had started to rain. I got to work an hour late and with a sore throat, having left my car feeling alright. Apparently walking briskly through the rain is not romantic under these circumstances, and just makes your throat sore.
Despite having thought that there was a huge backlog of work with terrible looming deadlines to be hacked away at, I had finished everything I had to do by four o’clock (including taking an hour off to eat a “Vegan Wurst” from a German sausage place in The Valley), by which time Bronwen had contacted me to say she’d now fallen sick and needed to go home, so I left work and walked back to my car, got Bronwen (about forty minutes after leaving work I drove past work again, on my way to get Bronwen) and drove home.
Night
Because Bronwen now has Ekka flu as well, she can’t look after me, so I had to make dinner. Fortunately, we had a can of hearty vegetable soup, which with just the right amount of cayenne pepper was just the thing for people in our situation.
Bronwen’s Ekka flu quickly degenerated into severe back pain, and she went to bed all sad and sore. I stayed up (because I am stupid and thought I was probably over my flu) and wrote this journal.
Saturday 16th August – Sizzler
Day
As predicted, it rained last night, and most of today. Not especially heavy rain—but nice, steady, grey and dismal rain—the perfect kind of weather for being sick. I slept in, having stayed up ridiculously late pretending I was better. Bronwen also slept in, and considering how sick she’d been last night, I didn’t want to wake her. However, it was quite difficult to tell if she was still alive, as she didn’t make any noise; after much careful investigation I decided that she was moving slightly—in a way more akin to being alive and breathing, than slow decomposition—and eventually, she did wake up. Amazingly, she was much better—still sick, but nowhere near as sick as she’d been when she went to bed. We were now much more confident that she’d survive.
To celebrate, we drove to Toowong Sizzler. Plus, due to forgetting to use it last time we went, we had a five dollar discount voucher that was going to expire—as well as a new five dollar discount voucher we’d got from last time—so we cleverly ordered separately and got five dollars off each, which actually makes it almost reasonable. I think Bronwen’s “endless salad bar” cost $11.95, and mine cost $3.95 more because I get “drinks”.
Night
After Sizzler we drove home and Bronwen decided she should sew, all old-school and electricity-free. As I have heard that delirious people can be quite dangerous—and knowing that sewing machines contain sharp and potentially dangerous parts—I left her to it and quietly made sexist images instead (though to be honest, I’m still so full from Sizzler that I probably won’t want her to make me dinner). She made a bag of rice that can be heated to provide comfort to someone who may suffer from a painful back due to the thoughtless coughing of the hordes of infectious carnies at the Ekka, so I felt bad and made her a nice image as well.
Sunday 17th August – Recovering
Day
Both Bronwen and I are still sick—but just in the generic flu kind of way now, coughing and spluttering and having mildly sore throats and things. The terrible death part seems to have passed. I had a quiet day at home, and it didn’t rain. The media had been warning of a “mega rain event” which was going to “hit”, and it had rained all Friday afternoon and all Saturday, but now today seems to be quite nice and normal outside. I’m not sure I’d call that a rain event, let alone a mega one—I’d call it a normal rainy day, followed by a normal sunny day.
I started the tragic process of eliminating any of my socks which contain holes. Some of these socks have been with me for quite some time, so it’s always sad to see them go.
Night
I had a quiet night at home, and went to bed early, on nice freshly washed sheets.
Design inspiration and flu from www.ekka.com.au