Fever

I know it has been quite a while since I wrote here and I would love to say that it was due to attending all sorts of fabulous parties in all sorts of fabulous outfits but the fact of the matter is I have spent the better part of my time here dividing my time between my bed, the doctor's office and the emergency room. I arrived feeling mostly ok and spent a few hours wandering around Amsterdam with Ulco, feeling a bit lost and out of place. It all feels so scrubbed, so homogenized. What once seemed like a vibrant and exciting place suddenly felt like the waiting room to nowhere. It was all so quiet, organized and predictable. I have been in Amsterdam over a week and have seen nothing that surprised me, caught me off guard, made me laugh or made me angry. Has it always been this way? I just remember it so different.

I was feeling fine when I arrived and a few hours later popped down to Rotterdam to shake my groove thing with Beyonce. She told us that we were the best audience ever and well, having never heard that line before, I totally believed her. We were practically sitting on the stage and everytime she flung her head, we got wig pieces in our eyes. It was a fantastic show.

The hext day Manuel and I met up with Nik and Marco and immediately headed to the mother-ship for Razzitos. Raspberries, Bacardi Razz and Champagne. What more could a poor boy just in from the subcontinent ask for? It was really great seeing everyone, but still I felt a bit disconnected from everything here. And I was running a fever, so figured a little nap would sort me out and have me in top shape for the evening's activities. I ended up getting more and more ill and by 9am was in the emergency room being examined by the fist of what would be a very long line of doctors, nurses, specialists, pathologists, and other assorted cast members from Grey's Anatomy. My fever was going all over the place and they were trying to get me sorted out. I know I have made jokes about Malaria in the past, but when they actually start looking into it, it was far from a fun situation. They took enough blood from my body to create another full-scale me - none of that mini-me stuff here, baby. I left more blood behind at the hospital than I took with me when I left.

They ruled out Malaria, Typhoid and all sorts of other fun ailments I had never heard of before and sent me on my way home. 2 days of a high fever later and I was in the doctor's office, still with no answers. I knew what wasn't wrong, but no clue as to what was and this may come as a bit of a surprise to everyone... I am not a very fun patient. Being sick is just so un-glamorous. Unless of course you are Greta Garbo or maybe Julia Roberts, but I just don't look good in fever. Try as I might, I just don't have the bone structure. The doctor sent me home with no more information than I had when I arrived and just told me it would all go away in a few days... or maybe a week or a bit longer. I was moved my his certainty and reassurances and went home and tucked myself into bed yet again.

Well, fast forward a few days later and the fever is gone, the coughis lingering but I am at last able to get out of bed and go outside and see my friends. So there you are, all up to date with my medical adventures. Next time I will hopefully have something more fun to write about...