Battling an unseen enemy is ... well ... really hard

Like all good attackers, this one slipped in during the dead of night. It was a week ago in the middle of the night when the enemy invaded. It came in slowly, infiltrating my system while I slept.

A week ago, I called it a night feeling hale and hearty. Woke up the next morning with a stuffed nose.

As it turned out, it was the initial move in an all-out assault that succeeded. Within two days, I was a composite of cold, water and medicine. I fought the intruders with nearly tool available -- aspirin, cough syrup, honey, tea, warm water and various tablets supposed to contain good stuff in it -- but a cold is an opponent with a track record that would make any sports team blush with envy.

On Thursday, I could feel what the late Steve Cannon used to call "the aliens invading my body" making their move. The cold began to take up residence in my head and then moved south to claim more territory. By Friday afternoon, my voice began to sound like the little girl in the movie "The Exorcist." The bad voice soon gave way to sneezing fits that polluted half of Ramsey County.

I managed to work a hockey game Friday night and a basketball game Saturday afternoon before giving way to unconditional surrender. By Saturday night, the enemy claimed complete victory as temp soared to 102.5. You could have held a weiner roast on my ears. A hot bath provided a temporary balm. By late in the evening, the fever was in fine fettle, running up and down by my body with unrequited glee.

When that happens, you simple feel helpless. We can understand when we are felled by the flu or something like pneumonia. They may be intangibles but they sound forceful. You tell someone you have the flu and they understand you are going to be on your back for a couple of days. But tell them you have a cold and they expect you to take a cough drop or a pill and quit hacking.

If it was only this easy.

I managed to get out for a brunch Sunday afternoon but still felt in a fog. That is the worst part of having a bad cold -- it makes everything else around you seem an out of body experience.

The new week brought some welcome relief. My temp finally went down to double digits and stayed there. I'm down to only one new handkerchief per 24 hours. The coughing is a little less each hour. After ingesting four bottles of cough syrup, a dozen Advils and half a dozen Mucinexes, I can actually taste food again. My nose is still in rugged shape but I can now breathe in and out and not sound like the old Bob-Lo boat as it was leaving for its daily trip past Amherstburg. (Ask an old Detroiter about that one.) Life isn't great. But it is a helluva lot better than it was a week ago at this time.

Unfortunately, this rosy scenario is only true for one member in our household. Being a good, supportive, sharing spouse, I think I passed on my condition to my unsuspecting wife.

She ended up missing two days of work this week with various difficulties. In this case, it was probably better to receive and not give back. Sorry, dear.

Amazingly, the dog managed to avoid being infected (or is that affected?). Just what do they know we don't?