Swine Flu 2

I think I might have Tweeted about this; on the way to work this morning, listening to KFrothingYankeeIdiot, the conversation in the car turned to Swine Flu. It's a serious concern; we're waiting for Grace and Michaela's school to close thanks to a pupil coming down with flu symptoms and, if that happens, there's a domino effect: if Grace and Mike were exposed, then Danielle was, and if she was then I was. Basically, we have to stay home until we get sick, get better or five days passes with no symptoms.

One thing that's not helping: it's allergy season. A lot of plants are blooming, which means a lot of people are sneezing and spluttering. It's hard to tell whether you're sick or are having an allergic reaction to something. It also means an awful lot of people are sneezing all over the place, which is going to increase the changes of catching whatever they've just sneezed.

Although AZ was H1N1 free, today we hear that there are four cases; we get to work to find notes on the doors: if you're symptomatic or have been to Mexico, don't come into the building. This afternoon, we hear that the W.H.O. (still think they should be the United Nations Infection Taskforce) has upped their alert level and, moments ago, the company has put out a cheerful reminder that we need to maintain good personal hygiene etc. The key is "stay home if you are unwell" - and this is worth pointing out because it runs contrary to American corporate culture. People who get sick come to work. They sit in their cubes making unhappy gurgling noises and demand sympathy, or complain loudly in the elevators that they're so very, very ill and yet still at work. Well, no more of that. They now need to go home, and they also need to start following some very specific rules about coming back to work.

It's all getting a little more serious. I will probably check the bank account and make a couple of sensible purchases - water, fever reducers, some other helpful odds and ends - just in case. You know, the sort of stuff you should probably have in a flat anyway. I can normally rely on my immune system. It's put up with all kinds of abuse, and it generally copes with invaders thuswise: it invites them in for a few drinks and a game of pool, gets them horribly drunk, feeds them a suspicious kebab and then lets them enjoy the hangover next day. The point is, when it comes time for the virus to replicate, it's so drunk it can't, and the following day it's so mortified at the thought it might have replicated the niht before that it doesn't want to and shuffles off looking for a way home that involves meeting the fewest gazes possible.

Don't knock it. My disreputable immune system works.

Anyway, I'm slightly concerned because I'm the least fit I have ever been (and that's saying something...I am blob! Hear me...eat crisps!) and therefore at risk from viruses. If I was a PC, I'd be running unpatched XP with an equally unpatched IE6. It seems like a good time to put some measures in place that mean I can look after myself if I do get ill.