18:55 Wednesday 7th December 2011
 
 There could be many reasons why I feel creative as I write this, and I'll explore a few of them while explaining some other stuff as well.
 
 First of all some background information may be useful. Since the beginning of the week I have been suffering from what for most people would be a bad head cold. Being a heavy smoker, a simple cold can get a bit more complex. A bad head cold can result, and has done this time, in the feeling that the lungs are flooded with mucus. Laying in bed with lungs that bubble and burble with each breath does not make sleeping very easy. So I am suffering from partial sleep deprivation recently. For no better reason than it seemed like a good idea at the time, I have also just drunk an extremely large scotch whisky.
 
 Any normal person suffering all this would rightly be miserable, and from time to time I do feel a bit miserable about it, and yet overall, I don't. In some respects it is quite exciting seeing how far I can push my body without actually dying. I think I am simultaneously pessimistic and optimistic about the outcome. 
 
 The pessimistic part of me has endless fun wondering if whether this time I have pushed my body beyond the point where it will mend properly.  For all I know I could actually be suffering, maybe even dying, from the early stages of lung cancer. The optimistic part tells me that in a few days that will seem endless as they pass, I will soon be well again.
 
 Perhaps it is the down to earth knowledge that I  know, with total conviction, that each painful day that passes so slowly in the forward direction will seem to be a mere blink of an eyelid when looked back at, that is a source of discomfort every bit as bad as other discomforts.
 
 As well as the mental discomforts, there are many physical discomforts to this illness. Initially it was a mixture of stuff. I had some headaches, an increasingly bad cough, and dripping nose.  In the first two days of this illness I managed to work my way through two whole boxes of man sized tissues with that dripping nose.
 
 I am sure it is actually nonsense, but it felt like for every pint of mucus that came out of my nose forwards, another pint dripped into my lungs. If they had a drain plug at the bottom, and I could have flushed them through, I am sure that most of the subsequent discomfort could have been avoided.
 
 It is my lungs, or more correctly, the mucus build up in them that is the biggest source of discomfort. I have already mention how distracting to sleep it is to have each breath sounding (and feeling) like it is being drawn through a hookah pipe. Then there is the frequent need to cough to expel that mucus. On the first day, perhaps because of coming home from work in very cold air, that cough was so violent that my throat became very sore, and I became quite hoarse.
 
 These last two days my throat has recovered, but now it is my chest, and even more so, my belly muscles that have become very sore from powering “power coughs” to dislodge some of the deeper, and thicker mucus.  That thicker mucus has also been interfering with my breathing to some extent. It is very easy to get breathless. Although why I should get more breathless walking down the stairs, and less so when walking up them is a bit of a mystery.
 
 Another mystery is why I have lost my appetite. I never lose my appetite – ever ! Yesterday the only thing that appealed to me was a tub of chocolate ice cream – and I had to force myself to finish it ! Today I have tried to tempt myself with roast sweet potatoes and chicken thighs. At any other time I could have wolfed down the whole lot in one quick sitting. Today I had two of the six thighs for lunch, and it felt like more than enough. Then I had just another two for dinner this evening. Those two also seemed to fill me up.
 
 I think there is one final mystery, and it is to do with temperature regulation. I haven't caught myself running a fever today, but I did have mild fever yesterday. If I have no fever today, why do I keep having episodes of heavy sweating for none of the usual reasons? (The usual reasons being hot or consuming large amounts of chilli sauce.) As I write these words my body temperature is slightly low at 36.6º C, and it is 21º C in this room, and yet I am sweating as if it were closer to 30º C.
 
 One of the reasons for writing this was to explore my own feelings, and look to see if there were any indications that I was getting better. Maybe, just maybe, there is one indicator. I've just had a sudden yearning for a snack of Potato Hoops. If my appetite is returning, then perhaps my body is starting to mend.