Being Sick

Blegh, I've been ill the past week or so....
It hit me on Sunday out of the blue. I was just standing there, minding my own and feeling fine, when BLAM -- I suddenly felt as though I had the flu.


"GREAT," I said to myself. "That's how it happens, isn't it? You're OK, and then for no obvious reason, you'll be sick. Just what I need."

And, sure enough -- the next morning, I woke up feeling like I was going to die. Oh, the suffering!

I went to work, anyway, and (of course) was unable to accomplish much for the day. I sat there in a half daze, fluids dripping from my face, chilled to the bone, and utterly exhausted. My head hurt; my throat hurt; my legs hurt; my lungs hurt; my toe nails, eyebrows, and ear lobes hurt. I was supposed to attend a local government meeting that day, but when it came time to head over to its location, I simply could not bring myself to move. Finally, I went home and slept for an hour so that I might be able to go back and finish the rest of my work. I managed to get through the harrowing day, but it was HECK, I tells you!


Now, all the folks I know were pretty understanding. No colleagues seemed upset that I'd skipped that meeting (even though I felt quite guilty about it), and friends all expressed sympathy. Still, I knew that things couldn't just continue that way indefinitely.

"What if this miserable illness lasts for a week? A month?? A YEAR???" I thought. "Eventually, coworkers are going to lose their patience with my compromised output, and family members are going to feel disgust at my refusal to help them with anything. I must get better!"

So, I made sure to get, like, ten hours of sleep that night, and indeed, I DID feel substantially improved the next day. Still, though, the sickness lingered. My body continued to ache and I was having coughing spells so hard that just about every muscle in my body was strained. Oh, and I STILL didn't really feel like working.


By the third day I was really beginning to resent not only the general situation, but also other people for expecting anything at all out of me. I'd become fed up with this pesky bacteria/virus/whateveritwas, and felt angry at the world. Even though no one had so much as batted an eye at me over the situation, I felt under siege; the pressure was mounting for me to get better! I could smell it in the air -- folks were bound to get annoyed. I was thinking, "I'm a SICK MAN. Can't you SEE that? How DARE you ask me to do my job, pay my rent, or obey traffic laws??? You people are cruel scoundrels!"

(Me, when I'm sick.)

I mean, that's what it's like when you're sick -- you feel as though no one else could possibly understand what you're going through. There you are, shuffling around the office, pain on your face, moaning like the damned, and you just KNOW that nobody else really cares at all. They don't GET IT, man!

And I know this to be the case because I don't really care when someone else tells me that they're sick. Like, perhaps an associate might say to me, "Man, I have a bad cold. I'm really sorry, but I just can't help you out with that project today." I'll probably nod and say, "Don't worry about it, man," but the truth is that I'm just thinking about what a big wuss the guy is.

I've realized that when I'm not sick, I lose my sympathy for those who are. In fact, there's a good chance I won't even believe them when they tell me they're not feeling well. I hear someone with a cold complaining about it, and I'm like, "Whatever, dude. Get over it."

(Me, when I'm not sick.)

Well, that's gonna change. Yes, sir -- this time, I'll make an effort to remember how miserable being sick really is. That way, I won't be insensitive to anyone who finds himself in my current position ever again. And I must document this sentiment so that the resolve never leaves me. Friends, this blog will keep alive my memory of what it's like to be sick.

It sucks in a way that is difficult to communicate.

...Kinda like this film:

Dark House (2009)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1260567/


Netflix description:
Trying to exorcise her worst memories, Claire (Meghan Ory) returns to the foster home where she witnessed a terrible massacre years ago. Capitalizing on its history, a mysterious showman (Jeffrey Combs) has turned the infamous mansion into a haunted-house attraction. Claire and her friends soon realize that a demonic force has taken over the building and they've been locked inside with a malevolent spirit who wants to perpetrate another mass murder.


Dark House is the convoluted story of an aspiring actress named Claire who must return to the mansion where she once lived as an orphan. Seems something really horrible happened there to end her stay: in short, the woman in charge of the facility went nuts and murderized almost everyone.

So, it's now, like, 15 years later, and Claire is still seeing a therapist in an attempt to overcome the trauma of her childhood. The shrink advises her to return to the scene of the massacre she'd witnessed as a girl to sort of confront it, but she vacillates.

WELL, it just HAPPENS that a horror show promoter named Walston comes along and gives Claire another reason to return to the now-abandoned orphanage: a promise of acting work. See, Walston has bought the old building and plans to stage a sort of ultra-advanced, digitized, haunted house there. He needs actors willing to play the parts of various teenagers being brutalized, and Claire accepts. Hey, she's just a really dedicated actress, I guess.


So, Claire, Walston, and about eight other generic aspiring horror actors, all go to this old house, and learn that it's been outfitted with new hologram technology to scare the pants off of visitors. See, there are these projectors hidden all over the place that display super realistic-looking 3D images of horrific murder scenes and ghosts whenever someone walks into a given room. In fact, this stuff is so cutting edge that it's hard for even the haunted house's actors to tell the difference between a real maniac and a simple holographic projection. What could possibly go wrong?

Yeah. Needless to say, our heroes start dying in short order upon attempting their first haunted house rehearsal. What were supposed to be grisly scenes of mayhem merely for the sake of fun quickly become the real deal. Claire and her pals have to figure out what's going on here. Is there a madman on the loose? Is the 3D hologram technology on the fritz?? Is there a GHOST in this place???


Anyway, I know that the plot of Dark House might sound fairly intriguing up to this point, but I assure you, any halfway decent ideas the writers may have had are totally lost in this film's woefully inept execution. Honestly -- Dark House is so cheesy that it's almost impossible to avoid laughing at it...but not in a good way.

The biggest problem is its atrocious acting. Not one performer in this movie deserves to be in anything more prestigious than an Afterschool Special. Even Megan Ory, as CLAIRE, is terrible, and she's the MAIN CHARACTER!

I've never seen such a self-aware cast as this. The only even remotely likable actor to be featured in Dark House is Jeffery Combs, as Walston...and that's just because he takes his hyperactive horror visionary shtick so far that it goes into over-the-top territory. At first, I hated him (as I did everyone else), but after a while, I couldn't help but chuckle at the dude. He's just so darn desperate to make his haunted house project work, and I even kind of trusted him. Everyone else, however, is mere fodder for the holographic ghosts.


And that brings me to another point: the holographs. Now, I realize that a movie like this doesn't need Avatar caliber CG effects, but if the whole deal is supposed to be relying on the idea of a haunted house with super advanced computer animation, then its attempts to depict said animation should AT LEAST be a little believable. Not so in Dark House, though. The special effects here are embarrassingly cheap. They look like something out of a made for the Sci-Fy Channel movie. This is just CRAPPY CG, folks.

Look, Dark House may have started as an almost-interesting idea, but the end result is just a poorly planned, amateurish movie. It might have, at some point, stood a change, but the final product is so stupid that I flat out hated it by the time Act Three rolled around. This film is too long, lacking in likable characters, and not even remotely scary. Skip it.

1 out of 5.

b.