Mandated Bed Rest for One Week...

I had another episode of fever last night, so this morning Daniele and Simone called the doctor to examine me to determine whether or not I needed to go to the hospital (Italian law - must be checked by dr first before going to hospital). Luckily no, I didn't have to. But the doctor confirmed that I have a fever and I'm sick with the flu. She said I need to stay at home until at least Friday in order to keep my body in consistent surroundings (no hot cold hot cold). ... My first thought, one week?! Aw man! I spent the day sleeping and realized that it will take my body some time to get over this flu, so I'm happy to have to stay home.

Since I can't go outside, supplies are being brought to me. Tomorrow I should get a pile of movies from a coworker. Whoo hoo! I'm on my last English language book and I want it to last a while!! :-O I have my Italian book to practice my grammar, and that Italian version of Harry Potter as well. I'm not too concerned. I just want to get better! This week I was supposed to have meetings to determine my role at Cossato... obviously it'll have to wait until next week. I'm pretty bummed about that, but what can you do?

I made garlic soup but I can't tell you if it was any good or not - my sense of smell and taste are gone for the time being. I'm sure my apartment reeks of garlic so I hope opening the window for a few minutes helped! I'm not too hungry at all, but gotta force myself to eat regularly. :-/ I'm working on 2 liters of water here... tomorrow I've got to drink 4 liters. I started to drink the water at 4 this afternoon, and haven't had to go to the bathroom, so it seems my body is really using up the water!

Been reading up on the Guardian... seems that evidence of bird flu is showing up in southern England. I was reading the article and they were speculating that perhaps an infected wild bird got in the farm (factory really), but then one of the people in charge of the farm said that's impossible, unless they got down one of the small ventilation shafts. Meaning those birds are kept locked up in a warehouse kind of place with no sunlight? Jeez. On top of all that, all of the birds from that factory, 159,000 of them, were gassed to prevent further spread of the disease. The government reimburses the owner of the factory for each healthy bird and egg that was destroyed. What about the lives of those poor animals? Is this what our society has come down to? Killing animals, healthy or not, to prevent spread of a sickness? Will the same thing happen when there's a pandemic affecting humans as well? Will humans be killed to prevent further spread of a sickness? I'm sorry but this bothers me alot!

Anyway, the book I'm reading now, American Ways, is quite interesting. It was loaned to me by Elena to get an "outsider view" of Americans. It's quite interesting. This week I'll have to post about some things I read in the book that I didn't quite think about before. :-) I always attributed some of those qualities to my personality, but realized it's my Americanness! Will post again soon.