Happy 4th of July . . . . hope you don't have bird flu

I hope everyone had a fun and enjoyable 4th of July. Typically this is one of my favorite holidays, not because I'm overly patriotic (with today's government, quite the opposite), but because it's about the pure joy of family, friends and fun. There is really no stress involved (New Year's is another fave but it's in the winter, which I hate, so that bumps it down on the list), just barbeque, beer, fireworks and good fun. Until this year. Until bird flu (again, I really do not have bird flu, but it certainly feels like it). I haven't written in a few days, basically because they've been the worst few days in recent memory and I've done nothing worth writing about. And I mean nothing. I was so excited for the weekend to get some things done and hang out with Cody, until I came home from work Friday feeling like a truck hit me. But while him and Dude played hours of drunk chess, I gathered my energy and worked on painting the dining room ceiling. I was doing okay for a while until I really started to fade fast. So I slept. Saturday I was awful. Awful. Awful. I woke Cody up, we went to Wal-Mart, stocked up on tissues, juice and cold medicine and I stayed in bed ALL DAY. Sunday was no better. I just sat in bed and worked on my scrapbooks (in the good news category, I at least got some work done on the ole' scrapbooks). Monday I went to work, felt absolutley horrible, so for the first time since starting this job 1.5 years ago, I left work early because I was sick. I came home and crashed. Last night when Cody called (he was working late) I was almost in tears with the pain and pressure in my head and ear. He came home, did everything he could to help, but sure enough I was awakened at 4am with my ear draining nasty stuff. My worst pain fear had arrived - my stupid ear gave out on me and the pressure ruptured my eardrum and was draining fluid out of my ear. Gross. Super gross and super pain. So I waited until 8 am to call the on-call doctor, only to have her call me in an antibiotic. Oh well.
Okay, enough about being sick. Bird flu sucks and I am the biggest baby when I get really sick. I am pretty good with normal colds and flus and I'm usually pretty tough, but once I cross a certain treshold I just melt and become 4 years old again. Anyway, with other news, Germany lost to Italy today. A tragic defeat. 119 minutes of scoreless soccer. Only one minute to go until the game is decided in penalty kicks. And Italy scores. And then with less then one minute to go, they score again. Heartbreaking. I can't even imagine that country tonight. Absolute sorrow.
Went and saw the fireworks tonight downtown. It was sort of raining/sprinkling so we watched them from our parking garage - too bad there was another building right in the way. Still got to see a good bit of them so it was still cool. No BBQ and beer though - doesn't go too well with bird flu.
I really really really hope this thing is over soon.