Floored by the flu

So, a few weeks back I had the flu – and I am not talking about the standard head cold that people get, call it the flu and spend the day in front of the television. I am talking about the fair-dinkum flu that makes you so weak that the light particles emitted by the TV screen can knock you over. Sitting in front of the TV all day would probably kill you.

Which, by day two of the flu, you wouldn’t mind (being killed I mean, not sitting in front of the TV), because you have racking cough that involves violent chest convulsions, to the point where – at least in my case – you pop an intercostal joint.

That is actually true – I coughed so hard I popped an intercostal muscle. Intercostals are small parts of the chest which humans evolved so that we could experience a sufficiently high level of pain that, if we ever ended up being crucified, it wouldn’t seem so bad.

Luckily, the pain was not continuous; it only hurt when I undertook extreme physical activity such as breathing, and, of course, coughing. I wasn’t so much bothered by the breathing, because I felt like I wasn’t going to be doing it for much longer; the coughing bothered me though, as it had become my number one hobby (just above having to lie down and rest on the way to the bathroom, a harrowing distance of at least four metres).

Thankfully, by day three I was well enough to go to the doctor, sit outside in the cold wearing a mask until called, and be told to keep warm and drink lots of fluids. I keep hearing how hard it is to be a doctor, but given that 90 per cent of my visits end with that exact same advice, I reckon I could handle it. The only hard bit would be that as a lawyer I am used to turning up to appointments punctually, and I probably couldn’t get used to the standard medical practice of not seeing patients until at least 40 minutes after their scheduled time.

I was also now well enough to sit up and watch TV, which is a pity because day time TV makes almost anything (except this flu) seems preferable. Daytime TV is full of shows like ‘Daryl and Shauno’s Eel Fishing Escapes’ and sports which would never be screened in prime time, such as the Oyster-shucking World Championship and the Rickshaw Olympics. If this is what kids watch during school holidays, I think I know why Australian schoolkids are returning NAPLAN results in line with what you’d expect from your average invertebrate.

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No doubt some of you are thinking that if only I had gotten vaccinated this wouldn’t have happened, but I am vaccinated. Unfortunately for vaccinations to be really effective, most of the population also needs to be vaccinated, and vaccination levels have really dropped away since noted scientist Donald Trump pointed out that Dettol injection was a safe and effective alternative.

(NB: I know some people are anti-vaccine, and I respect your right to believe that vaccines are ineffective, or deadly, or designed for mind control or to allow the media to track you for advertising purposes – but I do not want to hear about it, OK? If you want to explain your views on vaccines, point out why they will actually turn us all into lizard people, or just have a rant, don’t write to me. Write to Robert Francis Kennedy Jr, Secretary of Health and Human Services, United States Federal Government, USA, America, as he seems pretty gullible and is no doubt keen to hear your thoughts).

Anyway, I was soon well enough to venture out in public again, albeit with a persistent, lingering cough. Once upon a time society tolerated people coughing in public, but since the pandemic, when you cough in public – even if you have taken precautions such as coughing into your elbow and wearing a plastic bucket over your head – people look at you as if you were mooning them while simultaneously strangling the tooth fairy.

So I had to go back to the doctor to get an inhaler to address the cough. I’d never used an inhaler before, so the doctor showed me how to do it; but since I was dealing with a GP, a class of people who have fundamental difficulties with telling time, I read the instructions.

This is always a mistake, as big pharma do not want to be sued by anybody and medications always have a list of side effects that is scarier than Darth Vader walking a werewolf, and reads something like this: ‘WARNING: side effects of this anti-coughing medication include: coughing (naturally) sneezing, snorting, hallucinations, speaking in tongues, involuntary teleportation, and occasional random spontaneous detachment of feet. Do not use if you are pregnant, thinking of becoming pregnant, or are yourself the result of a pregnancy.’

In fairness, the inhaler did work in the sense that I did not cough whilst actually inhaling; what effect it had other than that is purely speculative. On the plus side, neither of my feet have fallen off, which I am taking as a win.

Thankfully I appear to be on the mend, and am looking forward to going out in public without the bucket. If I get the flu again though, I am seriously considering giving the Dettol a shot.

© Shane Budden 2025