Thanksgiving And Being Sick

It was Thanksgiving 2017.

For the first time in a long time the big dinner was not going to be at our house. My wife's sister, sweet Michelle, has two children, Scott and Kimmy. Scott is married to Jane and they have a new baby daughter, Evangeline. We were off to Jacksonville for Jane's first foray into hosting Thanksgiving dinner.

There was just one thing.

I had been sick, bedridden, feeling like @%$#, whatever you want to call it, since the previous Wednesday. I was the DayQuil/NyQuil kid in an effort to shake that off. My wife had even slept upstairs refusing to come near me. I have to admit at first it was kinda nice, that being alone thing. Married people know what I'm talking about.  That ended pretty quick and I missed her in bed next to me.

I can't remember the last time I was sick or even had a cold. But. I've written about substitute teaching and there lies the rub. In that high school it seemed like all the students were sneezing, coughing, or blowing their noses. It was like being in the middle of a petri dish and guess what?

They got me.

There's a reason liquid sanitizer is everywhere.

So I made it through the weekend, seeming to get worse all the time, and hoped I'd be fine as the week progressed. It was slow going and it was slow going.

As the days marched on I switched from thinking it was a bad cold to the thing that rhymes with blue. Why? The aching, the feeling awful, the headaches, that's why. I'd had a shot like a good boy but...  Remember the movie Airplane when one of the characters said, "Looks like I picked the wrong week to give up smoking?" Well, I picked the wrong week to be sick.

I've learned you don't pick sick, sick picks you.

So the sun came up Thanksgiving morning and you guessed it I still was shaky. So my wife, my mother in law and my twins loaded up the car and headed north.

Without me.

I didn't want to get my mother in law sick. I didn't want to get the baby sick. It was me and the dogs, like Macaulay Culkin, home alone. Watching terrible football on the telly.

By all accounts Jane did a wonderful job. My wife and her mother couldn't stop raving about her and the dinner she put on. My twins loved their dogs and especially Evangeline.

My Thanksgiving dinner? A burrito from WaWa.

I'm feeling better, I even went to the gym yesterday. My brother reminded me to use their hand sanitizer. Thanks Kirk.

And so it goes.

Happy Holidays.


#MarkMcEwen
Subscribe to my blog: Mark McEwen's World
Follow me on twitter: @mcewenmark
Like my page on facebook: www.facebook.com/markmcewensworld
And also visit my website: www.markmcewen.com

A Few Thoughts

A couple of things rattling around in my head...

You ever notice that actors and writers want to sing and play onstage?

From Keanu Reeves' band Dogstar to a long ago Bruce Willis playing harmonica and singing to Stephen King and his group, Rock Bottom Remainders, there's a story there.

That last band had a bunch of writers in it including Mitch Albom, Amy Tan, Dave Barry, Scott Turow, and many more. I'll bet you've read something by someone in that revolving bunch. Heck, my girl, Maya Angelou was an honorary member.

And here's something about Rock Bottom Remainders from a guy who played with them, Bruce Springsteen, "Your band's not too bad. It's not too good either. Don't let it get any better, otherwise you'll just be another lousy band."

That right there is a quote.

I mention that because although these guys wanted to be musicians, you very rarely find musicians who want to be actors or writers or anything other than what they're doing. There's Oscar winner Jared Leto who acts when he's not fronting his band, Thirty Seconds to Mars, but he acted before them.

And ole Jon Bon Jovi has acted in a movie or three. He was even on Ally McBeal and Sex and the City.

But

Most musicians are quite happy doing what they do best which is making music.

Here's something else...

Standups can become actors but I don't know of any actor who can be a standup. Kevin Hart movies sell a ton, Amy Schumer films do quite well, thank you very much, and Eddie Murphy movies have been very successful.  Now, name me an actor who can get up in a club armed only with a mike.

Silence.

In that same kinda vein, who knew rappers would turn out to be such good actors?

Ice Cube, Ice-T, Ludacris, RZA from Wu-Tang Clan, LL Cool J, the list goes on and on. Remember Will Smith began as a rapper and don't forget Eminem in 8 Mile.

RZA (center) on Californication

They are all over tee vee (NCIS anyone?) and all over the movie houses (The Fast and the Furious franchise).

Killing it I might add.

I didn't see that one coming. Did you?

And those are a few things I think about.


#MarkMcEwen
Subscribe to my blog: Mark McEwen's World
Follow me on twitter: @mcewenmark
Like my page on facebook: www.facebook.com/markmcewensworld
And also visit my website: www.markmcewen.com