The temperatures are again 90 or 90+; it is hot. Inside we have colds complete with sniffles, coughs, sneezes, the dreaded sinus pressure, sore throats and body aches. I have fully accepted into  my life Alka-Seltzer Plus for colds – The Orange Zest flavor. In fact, when I went to the store, I bought two boxes. We gave some to Summer, but she is a dud; it made her feel better but she says it is too hard to drink down and won’t take any more. All the more for me . . . . evil laugh.

I can’t complain because I have been lucky this summer with illness, and even the hot, humid days helped me sweat out twinges of sinus and made water in the form of iced tea taste so great. A lot less cola, a lot more water.

Now, though, I do have the “thunk your head on your desk” type of head cold. The draining of mucous down the throat. You could have done without that last detail, right? The ache in the ear.

Yesterday, I was again sucked into the Syfy station marathon of Earth hitting objects – asteroids, comets, solar flares, meteors. Me and my TV and my blankie and my kleenex. Then, the super powers that lie dormant in me most of the time emerged and I squeezed myself into my cell phone (because it is so hard to find a phone booth anymore) and came out as “Super AmeliaJake.” I cleaned the kitchen, picked up stuff, made the dogs a really nice dinner and showered. This is not super stuff for most, but it is for me . . . my bar is set very low – at about dustbunny level on the floor.

And, by the way, our dustbunny population is exploding because Shane is shedding. Frankly, I don’t see how we could have a dog left. However, we do and I tried to vacuum him. It didn’t work so well. He tends to shed a lot when he gets near the vet, so maybe I should run him over to the parking lot and just let the hairs settle on the gravel. Or would that be cruel? Maybe if I went over with a mayonnaise jar and let the medicinal air fill it and then came back and opened it by his nose, we would have a controlled shedding effect?

Probably I should give this some thought.