Bleah

You know, everyone told me turning in the dissertation would be anticlimactic, but I haven't found it so. I'm enjoying this time.

In my final week of dissertation work, my worry was not so much an impending emotional let-down. Instead, I figured my post-dissertation days would usher in a series of illnesses the likes of which I haven't seen for awhile. See, when I relax after great stress, it's as if my immune system runs up a white flag and throws open its borders.

So tonight it hit. Let's call this Round 1 in what I'm sure will be a knock-trillwing-down, drag-'er-out fight. I'm feeling. . . I dunno. It's kind of a cross between morning sickness and stomach flu, with a bit of flashy vision stuff thrown in for good measure.

In other words, I'm feeling thyroidy--both hyper- and hypothyroid, if that makes any sense at all. See, I've been both.

Good times. Good times.

Of course, I promised my students I'd have grades posted by 10 p.m. That's not going to happen, as I'm going to bed soon as I finish typing this.

Bastard immune system. It probably resents me for believing it works in the cuddly "Danger Model" proposed by Polly Matzinger, in which newcomers to the system are allowed to hang out until they pose a danger. You know, a community-based model instead of a shoot-'em-up, Atari version with little T-cell spaceships like they used to print in TIME magazine in the late 80s when they were trying to explain AIDS. My immune system prefers, I think, the sci-fi model and resents my feminist intrusion.

Yep. Definitely losing my sharpness of mind. Time to sleep!