If Dick Clark's not using his wheelchair, give it to me.

I'd love to think I had something interesting or humorous to say today, but the truth is I just feel crapodelic. My allergies are really in high gear now, and I'm doing my best to ward off this stuff becoming a sinus infection, but I think I'm just kidding myself. An infection is looming, and it's just a matter of when.

And when I get like this, I can't even really think very clearly, which makes me useless at work. But I go because it's kind of a holiday week, and I fear that my bosses will think I'm just scamming vacation days by using sick days. I know this is stupid since I've sat at my desk coughing and blowing my nose all week. Any half-wit can see that I'm not well. But that's not going to stop me from going to the New Year's Eve gala tomorrow. No siree. I've got a new dress. And shoes. And a matching purse. So, if I'm going to that, I'm having trouble justfiying why I shouldn't come to work. It's silly, though. I have sick days - I should use them. This is what they're for!

Next week I'm not being this stupid. No one wants to hear me hacking up a lung over here. They don't want to hear my nose emptying into a tissue every 10 minutes. Even if I'm not contagious, if I don't feel good and I'm just annoying my co-workers, I should stay home.

I used to work with a guy once who we wished would stay home more often. He was old and had some kind of respiratory thing where he repeatedly coughed up stuff that he then spit into his trashcan. It was nasty - truly disgusting. Then he had a car accident, and he was shaken up, but not really hurt. But he managed to get a doctor's note that allowed him to take advantage of FMLA. The guy didn't show up for work for 2 months. And for the next 6 months, he showed up only sporadically. It was unbelievable. At one point, they thought they'd try giving him a laptop and making him work from home. Somewhere along the line he had to turn the laptop back in, and they found gay porn all over it. No lie. And you know what? He still wasn't fired. But here I sit worried about taking legitimate sick days.

Maybe my allergies have affected my sanity.