Flat on my back in bed.

I wish I could say I was doing fascinating!! and exciting!! things while home in LA, but sadly, I cannot. It is raining like the dickens outside, all my closed-toe shoes are at the cobblers (because it was supposed to be SUNNY DAMMIT), and we all know that I do not deal well with rain. To make matters worse, my lower back is in excruciating pain (really, at 24? Aren't I supposed to be at least 50 before the back problems start kicking in?) and I can slowly start feeling myself getting sick. I think this has to be one of the worst feelings in the world, because you know that debilitating illness is imminent, and there is nothing you can do to stop it.

So I called my mom while she was out running errands to buy me some zinc pills, because I've taken them in the past and damn, they work. However, my mother is a doctor and does not believe in herbal remedies. No, like my father, she believes that antibiotics are God's gift to the world. At least, unlike my father, she does not prescribe me every single antibiotic under the sun every time I get sick. Thanks to my father, I am sure there are some super-strains of viruses and the like that are immune to antibiotics because obviously I stop taking antibiotics as soon as I feel better, rather than going through the whole two-week course. So those half-dead viruses just become stronger and resistant to antibiotics. Sigh.

Anyway, like I said, my mother doesn't believe in herbal remedies and thus getting her to buy them was/is an exercise in patience.
Me: Hey, can you get me some zinc pills while you're out?
My sister (who is currently running errands with my mom): Sure. Where can I get them?
Me: Any drugstore. Whole Foods. Just ask for zinc pills. Make sure they are pills, and not lozenges.
My sister: Okay.
[10 seconds later, the phone rings.]
Mom: What do you want?
Me: Zinc pills. You can get them at pharmacies and the grocery store.
Mom: How do you spell that?
Me: Z-I-N-C. You are a doctor, how do you not know how to spell zinc?
Mom: What is zinc?
Me: It's going to make me feel better!
Mom: Why don't you take antibiotics?
Me: Because I don't want to.
Mom: Are these things some kind of liquid?
Me: No! Pills! Pills!! And I don't like antibiotics.
Mom: You should really take antibiotics.
Me: I don't want to! Zinc pills please!
Mom: Okay, fine. But you should really take the antibiotics.

I was going to ask for echinacea and the Laughing Cow light cheese, but I feel like that might've been pushing it too far (Plus, some studies have shown that echinacea might not actually work, or that echinacea pills don't actually contain echinacea).

Also, no antibiotics because I plan on drinking drinking drinking for New Year's Eve, and I've heard that it's not wise to combine alcohol and drugs. Although, shh, I have been known to wash the occassional pill down with a glass of wine because the wine was closer to me than water.

And so, I am flat on my back in bed (haha, you thought that with that header, this post would be more interesting, didn't you?), watching Friends on DVD, procrastinating on all my work (cannot do work if I can't sit up!) , and hoping, hoping, that my mom can manage to just get my damn pills.