Sunday, May 28, 2006

Laryngitis

I have a ton of stuff I could blog about this weekend.

For instance, here's a picture of my new hanging bud vase made from an emptied light bulb. [Note 1]

My big news today is that I cannot speak. Until about an hour ago, I couldn't even produce a croaking noise. Now, I can speak a few words in a Stephen Hawking voice.

I can also whisper very faintly, but the articles on laryngitis all say that I should just not talk or whisper. [Example]

I'm grateful to Megan for asking about where Wedel is, because that got me out of the house. I went to Loeb and Phuoc Loi for fruit, juice and soup and to Wedel for chocolate.

It is strange experience to be out in the world not speaking. I'm curious about what the sales people thought of me. I smiled, nodded and mouthed "thank you" but didn't make a sound. Did they notice I wasn't speaking? Did they find my overcompensating with the facial expressions to be weird?

We can be sure that Kathy A. thinks I'm weird. To let her know that I couldn't go swimming today, I set up ReadPlease to say "Hello Kathy, this is David Scrimshaw's computer. He has laryngitis and cannot speak. He will not be going swimming today. He can hear you now if you want to say anything." I called her up and after she said "hello", I clicked play and away it went. [If it's still Sunday, May 28th, you can hear what it sounds like by calling my phone. I also used ReadPlease to give me a message that explains I won't be answering the phone or replying to phone calls today.]

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You lucky bastard! I wish I could think of an equally ingenious way of being excused from participating in Bar Camp while still adhering to the mandatory attendance criterion. Sweeeeet.

Anonymous said...

I LOVE the light bulb & iris thingy.

Sorry you're sick - laryngitis gives you a strangely altered relationship to the world. I went deaf once from an ear infection while hitch-hiking from Vancouver to Ottawa. It was bizarre....I was among people, but felt totally isolated because I couldn't communicate.