Almost over my cold/ librarian rant

Here's what's left of it: a bit of stuffiness and labored breathing. A coughing fit every afternoon between 3 to 3:30 pm is guaranteed. Yes, I'm using my inhaler more often.Still, I'm feeling better than I did 4 or 5 days ago.

To what do I attribute my recovery? I drank a gallon of orange juice in about 4 days. PLUS, I took 1000 to 1500 mg of vitamin C every day. An XS acetaminophen tab every time I had a headache. Like NOW!

It's always hard to drink enough water at work, especially when I'm at the reference desk. I take a multivitamin tab everyday. I drank tea with umeboshi (wet salted pickled plum). Or green tea with seedless ume (dried plum). When my throat hurt or I coughed too much, I sucked on a vitamin C lozenge.

I TRIED to sleep earlier and a bit more, but just found myself waking up earlier!

DARKNESS BEFORE DAWN UPDATE: It's almost 4 am, and I've been up for about an hour. I fell asleep - more like a coma! - before 8 pm. BEFORE 8 PM - a sure sign that I'm sick/exhausted. I've had almost 7 hours of sleep and don't know if I can settle back down. I woke up with a coughing fit, which is always exhausting.

The RANT: All the dehydration (DH was right, once again! He said I looked dehydrated just before I shuffled off to bed!) and stress of work yesterday caught up with me. I was tired, tired, tired. The children in the library are on the Internet computers fiddling with the settings, spoiling it for the next user - which means I had to reset them. And this is not as easy as it sounds. When I remind them not to do this, some say, "OK, yes, Aunty." Another gave an excuse. THERE IS NO EXCUSE.

Then, I told the same girls NOT TO RUN. They know better, BUT CONTINUED. Yes, I'm shouting. They persisted and I had to use my MEAN VOICE. And with the remains of this cold, it can sound a lot like the VOICE FROM THE EXORCIST. It's tiring to repeat myself and raise my voice, which is why I would be CRAP as a teacher of young children. I listen to the teachers of some of the classes that come to visit the library, and I cringe and THEY SCARE ME, they're so mean. sigh. It's tiring to type this - reliving it all again!

Parents SHOULD NOT LEAVE THEIR CHILDREN IN THE LIBRARY and expect us to babysit them! When they are in one place for HOURS - and I am talking 3 to 5!!! hours - the best-behaved children will get into trouble.

I was going to write about the kind of trouble, but I'm hoping this will not escalate.

I need another gallon of orange juice...