"Battling an Illness"

Me in bed

One of the amazing things about being a secretary is that when you call in sick - that's it. You stay home, watch soap operas or go water skiing or do whatever secretaries do when they are sick or fake sick. Today, for instance, my secretary Rosemarie called in "sick" but privately she told me she was going to Mystic Seaport this weekend with her boyfriend that she met on a cruise, Ed. And it would be patently ridiculous for me to dial her home number to tell her I need some copies of something and expect her to do it ASAP.

Unfortunately, today I am legitimately sick with a fever. I slept in 37 layers of clothes, moaned occasionally, complained to Perry, asked Perry for kisses and sweat up a storm. But instead of spending today nursing myself back to health in order to drink heavily this weekend, I had to drag myself out of bed at 7:30am, work on some "urgent" documents, get on a conference call at 11, send out several emails profusely apologizing for being ill, and in general just pretend my apartment was an office and work just like any other day while trying not to be on the verge of death. Apparently the price of being legitimately sick is also being publicly humiliated by having it announced on a conference call that I was "battling an illness" which I guess is nice so I could leave the call early but then I also had to try my best to sound sick and downtrodden so I didn't look like I was faking. I'm sorry but this is not legitimate - since when are my secretary's fake illnesses and podiatrist appointments (for which she had to leave 3 hours early on Tuesday - he told her to hold off on bunion surgery) more important than my real diseases?