I’ve got man flu. Not a mild head cold, or ‘the sniffles,’ this is full blown man flu. I feel terrible and you should feel terrible for me. This is the major part of man-flu. Not the symptoms of my illness, neither am I that interested in where I got it from (though, it may have something to do with a battered immune system after a weekend of birthday celebrations) No, if I have man flu, I want everyone to know about it. I want the people around me to sympathise, empathise and to rally around me.
Getting people to rally around you is an art form. You have to be subtle, yet forceful, ill, yet capable of communicating your discomfort. I do this by walking slowly, with a slight hunch, groaning and surrounding myself with exotic fruit, like a modern day Cleopatra.
'You'd tell me if I looked like death, yeh?'
These are all clear messages that man is near to death. Obviously, man (or me) is not near to death but in his head (or my head) it’s all over. We are incapable of doing anything and the end is probably nigh.
Victims of man flu range from young men to old men, not forgetting middle aged men. This illness is indiscriminate when it strikes. No man is safe. The only men that are safe are wo-men, more commonly known as women.
If men don’t die, they usually recover. Usually within 24 hours. In fact, I started writing this blog twenty minutes ago and I feel bloody fantastic.
Sorry to scare you, I really thought I was going to die there for a minute.