I have stolen this title from
. You have to read his substack, as his words are always so gorgeous. His title today though was extremely apt for me and I will proceed to tell you why.My usual Saturday routine when I'm on my own is to sit on the sofa with a nice cup of tea and catch up on all the YouTube videos I have missed during the week.
I have no idea what happened this morning, but I think my body must have done the amazingly stupid feat of trying to cough, laugh, sneeze and breathe at the same time all whilst in the middle of drinking a cup of tea. THIS IS NOT A GOOD IDEA.
One minute I was drinking tea and the next minute I was both inhaling tea and having tea come out through my nose and mouth, plus simultaneously not being able to breathe.
I was trying to breathe but nothing was happening. No air was being let in through my mouth and my nose was already blocked.
At this point my orderly brain kicked in and I tried taking the tiniest of breaths just to get the oxygen in so I could think and at the same time I hit at my throat to break whatever air bubble had formed.
Slowly - although it was probably only a couple of seconds but it felt like a week – it felt like an air hole opened up in my throat and I was gradually able to take deeper and deeper breaths. It took around ten tries to get a full deep breath in.
I was covered in almost a full cup of tea, so as I was getting my literal breath back, everything I was wearing went into the washing machine and I blew my nose a few times to get the tea out.
I have never had that happen before. I have certainly never blown tea out of my nose. I’m usually far to busy drinking it.
I would admit it was quite a shock to find yourself suddenly unable to breathe when everything around you is just carrying on like normal and you think what a way to go! Although admittedly I only thought of that afterwards. At the time I was far too busy trying to breathe and figure out my next move.
Humans are ridiculously fragile and we can go from upright and living to the absolute opposite within a second. I would be lying if I said that experience hadn’t shaken me a little. I had to go and find a biscuit and another cup of sweet tea just to sort my brain out. Once I got changed into some non tea soaked clothing I sat back down on the sofa with another cup of tea, found myself another biscuit and quietly open sub stack to have a read.
The first thing I saw was Matt Inwood’s post with that title. To say I found it laughably ironic would be fair.
I must have inhaled a lot of air just before my throat closed, as all I could do afterwards was burp, and that is something I don’t often do. I was never even able to burp until about four years ago, I think I’m more of a hiccup person.
Once I’d drunk my tea and eaten a few more biscuits I fell asleep. This is my usual reaction to stress, I get extremely sleepy and then I’m off into the land of nod.
I woke up about two hours later feeling much happier about things, listened to the thunder outside and resolved to do nothing much for the rest of the day, not even catch up on The Rookie as that’s just too much excitement.
I was feeling quite accomplished, having managed a full-scale hair colour/hair wash/shower/exfoliate/moisturise routine. I know that’s nothing for many of you but for me it is a definite achievement every time.
I shall spend the rest of the day watching YouTube and snoozing.
Tomorrow I’m off early to the gym, so let’s see what awaits me there…
My dinner is already sorted out, as I have a jar of homemade Turkish green beans on standby, some fried aubergine slices and some nice white fish fillets to bake on top of the beans. (Video courtesy of my late friend Ken.)
You get the stack a day early, even though there’s no written recipe today as I am I’m heading back to the sofa.
Please leave the drowning on dry land to me, in future. 😅
Thank you for the 'I am fine' subheading!
As it happens, I was reading that while having a cuppa and a biscuit after just getting back in from this afternoon's gig. Glad that you're OK - your updated afternoon plan sounds like an excellent decision.