The Curious Powers of Jim Halpert

Ok, the title is a refrence to an episode of "The Office" when a bat flies around the office and Jim pretends he's a vampire. At three in the morning Monday, I was wide awake, my body having decided that 5 hours of sleep was about right. By 0530, I was fed up and decided to go for a run. As I was running, a bat flew into my neck and flew off. I didn't feel anything other than an impact, and the sound of leathery wings beating a hasty retreat. So I continued to run, and had a nice 3 mile loop. As I was running, however, the somber words of our microbiology professor kept tapping through my mind in time with my feet. "Most people don't know they've been bitten" "Bats are carriers", and "universally fatal" were the cheering sentiments that filled my wee imagination. I got home, showered, and looked up rabies in my microbiology textbook. I was still debating whether or not to tell Mindy or if I should just shrug it off and go to school like normal.
Thirty minutes later I was sitting in the ER across from school. Upton Sinclare, in his novel "The Jungle", opined that women tend to grow emotionally more or less constantly and gradually, but that men tended to grow suddenly in big sporadic spurts. That description fits me pretty well. It's pretty wierd, suddenly living with the possibility of having a fatal illness. I reassured myself that, as far as I knew, the post-exposure vaccine was very effective, and that, in all likelihood, nothing had in fact happened. Then the comforting voice of doubt would whisper, "but why would the bat fly into you in the first place unless it was deranged?" , and "if the vaccine doesn't work, then you'll die because only one person has ever survived symptomatic rabies, and she had severe neurological sequelae" or "if your neck feels numb or tingles, then you're a dead man, and you'll die right when your little boy is going to be born, and you'll never see him, and his mom's last memory will be of her husband, the deranged, rabid, lunatic who could no longer recognize her through his dementia." Perhaps ignorance can be somewhat blissful then.
At school, all I could do was joke around about it because really, worrying isn't going to make you feel better, so you might as well laugh. I am the inveterate sarcastic cynic, despite my best efforts to reform, so instead, I just whipped up some Alda-esque black humor. After 10ml of IM rabies immunoglobulin, I was pretty sure that things would be OK, especially since I had recieved it about 4 hours post exposure. When I was just sitting quietly in lecture, though, mr. comfort returned with his gloomy prognosis and dismal outlook should I develop 'la rage' as Jean Gaulois would say.

For those who cannot recall their infancy which is when the probably last recieved IM shots in the glute, it isn't too bad, really. I thought it would hurt like the dickens, but the glute shots hardly stung at all. The shot in my quad was no treat, nor the delt, but IM glute is a good way to go, I think . I have to return 3 more times, including tomorrow morning for more shots. After the 28th day, we cross our fingers and wait. Since there are no known failures of post-exposure rabies prophylaxis, I'm sure I'll be penning this blog sporadically for years to come. I do have a strange aversion to garlic, sunlight, and I can't see myself in the mirror anymore really. Oh well, you can't win 'em all. On the plus side, now I'll be able to relate to the plot of "Twilight."