Superhypochondria strikes again!

Ever since I was a small child, I've had a relatively overactive imagination. I used to be exceptionally good at inserting myself into story lines -- during playtime, I seamlessly transitioned from being the 6th Fraggle to the 6th Babysitter in the club (or 8th, or 12th, or how many they ended up with). I spent days exploring the yard as Indiana Jones' long-lost archaeologist daughter or as the youngest agent for CONTROL (in this I often played alone -- I was the only 8 year old I knew who watched Get Smart).

To be honest, this didn't change as I got older. My college friends will not hesitate to tell you that I tried very desperately to learn how to apparate (a la Harry Potter) on cold Central Pennsylvania nights.

But now it's gone too far. I've recently started reading The Stand by Stephen King for a book club. For those of you who didn't know (because I didn't!), this book is about a virus that wipes out over 99% of the human population. It begins with flu-like symptoms. I started this book 2 days ago, and today at work, I started feeling feverish. A few moments ago, I was fighting off sniffles. If the entire population of the United States has been infected by a deadly virus in the next few days, I swear that I'm never reading another Stephen King book again.