Day 619

After my weird episode on Wednesday, with more of the same yesterday (but to a lesser degree ... and minus the blurred vision) I've pretty much decided it is/was all a virus.   There are elements which are worrying and could point to a "you don't have fibromyalgia at all, you actually have MS" diagnosis (which is a whole other post I am not keen on writing just yet), but there are elements which could quite well be viral.  Combine that with some wonderfully sympathetic commenters telling me either they or others have felt similar, and given my assistant cheer coach's husband was in hospital with same symptoms (with no definite diagnosis) I am thinking that the flu has just taken on a new strain and I'm just one of many ...

As I hang around the house recovering from my "mystery virus" I've managed to not only get lots of doona time in, but I've also well and truly started writing my next children's book series.  This one is aimed at older children and I am very excited to be writing it.

But the other thing I managed to do was get on top of our "contributions" for this month and donate to another worthwhile cause.

Husband and I are suckers for giving to a good cause. I am getting phone calls ALL THE TIME because we're on the good Samaritans telephone list that must get passed around all the charities - so we end up giving to at least one charity a month.  This month's charity didn't come via phone call.  It isn't an Australian based organisation looking to conduct research, provide care, fund therapy or train dogs.  This time I'm not contributing to cancer research, the Red Cross or the Australian Surf Lifesaving Society. All are very worthy causes and ones we support regularly. But this month's charity is quite different ... and while seemingly simple in theory needs our help in practice.

This month's charity could quite well save many children just by helping them wash their hands. "In Australia, children are taught the importance of washing their hands. Sadly, 4000 children in developing countries could die today because they don't."  Apparently diarrhoea kills around 4000 children under the age of 5 every day, and it could be combated by increased hygiene via access to water and soap.

As part of our normal support of Plan International, I received a letter last week requesting we support Plan's WASH project in Uganda (Water and Sanitation Hygiene).  At first I put it in the pile with all the other charities we are asked to assist.  But since I've been off due to my own bout of illness I actually sat down and read about it.  If my dream truly is to help as many children in the world as possible believe in their own power, shouldn't I start by trying to keep some of them alive first?

Husband and I made the decision that we wanted to be involved in this project - not just by providing our token $30, but by making others aware of the program.  Because, not only do we get the opportunity to assist, but for every dollar we contribute, AusAID has agreed to contribute up to $5 more (that's not just matching us dollar for dollar, but actually by $5).

Anyway, the purpose of this post isn't to do some horn tooting about being all charitable and all that (honestly it's not ... well ... maybe a little ...), but rather it is to highlight that this project by Plan is actually a pretty good one to get involved in.  We may not be out there digging for water and putting in infrastructure (like my folks are about to do ... another story for another day) but we may be able to help some kiddies stay alive.

https://www.plan.org.au/rpp/donate/register

Click on the picture if you think you can help wash some hands.

In the meantime I better make doubly sure my family are all doing likewise so that this silly mystery virus doesn't start making it's way through the entire clan. One dizzy airhead in the family is enough for one week ....

It's Friday!! Woot woot. Time for a bit of flog blogging blog flogging. Head on over to the lovely Glowless to link up and see some other flogs floggers.   Glowless has done this cool Vlog this week so it's worth a look see (and it totally makes sense now that I know who the crazy eHarmony cat lady is).    Check it out.