How I know I’m great in bed

I’m great in bed.

And that claim has nothing to do with macho arrogance. After this past week it is just the sad, middle-aged truth.

Last week, I developed a middle ear infection and since then, I wake up every night with a pounding head, a face numbed by pain and vertigo, which would have been hilarious if it was Snapdragon who suffered from it.

On Saturday night, I went on a date with the most gorgeous woman I know. I wore a suit, but spoilt the effect by sweating and panting the entire evening like a pervert.

“What do you want to do now?” she asked when we got home.

“I want to go to bed,” I said.

“Oh!” she replied.

And then I disappeared under the duvet and only reappeared at 10.30 the next morning.

I recognised the symptoms immediately.

I had it four years ago and was sure it was either a tumour or my brain that was growing too big for my skull.

It wasn’t.

Early this week, I went to see the doctor – a different one.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. Which is ironic, because I don’t pay him a fortune to tell me to diagnose my own health issues.

“I wish I could tell you it was an axe wound or an old war injury, but it is far less manly than that. I have a middle ear infection,” I told him.

“I think you’re right,” he said after he looked into my ears with one of those lovely shiny toys doctors play with. “It’s not an axe wound.”

Everyone’s a joker nowadays.

And then he prescribed a huge bag full of medicines and told me to get a lot of rest.

Not that I had a choice. The potent muti, combined with the lack of sleep over the past nights, knocked me out cold. I think the past few days I spent at least 18 out of 24 hours somewhere between being asleep and not being awake.

I only woke up every two hours to go to the bathroom and smoke a cigarette before returning to the drug-induced comfort of my duvet. And on the way to my smoking spot on the stoep, I walked into walls and door frames on several occasions.

And that’s why I can confess, dear reader, I’m great in bed. But out of bed … not so much.

Dirk Lotriet. Picture: Alaister Russell

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