Top 8 MTG Cards that Describe How Sick I’m Feeling

By the time that you read this, I’ll consider myself lucky if I can breathe through my nostrils instead of dead, chapped lips. That’s right – like so many others this time of year, I have fallen ill. For all of you who will be defeating me and my terrible pool this weekend at GP New Jersey… I apologize in advance for blinding you with my raw, red nose. Perhaps I should just cosplay as Rudolph. Anyways, here’s the process I’ve been going through, told through cards of everyone’s favorite game.

Sick and Tired

It might surprise people, based on my lengthy articles, to hear that I like to talk. A lot. If it has a pulse, I’ll talk to it. Friends, people on the street, squirrels (#MTGUN3). That’s why on Monday night, when my throat felt a teensy bit sore, I assumed that I was simply losing my voice, as occasionally happens. I went to sleep as usual. But when I awoke Tuesday, my throat was still voice-losing sore.

“Weird,” I said to the squirrel that accosted me on my way to the subway. “My throat is still sore. I assumed it would be better by now.”

“Chirp,” said the squirrel.

Still, I thought little of it. It was the last day of class of my semester, and everyone was a bit worn down. My classmates reassured me that I was probably just tired, and the semester was finally catching up with me.

“You’we pwobabwy wight,” I said, my tongue feeling thick and heavy. I spat some bright blue mucus onto the ground, and continued on my way to class.

 Spread the Sickness

Eventually, I could deny it no longer. My sore throat had worsened, I felt fatigued and out of it, and the bright blue mucus had begun seeping out of my nose as well as my mouth. Whatever sickness had been spreading around campus had finally reached me.

Exotic Disease

When I arrived home, I was so incapacitated by my symptoms that I laid down and moaned until my wife got home – then I started moaning even louder.

“What’s wrong this time?” she asked, amused as ever by my antics.

“I… I have a sore throat… and… and a cough… and my nose and sinuses… they… they’re so conges- ACHOO!” I responded bravely, each word a battle against the pain in my throat caused by my body’s killer T cells blasting viruses and healthy throat cells indiscriminately.

“So… a cold?” my cold, unfeeling wonderful wife* replied.

“A cold?! A COLD?!” I broke into another coughing fit, shivering, before I could finish. I eventually mustered up the physical and emotional courage to continue. “I… I clearly have some kind of exotic disease! I’ll be lucky to live through the week! Nay…” I paused dramatically. “I’ll be lucky to live through the day.”

It was at this point that I realized my heartless admirable-for-putting-up-with-me bride had already left the room. I coughed more bright blue completely normal mucus into a tissue and curled into a ball, barely clinging to life.

*Many thanks to my wife for editing this article while I was deep in the throes of some strange, body-wrenching virus. Or the common cold. We’ll never know for sure.

 Certain Death  

“Did you read about the new study where they found that men might have weaker immune systems than women?” I asked my wife. “It’s no surprise that this strange disease is ravaging me so…”

“Mmm,” she replied.

I cough loudly, suddenly struck by an uncontrollable fit begging for attention. “I… I face certain death, my love. If I pass… don’t mourn me, for I lived a good life.”

“Mmm,” she replied.

“But… but tell my story… like Eliza did for Hamilton… please…”

“Mmm,” she replied.

Death’s Shadow

“You know, I’ve been wanting to try a new deck in Modern,” my wife said suddenly.

“Oh… oh really…?” I asked, barely clinging onto my sanity. “Which one?”

“I’ve been thinking of trying Grixis Death’s Shadow,” she said.

I cried out. “How dare you mock me!”

She stared at me blankly. “Huh?”

“You talk of Death’s Shadow, while every moment my light grows dimmer, the shadow of my end… the candle… erm… you know… it gets taller!”

“Hey, isn’t that the flavor tex-“ she began.

“The point is, you flippantly throw around words like ‘death’ and ‘shadow,’ all the while it comes for me!” I shouted.

“Uhhh… you mean… you wanted to play Shadow? I can try something else if you’re playing it,” she said. “It’s really hard to follow what you’re saying. Why don’t you take a nap?”

“Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of your outrageous torment… you tell me to sleep, but soon I shall, and in my sleep of death, what dreams may come?” I monologued sagely.

“I think you just butchered Hamlet,” my wife replied absent-mindedly.

 Fevered Visions

Dear Diary,

I’ve never kept a diary before. But as it becomes abundantly clear that my days are numbered, I thought it only fitting to write what are sure to be my final thoughts.

Today, my sinuses have become congested. The pressure is enormous. Though, of course, the pressure to be strong for my family is even larger.

My sleep is fitful and restless. I have strange dreams and visions. My wife says that my body temperature is normal, but I know that she lies to give me hope. My fever has to be at least 110 degrees. I’m burning up, and yet so cold at the same time.

But the visions… they are reassuring somehow. I dreamt of a violet rose, gently floating along a stream through a forest. The sound of the water flowing and the insects living… so much life. And the rose… cut from its stem, it should be dead, and yet it lingers for just a moment, drawing its final few breaths before it follows the stream to whatever comes next…

My wife tossed my diary into the trash.

“Hey!” I shouted. “Those will be the last words I write!”

“It’s garbage,” she replied. “You should stick with those crap humor articles. Also, since you seem to be feeling better, take out the trash sometime this week, will you?”

 Delirium

Wherewhowhatwhen am I?

I seeheartaste burnt toast.

My surroundings are whiteblueblackredgreen.

Everything is a hazefogmist of confusionmadness.

Did they really print AttuneHubRefinerWhirler at that CMC?

A moment of lucidity.

I lay on the kitchen floor, my faced pressed against its cool surface. My wife steps over me to get the toast that I don’t remember putting in.

But wait. It wasn’t toast when I put it in.

It was bread.

My body was rocked with convulsions as this truth shattered my mind.

 Kozilek, the Great Distortion

            “It’s changed,” I muttered. “Everything’s different now. A minute ago… a minute ago it was bread…”

            “And then you burned it,” my wife accused, exasperated.

            “But now… now it’s toast…”

            “No,” my wife replied. “It’s pure carbon.”

            “Praise Kozilek!” I shouted. “He’s turned bread into carbon, and we are all made of carbon! If we put enough bread into toasters, we can build a new people! A new worl-“

            My wife kicked me in the side. Hard.

            “Stop lying on the kitchen floor and go back to bed. By this point, you have to have enough content for your stupid article, so if you’re not done acting like an idiot when you wake up tomorrow… there are more kicks where that came from.”

*

Sunshine gently warmed my face. My eyes fluttered open. It was a miracle; I was healthy and alive! Despite enormous odds, I had recovered from whatever strange sickness had befallen me. In the nick of time, too! I was going to GP New Jersey today!

I leaped out of bed and frolicked into the kitchen. My beautiful wife awaited me.

“Look at that,” she observed dryly. “What a miraculous recovery.”

“Indeed!” I cried out in joy. “And just in time to write my article and go to the Grand Prix!”

“How convenient.” She glared at me.

As I headed down to the GP, I stuck my head out the car window, taking in the wind and sunshine. I was alive. And to celebrate, I was on my way to go play one of the worst Limited formats in recent memory.

All was right in the world.

Ryan is a grinder from Boston with SCG & GP Top 8’s and a PT Day 2. His fragile self-esteem is built on approval from others, so be sure to tell him what you think of his articles on Twitter @RyanNormandin.