I thought toxoplasmosis was mostly a cat dealie - that's why pregnant women aren't supposed to clean cat boxes. Something like that, anyway. Are you maybe thinking of myxomatosis?

Oh, man, the headaches could be a symptom. i thought i was getting migraines. Could i have parasites? Why couldn't i have one of those amazing weight loss parasites? Someone point me at the good parasites and should i drown these possible ones in booze?

I don't know that toxoplasmosis is so often associated with transmission from mice, as it is from cats. But hantavirus can produce, and first present as, headache symptoms, too. If you do develop breathing issues, don't screw around seeing a doctor, and be specific about your wild rodent encounters.

Cats get it from mice and it makes mice act odd. These two mice i had acted very odd for mice: being very bold, even friendly but neurotic, dancing--
There was this incredibly gross incident involving this spelt bread i made that i left on the stove for less than a minute and found "black rice" on just prior to eating. It's as close to eating poop that i got as far as i know and i have been pretty rigorous on poopp patrol--
i would be so much more squicked out if i wasn't in pain.

i don't seriously think i am in danger of anything deadly unless i have a sudden anyeurism, so cross your fingers and hope my brain vessels blow.

prior to intent of eating. There was no poop eating but i was disgusted enough so throw out all the rest of the bread and not eat anything the rest of that day.
Never do i ever consider having hantavirus, but i bet that if i had those symptoms i'd probably think i had a bad flu and just end up dead.

Unless you've got some of the other symptoms, as a layman my opinion is that it's probably just a headache. Although you can't rule out brain slugs.

≡ Click to see image ≡

Either way, pay attention to how you feel this weekend.

i've been worried that i'm developing a migraine condition but this one's finally slacking off.
Now i know i haven't been to the brain slug planet recently. It would be worth a brain slug or two to do some traveling.

Migraines ain’t no fun. My sister gets them, and they just lay her out. Apparently the meds she’s been prescribed are no picnic either. She finally decided that she’d rather put up with the occasional day spent in a darkened bedroom than be a full-time zombie. That’s a tough choice.

I’ve only ever had an aura. I was here at work, and over the course of about twenty minutes my vision became really… odd. Kinda like this, except it was more like an inverted upper-case L and was in the upper left of my field of vision. I was freaking out, thinking I’d had a stroke.

Fortunately Science Girl was able to figure out what was up, contact a nurse-practitioner and tell me to take some ibuprofen and get some caffeine in me ASAP. That seemed to do the trick. The vision faded after maybe half an hour or so, and while I did have a headache, it really wasn’t that bad. Sure spooked the shit outta me, though.

This guy was talking about toxoplasmosis last night on The Daily Show. He's saying the evolutionary point of this is that the toxoplasmosis makes the mice bold so they can get eaten by the cat, thereby causing the cat to catch the disease.

Nah, you're cool. Every time the mice get all crazy in my kitchen I think I have some kind of terrible disease and then I look it all up and learn that actually, I don't. The thing is, the only deadly disease you get from mice is that thing they die from out in the southwest and for that you have to breathe one helluva lot of mouse poop air. So if you haven't been doing that, you're cool -like, if you haven't been cleaning out your cabinets by just sweeping them and then leaning over and breathing in. If you saturate the whole thing with bleach first then you're fine (this is what I do, put a bandanna over my mouth, pull everything out and then kind of slop a half a bottle of bleach in there. Liquid kills the death dust). And bubonic plague is rare. So chances are you're fine.

From one mouse plagued household to another,
yrs. sincerely,
MGL

fucking cat lovers. you're all nutters fyi.

eth- how recently did you deal with these brazen mice? iirc a simple blood test will tell you for sure...

It's not me so much as the mice, one dead, one thankfully disappeared, but both behaved unusually enough that i don't think it's far fetched. i never use to be the type mice openly taunted without fear. Something is clearly amiss.

Last mouse contact was over a month ago but it usually clears up on it's own even it is present.

I suspect you have some kind of nonspecific itis that is causing the headaches. I brought back an old school sniffling mess from New Orleans and it's still with me, no amount of whiskey and sleep deprivation will defeat it. Got that old NO funk is what I have, probably caught if from that fucking chorus of roosters that was in my mom's backyard. Jesus the simplest things involving me going to New Orleans turn into a fucking Tom Waits song.

So yeah, point being, don't sweat the little plague mice, just rest and hydrate and stay away from stone bummers for a while.

Being in NO makes me worry you have been invaded by crazy insidious mold spores.
i think i'm just unhealthy but not so compromised i have to worry about toxo, and yet since not really smoking for most of a year i haven't really gotten sick in the cold and virus way, but, of course, i am just waiting for death.
Or enduring inspiration.
Maybe just a consistent noncreepy pot source.

Yeah, weed would solve all my problems.
Much concerted focused music listening and movie watching and inspired making of stuff would occur.

I think you might be right on the mold dear Eth, my wife had a serious mold attack while we were there. I was fine and held it up to my peasant stock being better than her peasant stock but I wonder if I just took it home with me?

You know what's funny? I was just walking the dog and found half a little scraggly bag of cess weed in the street. I'm not much of a doper these days but I've thought about it recently. Do you think it's loaded with afterschool special drugs and rat poison?

I suppose I could test it out, there's no fear that I wouldn't be able to taste angel dust on the first puff, even after all these years. It's not a taste you forget.

i don't know how you get rid of mold but i've heard since Katrina, the whole mold situation there has become dangerously bad.
You could try the weed in my stead but it won't be the same.
Meanwhile i guess i'll throw together that dirty martini.