So, who amongst us has been stricken by this year’s awful flu/URI plague and where are we?
Mrs. Shark and I got sick over the weekend (New Jersey).
Please report in . . .
I got a head start on it - I was out of commission for five days over Thanksgiving weekend. Nevada.
I’m not sure what this year’s symptoms are. I had the vaccination, but started coughing the day after Christmas. Spent several days in bed feeling pretty poorly. The cough made all my ab and chest muscles hurt, and I was having bouts of the runs. A week later, it turned into a head cold, but at least the cough abated to something less wracking. It took about two weeks to feel like I had any energy at all.
Oh yeah, Oregon.
Just got over it. Two of my friends now have it. Half of my office has or had it. Los Angeles area.
I’m also in NJ. Came down with a fever on Sunday the 15th and slept for two days. That sucked because I had MLK day off on Monday. The rest of the week I had major sinus congestion. I’ve had the flu in the past, it’s horrible, so I always get a flu shot every year hoping it will help.
To everyone in here: Get plenty of rest, drink lots of water/soup and I hope you feel better soon.
All of this matches my wife’s experience. I went to bed on New Years Day and stayed there for three days. I had it easier than she did.
Also Portlandia
My ex housemate is currently in the hospital. She’s had it since before Christmas. It morphed into pneumonia. She has pretty brittle asthma to begin with plus a shot immune system 
Not the flu, but a bad cold I got on Christmas Eve, my first in 12 years. I’m still not entirely over it. If I had the flu, I’d have to be hospitalized.
Son got it Friday. I got it yesterday. Daughter has it today, but is actually fighting me to go to school. Kids!
Flu. We got our shots, but apparently, yeah, whatever.
Also near Portlandia. West Coast in the lead baby! (Don’t deny me my simple pleasures.)
Neither of us ----- but I’m keeping nine-pence handy just in case. 
I haven’t had anything really nasty - yet - but my parents, who are both 83, have dealt with this over the past few weeks. My dad said that he just had an awful cough without a fever, but my mother had a confirmed case of influenza and was prescribed Tamiflu. Dad called me that evening, which was Friday, at about 9 o’clock and told me that she’d also been prescribed an antibiotic but the Walmart pharmacy wouldn’t have any more until Tuesday. I told him, “Call Walmart first thing tomorrow and have them transfer it to another pharmacy. She NEEDS that medication.” He did, because she couldn’t talk, and the grocery store near their home did have it and she was able to get on it as of Saturday morning.
They’re both feeling a lot better now. 
Last fall, I had something that slowed me down considerably for a few days, and while I wasn’t all that stuffy, I basically lost my sense of smell. For example, I changed the cats’ main litterbox, which has an old bath towel underneath it. I could tell one of them had peed on the towel, because it was heavier than expected, but I could not smell it. :eek:
What does this mean? 
I’ve had a bad cold for almost a week now. I’m in the clearing-out stage now (I hope!)
Not as bad as the flu though - I got my shot.
I got a cold right after Christmas. Knocked me down a bit, but I managed to avoid full-blown bronchitis for once. Mostly through using my rescue inhaler regularly. Infection-trigger asthma is super fun. But it went better than most of my colds as a result. My partner, however, got a nasty bug a few weeks before Christmas that took nearly a month for him to fully shake off.
Nine of us in my family got a gastro bug from my niece just after Thanksgiving. It went through the family for 2 weeks but only 48 hours at a time.
Then she doled out some bronchitis and I got it from before Christmas to last week. It was really bad, I never had bronchitis before I don’t think. I felt exhausted from coughing and had a hard time changing climates by leaving the house. Exercise was right out.
The flu did go through my friends’ house. I got a text one afternoon asking if I could bring them supplies. I got Gatorade and Lysol from the drugstore and left it outside their door. I got my flu shot but no way was I gonna chance it!
My cousin’s mother-in-law died of the flu a few weeks ago. She was 93. New York City.
If memory serves, its the fee charged by the man with the cart in Monty Python movie. 
A nasty cold is making the rounds here – I haven’t gotten it yet since I don’t see many people. Neither does my father but on one of his few appointments he was in the room with someone else who had it, so he thinks he got it. I will call for a quarantine at home!
My husband and I haven’t gotten it, but everyone else in the family has, and most of the people at work. I suppose it’s just a matter of time. My daughter has had it for over a month.
Fuck. Started coughing Sunday night. By midnight I had the kind of cough that won’t let you inhale. I thought “welp, this is how it ends”. Had to sleep for two nights sitting up to keep from coughing to death. 103 fever, sweats and chills, crazy fever dreams. The worst part is not being able to snuggle with my four year old. The best part was the NyQuil, melatonin and cough syrup with codeine cocktail I invented to help my sleep. I call it The Cosby.
Still not 100% today, but back at work. All I can think of is my bed. That and not coughing, because everything hurts when I cough. even my eyeballs.