The great outdoors grates on columnist

To medicate or not to medicate -- that is the question.

Whether 'tis nobler in the chest to suffer

the hacks and wheezes of outrageous spring colds

or to take OTC drugs and by ingesting, end them.

And by ending them? To breathe, to sleep --

to snore; and by sleep, to say we

end the coughing, sneezing groans

the colds do bring us. 'Tis a result devoutly to be wished.

To breathe, to sleep.

To sleep -- perchance to dream... Ay, there's the rub;

for in that medicated sleep we find ourselves

slumped over the keyboard at work and drooling into QWERTY.

I'm spending Earth Day today wishing I never had to go outside again. We went sort-of camping this weekend. I say sort of because what we actually did was flop on the pull-out bed in a friend's RV, which, to me, is not camping. It's uncomfortable hoteling. The mattress, although heated, was the only thing thinner than my bank account. When my husband asked my how I felt the next morning, I said, "Like putting a chiropractor's children through college."

The gorgeous weather early Saturday almost made up for the fact that it got cold and wet that afternoon and stayed that way until ... what time is right now?

We were the guest chefs this weekend for our camping buddies. That is, my husband and a friend of ours were the guest chefs. I was the pancake maker and since only two people ordered pancakes, I got to spend my time huddled outside the kitchenette door re-reading The Three Musketeers and telling my youngest son not to pick the pretty three-leaf vine on the side of the tree.

Having a real roof over our heads for the weekend instead of the usual nylon awning doesn't make a lot of difference when you're having to run through the cold rain to fetch the iced tea, deliver sandwiches or hide out from the cleaning crew's pit boss. By the time we rolled back into the driveway Sunday night, the sneezes were beginning. Within 24 hours, the coughing began.

I hate spring or summer colds more than anything. In the winter, I don't mind being cruddy and miserable because I know everyone else is. But in 70-degree weather, when they're all bouncing around their yards, gardening like Easter bunnies on speed, and I'm inside vultching over a humidifier, it only makes the misery that much worse.

(Vultching : To vultch; to hover over something like a vulture hovering over a dying animal. Like me.)

My husband wants to go back this weekend. He swears the temperatures are supposed to be in the 80s and even at night, the lows aren't supposed to be under 50.

I don't care.

If God wanted us to sleep outside in April -- without central heat and air, fuzzy slippers and electric blankets -- He would have moved Memorial Day to March.

When you take the sodas out of the ice chest and put them in the tent because the tent is colder, it's not time to go camping yet.

If there's a teeny, tiny model ocean liner sinking in the campground swimming pool because it just hit an iceberg, it's not time to go camping yet.

If you're more likely to catch pneumonia than lightning bugs, it's not time to go camping yet.

But we'll probably go camping. The hubby has me at an unfair disadvantage now that I'm all croupy and cruddy. I load up on the day-time over-the-counter drugs to get me through work (sort of) and the night time stuff to get me through bedtime. All he has to do is wait until the meds take effect.

"Honey, let's go camping this weekend."

"Mmmm ... ok."

"We won't even need the tent -- we can sleep out under the stars..."

"Mmmm-hmmm. Sure, whatever."

"It's only going to be 38 degrees, but we can all cuddle and huddle around the campfire..."

"I don't think so. I'm drugged, not dead."

Be all my sneezes remembered.

-- Mary Reeves is a staff writer for the Times-Gazette. She can be reached at (931) 684-1200, ext. 215, or by e-mail at mreeves@t-g.com. This column is published each Wednesday.