Did You Get a Covid Superpower?

I did. 

And I wasn't expecting it. And I honestly feel kind of weird for talking about it to anyone, much less writing an entire blog post about it. 

But when I mentioned it to a couple other people casually, I found out I wasn't the only one. So, I'm mentioning it to more people to see just how widespread this phenomenon is. 

First off, it feels kind of ooky to me to be writing about having Covid in this way. Many people lost their lives and people are still at risk to this day. So, please get your vax and boosters, keep wearing your mask and keep yourself and those around you healthy. 

I never want to get it again. I'm so glad for the vaccine, because I imagine it would have been much worse had I not been vaxxed and boosted. My illness was minimal, but there are still a few symtpoms hanging around. 

One is the faucet of snot that my nose has turned into. This can stop at any time and I'd be the happiest. 

Another is just getting all tired and bleh pretty easily. But then I'm not a good sleeper, so that just means I feel like a lump most of the time. And my brain is mean to me about it. 

Then, I have this super-annoying after-covid effect of not being hungry for anything anymore. Used to be, I could tell you exactly what I wanted to eat at any given moment down to the dish. Now? I couldn't be bothered. 

Yeah, I get hungry, but I don't *want* anything. So I don't eat. And then I get hungry again and the whole cycle repeats. But I don't want to cook anything because of the aforementioned "bleh" feeling.

The only time I even get excited about food is when we are out bopping about and that's more about trying something new than experiencing a new flavor.

And this sucks, because the one lingering "superpower" that Covid has gifted me is... 

I am now a super taster. 

I had a pretty good palate before, but now? Now, you can present me a dish of food and I can pick out the ingredients and spices without even thinking about it. 

And the flavors themselves are so BIG right now. 

I got a multipack of fruit flavored gum from an Asian grocery the other day, cause ya girl loves trying every single variety of gum presented to her. So much so that me and Mickey's sister have a text thread that is completely dedicated to all the new gums we try. I love gum. 

But this gum was like a flavor explosion in my mouth. As if Willy Wonka himself prepared this packet of gum personally for Violet Beauregarde in an alternate reality where she was the hero of the story. The first piece I tried was orange and it was the orangiest. 

Then I started noticing how "strong" normal things started tasting to me. Tomato sauce on pizza with too much sugar? Nope. Miss me with that sweet shit. 

Very salty and dry Better Made chips? I can only eat like five or six before declaring them "too salty" and having to stop. I used to be a half-a-bag-or-more in a sitting. And I'm talking the big party bags. 

Have y'all ever had Better Made chips? Their version of the Yellow Bag Lays might be my favorite base potato chip. So perfectly salty with not a lot of greasy grease. 

And spicy stuff? HOO BOY. 

At Halloween we gave out ramen and Pocky and it was cute, but we are left with a lot of ramen. I was cool with that, cause I've been cooking myself up a lot of ramen with a soft egg. 

I made some the other day, not even the one marked "Spicy!!!" with the danger chickens. I couldn't eat more than a bite. My mouth was ON FIRE. But it was well-flavored fire. Like, it wasn't just heat for heat's sake, there was some substance behind that burn. 

So, sometimes this new superpower is fun, like when I am enjoying a massive pot of mussels and they taste perfect and I can taste everything together or apart based on how I concentrate on it. But other times it's not in that I cannot stand red sauce on pizza any more because it is often too sweet. Frozen thin crust pizza is one of my safe, low energy foods, so this one is a blow. 

I'll be crushed if the Mugly's Caesar Salad succumbs to the same fate. 

But either way, I am not complaining, because I had a mild case and didn't pass it along to anyone else as far as I know. 

This phenomenon just surprised me, cause I was worried about losing my taste or smell because I really love exploring flavors. And it was the exact opposite that happened to me.

When I mentioned this to a few of my "safe" people, I heard a few different things ranging from no "superpowers" to super smell (this does not sound fun at all) to improved singing abilities. 

So with those results from that small of a sampling, I thought there might be more! Did y'all get any lingering effects from your bout with covid? I'd love to hear your experience!