Late winter, or early spring?

Both Jack and I are struggling with what feels like a boomeranging head cold: it seems to wear off and then - atishoo! - the streaming nose and the cough and the sore throat all come back again. 
I should have picked Eben and Luca up from school today. But Josh knew I wasn't well and did it instead - I gratefully went back to bed.
So that's my rather self-absorbed Mono Monday story for today.
The news, about Gaza, about Ukraine, about the US,  is as disturbing as ever.  
An old quote from North American writer Elizabeth Smart keeps going round and round in my catarrh-infested head:
" Butter is up 10 cents. The human being is down."
(From 'By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept').