I called in tired today...what doesn't that count?

Today was one of those days that I was sick and tired, or sick of being tired, or tired of being sick, so I went in at 7am and left at 11.
Everyone at work has been sick for the last 2 months, literally every day at least 4 people are out. Is it my fault that I have remained healthy and therefore ended up working the longest hours, don't I deserve a break?
It's kind of like the smoking thing... smoker's get smoking breaks, it's a pretty much understood thing, every few hours (or some people every hour) they take 10-15 minutes and smoke a cigarette. As a non-smoker if I were to go out on the porch once every few hours for 10 - 15 minutes I would be seen as a slacker. In fact that happened a few years ago. My boss saw me and some of my assistants on the porch and commented on the lack of work to someone else. It was during a crunch of working 7 - midnight or later for quite a few weeks in a row and was out first day break EVER. Now if we had had cigarettes in our hands would he have said anything to anyone else? I don't think so.
Today I took a long nap, watched some old West Wings and Law and Orders and avoided all depressing news channels for at least 12 hours. I sat out in the shade, discussed the direction of the breeze with some ants, we decided there was decidedly not enough breeze ... so I came back inside.
While online I did run into some blogs over run with links to news sites and I clicked out of them faster than you could say "The world is falling apart..."
I'll plug back into reality tomorrow, if not better off than maybe just better prepared.