Sunday, April 11, 2004

cure the common cold. please?

I'm so sick of being sick. I came down with a cold somewhere between one poker game (at work) and another (at Stanford) two Thursdays ago. I was miserably ill for the entire weekend, ended up taking two days off of work, and finally went back with a residual cough and some congestion. The congestion cleared up a couple of days later, but I'm still coughing.

The worst part is when it gets better, to the point where I think to myself, gee, I'll wake up tomorrow and it'll be gone! Then, I wake up, and have an uncontrollable coughing fit, and start the day with no voice.

Last weekend I tried to pretend everything was fine, but it kept getting worse, until I couldn't eat because the swallowing part was hurting my throat. This weekend I gave up and decided to just veg out. I'm hoping after two days of basically nothing but books and TV, this cold will finally decide I've offered it enough rest, bland food, and vitamin C, and leave me alone. Yes, I'm anthropomorphizing my cold. It's mean and diabolical and I hate it with a passion.

On the bright side, I've had lots of time to experiment with home remedies, and I've concluded that the best things for a cough are: my old staple of Ricola cough drops, Japanese green tea, New Zealand honey, and Pi Pa Gou, which is like a thick minty cough syrup from Taiwan that actually tastes good. Also, Nyquil and a big stack of pillows are essential on the worst nights, since something about lying down seems to trigger coughing.

 

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