Buck Up

I've been fighting off a cold for the past few days, and I feel as though it's now a war of attrition, and it's just a matter of time until I give up and let it colonize me.

On Thursday, I started feeling a sort of raw achiness in my chest, and at the first opportunity, I ran out and got some Cold FX, which is supposed to head off the cold at the pass, but I think it merely delayed the virus, and possibly added a few prisoners of war to it's arsenal.

I took the opportunity to spend the rest of the weekend lounging and resting, and drinking so many cups of tea that I sloshed when I walked. I lounged and rested to the point that my kids were going to buy me some moss for my north side for my next birthday. If lounging and resting had been an Olympic sport, I'd be on the Wheeties box. I barely moved for two days, except to get dressed so that I could go over to someone else's house for dinner. I was beginning to feel a bit ashamed of myself.

But still the cold has lingered on, not really blossoming into anything significant, but hovering around my chest and throat and making me cough and spew and be very unattractive.

So, today, I braced myself, and brought out the big guns...I took some Buckley's Cough Syrup. I'm not sure, but I think Buckley's is a purely Canadian product, so there may be some of you who have never heard of it, but believe me, it's famous in this country; mostly because of it's insanely vile taste. It tastes so incredibly bad that there should be songs and fables written about it, but this is Canada, so, not so much.

Buckleys tastes like pine needles marinated in tar and then boiled in kerosene. It is Sadaam Husseins' aftershave. It is like kissing Satan. It is what pure evil tastes like.

The stuff proudly proclaims on the label that it is "sucrose-free and alchohol-free". Good God, why? If ever a substance would be improved by copious amounts of sugar and alchohol, then believe me, this is it. It is truly loathesome.

But, and here's the kicker, it seems to work. One dose of this stuff, and your cough is soothed and your throat feels better and you can forget you are sick for a little while. (That is, when you have picked yourself up off the floor from the little fainting spell you had when you swallowed the stuff. )

I'm hoping that if I take enough Buckley's, I will black out long enough to be rid of my cold. But that amount of Buckleys would definitely not be worth it.