The common cold, a winter malady I suffer just once every three or four years, brings out the worst in me.  My best, mind you, is most people’s worst.  I find myself wondering why I feel even more negative than usual.  Minor annoyances take on major4283452924_2c9f3120af significance: why do BOTH supermarkets in Hood River sell only rock-hard and bright green bananas?  Why are so many people unable to drive without tail-gating the car in front, which is always me?  Why do radio hosts get away with hundreds of “ums” and “ahs” and repetitive space-fillers? 

When EVERYTHING I find is WRONG, I know I am coming down with a cold. The sneezes come first. I can’t even finish a sneeze before the next one is escaping.  My nose is running like Multnomah Falls. In my mind, I canvas my recent acquaintances:  was it that waiter who had so many facial piercings I thought he had fallen into a fishing tackle box?  Was it the snooty technician at the hospital who kept calling me “Honey,” as she proceeded to drill four test holes before finding a vein with artesian qualities?  Or, was it that naughty boy in that eighth grade class I covered last week, the one who kept asking if I ever smiled?

In short, I want to know who passed this nasty bug to me, so I can curse them with the breath of a thousand camels.  May their carpets be over-run with fleas from those camels.  May their morning tea taste like burning camel dung and linger on their palates like wet camel fur. 10591251906_93db77931c

Nasty.  You get the picture.

After about twenty-four hours in revenge mode, I start the cure.  The cure involves lots of sleep, Echinacea extract, home made chicken soup, and tea.   Lots of tea.  This time, I decided to try the Sencha Naturals Green Tea + C.  It is an instant drink made primarily of matcha tea, some natural vitamin C, antioxidants, and a blend of herbals including lemon and ginger.  There is a wee bit of natural sodium bicarbonate to give it a pleasant fizz.  

Remarkable stuff, I felt my bronchial passages relax as I sipped.  Delicious and soothing, the first cup went down easy.  The second cup, even easier.  I generally avoid matcha because it tastes too . . . green.  But this has a lovely whiff of citrus and a sensation of fizz that hits the palate like a satisfied sigh.  Yesssssss. 

To that eighth grade boy (who, like so many others these days has a surname as his first name): I AM SMILING.

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