"There's Some of That Going Around."

It's always comforting to receive this lovely empty consolation when your skull feels like it's five hat sizes too small for your brain. Sure you can get a cold from someone, but it's not likely that someone that knows someone that has a cold has sneezed on your stapler. Now the Bubonic plague, that goes around, but a stomach virus or the sniffles never present an epidemic.

Ultimately people simply like to offer up their own personal diagnosis. I can't begin to count the ridiculous home remedies I've been "unofficially" prescribed. It was a very sobering moment when I finally stopped subscribing to these words of advice. I found myself sitting in a dark room with a towel over my head and Vic's vapor rub on parts of my body that can only be reached with the help of a baking spatula.