The Penguin

 Upon Googling "common cold", you're likely to get the standard laundry list of symptoms: sneezing, coughing, mucus production, headache, fatigue, possibly aches and shivering. Nothing serious. The advice is very general: rest and plenty of warm fluids, avoid chills, take pills, see your doctor if it takes a turn. We're so used to common colds - hence the "common", vulgaris, meaning "low" or "plain" or "ordinary" - that we generally don't give them a second thought. We go to work and school with them, spread them around willy-nilly, shrug them off as little more than a seasonal occurrence. Colds are so mild in most cases that we simply forget we were ever sick. And because of their seemingly run-of-the-mill nature, very rarely do we see an instance of the cold - that is, a very particular one in an individual patient - described in any meaningful way. Part of this, of course, is the grab-bag nature of cold symptoms, anything...

Howdy, y'all - I know it's been a while. Honestly things have been so in flux in my life lately, I couldn't focus on any one thing long enough to blog about it. Maybe eventually I'll blog an update on all the changes happening. I'll just say this: things are good. Not easy - in fact, it's been like climbing a mountain in a meteor shower - but exhilarating. I think I'm finally able to manage constant, unresolved challenges without breaking down and getting depressed; this is a huge milestone for me. It helps that I have such a great group of friends, especially my girlfriend Mandy, my buddy/editor/housemate Joe, friend Emma, and coworker Jason. One thing that stood out for me was a recent bout of illness - probably just a very bad cold, but it was about the worst I've been sick in several years; Mandy had it too, and Emma was just poleaxed by it...the infection starts in the lower sinuses, abates for a while, and then latches onto the upper airway and b...