Feb
13
2007
The medicine conundrum
Author:With our income tax windfall, Brandon and I decided to take up the carpet and linoleum in our open-design living room/kitchen and install wood laminate flooring instead. I don’t know if it was the wood particles floating around or maybe the formaldehyde used in carpet and insulation, but something triggered an acute case of sinusitis that I haven’t been able to shake.
I should preface the following by saying that I and medicine do not have a very good history. When I was 7 and hospitalized for strep throat/scarlet fever, doctors soon found out I was allergic to Keflex by the tell-tale rash that speckled my fever-wrought body. A few years later, I was given Amoxicillin to only meet the same end.
When I had my wisdom teeth extracted, my dentist prescribed Erythromycin. I would have gladly had all my teeth extracted in lieu of this nefarious posion masquerading as a antibiotic.
So, perusing the cold aisle at Walgreens, I debated the children’s brand, which boasted a bubblegum-like flavor, but decided on a orange-colored bottle of Tylenol Cold Multi-Symptom promising to taste like a “instant CitrusBurst sensation.”
Still, opening the bottle at home, I sniffed it suspiciously. It smelled like orange Tang. I downed in one gulp. It was the most disgusting definitively non-citrusy bile I’ve ever swallowed, with an aftertaste much on par to that of black licorice soaked in vinegar.
I suspect it to be the same sort of liquid they fill the Kool-Aid pitchers in hell with.
If they can make children’s medicine taste like bubblegum and cotton candy, why can’t they make adult medicine at least bearable?
