Aphrindesiac

Dan Brown wrote two books about his protagonist, Robert Langdon, Angels and Demons and The Da Vinci Code. Robert Langdon is a Harvard professor who studies religious symbolism and goes on all these exciting adventures that take him through churches and museums and libraries. It sounds dull, but I assure you, it is not. I enjoyed many things about good 'ol Dan's books but one thing that stood out was how many times I got to read and ponder the word "docent."

A docent is actually "a person who leads guided tours especially through a museum or art gallery." The word docent rolls off the tongue and does graceful somersaults and breezy trapeze flips around inside my stuffy, bored head. In my pretend mind it means, "a decent person who dotes on me." Ahh, pleasant, decent, doting docent. I need to get me one. (What, did you think this blog would be about religious symbolism? Pish, please. Although I would like to know who the hell read those books and thought, "yes, Tom Hanks as Robert Langdon, yes!" Are you daft? Absolutely no part of Tom Hanks symbolizes Robert Langdon to me. But, I haven't seen the movie yet, so who knows. He was great in Big.)

Anyway, speaking of made-up words, (a horrifying segue, I know. Whatever, I'm sick) in the mid-to-late nineties we used a superlative, a slang word, if you will, to describe the ultimate whatever-it-was of the moment. You may know it if you were, like me, the bomb diggity back then.

When we dropped "bomb diggity" on the regular, things that would qualify as such to me were ecstasy pills, DJ Dan and Jnco jeans, to name a few. In ten short years, my list is different. Thank god. My bomb diggity list is always fresh, always evolving, always keeeping a finger on the pulse of what's happening. In fact, today, my friends, I have discovered something new to put on my list. That's right. I have an announcement. Move over ecstasy, you've been replaced by... Afrin.

Yep, Afrin nasal spray, now apparently in no-drip formula, is my new bomb dig* shit. (As are, to continue the parallelism of the list above, Lilly Allen and skinny jeans, incidentally.) My recent problems -- those of the respiratory nature -- have left me in near-agony the past two weeks. I've been blowing my stubborn, congested nose without relent. Beware all tissues, toilet paper rolls, napkins, paper towels and newspapers -- hide your young! I've been sleeping on a pile of pillows to keep my head propped up at night. And the sneezing... Well, today I finally conceded and went to the doctor, who prescribed an OTC wonder! Two sniffs on each side immediately sprung open the gates to sweet oxygen heaven. Eureka! I actually floated a little. Afrin has brought me ecstasy in a way that actual ecstasy once did. I should have picked up some glow sticks at Walgreens while I was there.

Hooray! Now everyone at work will think I was faking it the last two weeks. But I shall preach the intoxicating joy of Afrin to my coworkers so that they, too, can be soothed. Because it's likely that I'm still contagious and they will now catch what I had.


*Bomb dig is an abbreviation for bomb diggity -- used by those with so much bomb dig shit in his or her life that it would take forever to say out bomb diggity every time and thus abbreviated.

The Little Dipper

After an unsuccessful search and careful consideration, I decided it would be a bit uncouth to call the front desk to ask if anyone had turned in my missing bikini top from the pool area...

Oh well, charge it to the game, I guess.