Goo-ru

I’ve been discharging thick brown ooze from my mouth for the last few days. It tastes like infection.

The other day it felt as if the ooze was going to explode through my ears each time I swallowed. My head was filled with the brown and it hurt.

As I drove home from work the other day, the brown had reached my ears, thus clogging them. I tried feverishly to pop my ears while maneuvering traffic – opening my mouth wide as if I was trying to yawn. I did this several times in succession. To onlookers I must have looked like I was having a psychotic episode, biting at an invisible fairy that only I could see.

When I reached the driveway, I squeezed my nose and blew – a last-ditch effort to clear my head. This relieved some of the pressure with a good squeak, but totally clogged my left ear to the point where I could hardly hear anything through it.

I stumbled into the house, a little off balance since my equilibrium was off. I warmed up a microwave heating pad full of beans to help melt the brown gunk clogging my left ear.

I then laid down for a very short nap with my head on top of the bean-filled pad only to wake up with my ear still out of commission. This sent me into a brief panic to the point where I placed the bean bag into the microwave for another two minutes. Meanwhile, I panicked a little more and shoved a granola bar into my face.

When the two minutes were up, the entire house smelled like roasted beans, which then started to make me nauseous. I tried to lie on the bag once more only to burn my face. It was really hot!

Shortly after this brief but powerful episode, Laura came home and suggested that we make a visit to Med Express on Greentree Road.

For those of you unfamiliar with Med Express, let me just say that it’s a convenient little doctor’s office that accepts walk-ins until 9:00 PM. Emergencies are their specialty, but they do not charge Emergency Room rates! Go, Med Express!

To make an unnecessarily long story slightly shorter, the doctor’s diagnosis proved my original theory. I had an infection. She prescribed some penicillin and ear drops and sent me on my merry way.

I took off work today to try and catch my balance – and it was worth it. I haven’t tried to enhance my hearing through ear-popping since last night (at least not as enthusiastically).