CONTENTS UNDER PRESSURE: SINUS INFECTIONS ARE NOTHING TO SNEEZE AT

Forget Fat Boy on the radio. Cape should be known as the Home of Snifflebugs.

All right, let's have a show of hands: Is there anyone out there who has NOT been infected with the wheezing-coughing-sneezing-nasal-congestion-head-swollen-to-four-times-its-normal-size-til-the-oxygen-flow's-cut-off virus?

I didn't think so.

I keep waiting for the county to declare an epidemic, but the nurses at the health department are probably too sick to fill out the paperwork.

In case you haven't figured it out, I also had it, and so have most of my co-workers here at the Southeast Missourian.

Fortunately, it takes more than a virus and a little mucus to stop the newsgathering process.

A virus, mucus and an election would have pushed us right over the edge, but the election's still a few weeks away.

I had the virus, sniffled for a week and it went away.

Then one morning I woke up with a fever and congestion and figured it was back for Round Two.

Then I started coughing and remembered the magazine article that had informed me that many adult Americans are being diagnosed with whooping cough.

I guess the immunization I got in kindergarten has worn off. They just don't make things to last anymore.

Fortunately, my friendly health care professional was able to inform me that no, I did not have whooping cough.

Nor did I have anything that resembled a rare form of sinus cancer.

"It's just a sinus infection," she said.

Since I had never had a sinus infection before, I was initially relieved at her pronouncement.

Having now survived my first sinus infection, I can say with authority that the word "just" had no place in that sentence, thank you very much.

I am not exaggerating when I tell you that I spent a few days trying to figure out to turn the sinus infection into full-fledged pneumonia, reasoning pneumonia would either kill me in a day or two or be cured immediately with massive amounts of penicillin.

It's important to have options.

It seems that everyone I know who has spent any length of time in Southeast Missouri has suffered a sinus infection or is annually besieged by allergies.

Pollen. Mold. Mites. Crap in the air that makes them sneeze.

I think it's the Mississippi River. I grew up in St. Louis, where the Mississippi is also a big part of the landscape, but I think all the smog kills the whatever allergens or viruses might be floating around.

Hey, it's a theory.

Which leads me to my latest conclusion: Forget the Fat Boy on the radio. Cape Girardeau should be known as the Home of Snifflebugs.

I like the idea, but I don't think I can sell it to the Convention and Visitors Bureau.

I even came up with a slogan. "Visit Cape Girardeau: It's Nothing to Sneeze At."

As soon as I feel well enough, I'll start working on the bumper sticker.

In the meantime, does anybody have an extra tissue I can use?

Peggy O'Farrell is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.