I’m considering starting a non-profit to help people like me. We suffer from a never-talked-about side-effect of Parkinson’s: noses that run excessively:
Nose # 1: You’re not going out running again, are you?
Nose # 2: Got to get my twenty miles in. Have you seen my running tights?
No, not that kind of running. I’m talking about noses that run excessive “nasal mucus.” This leads to the formation of dried nasal mucus. The end result being a word that rhymes with “cougars,” but starting with a ‘b.’ If the deposits hang from the top of the nostril, they’re known as stalactites; if they form from the bottom they’re called stalagmites. Anyway, these deposits obstruct normal air flow, so when you sleep at night you make a whistling sound that drives your wife nuts. This can cause sleep apnea, where it feels like someone is trying to suffocate you by pressing a pillow against your face. That someone would be your wife.
Speaking of which, my wife Liz, who is a full foot shorter than me, looks up and notices all formations. She points and announces: “Hey, Mister Romance, you’ve got a big one hanging on the starboard side.” She lacks the deft touch of my friend Al at the health club. He discreetly whispers, “Hey, ‘Jer, you’ve got a bat in the belfry.” I take the hint, saunter to the men’s powder room, and proceed to do the necessary excavation. Turnabout being fair play, I return with a yard of toilet paper and pretend to pull it from the back of Al’s shorts.
Ha! Ha! After walking on broken eggshells the last three paragraphs, we have now reached the point where we can actually say the word “booger.” Like adults, we can acknowledge “booger” is more fun to say than “colonoscopy,” but only if it’s happening to someone else. Yet, the question remains: how do you tell someone they’ve got a hanger without making them mad or embarrassed? Especially if it’s during tense negotiations with the dangerous, yet comical, North Korean Leader Kim Jun-ung?
President Trump: Chairman Kim, you have pinky-sworn you will denuclearize the Korean Peninsula and that….say, that is a very, very bigly booger hanging from your left nostril.
Kim Jon-ung: How dare you insult Exalted Leader with lie about dried nasal mucus! Fire and brimstone shall rain down on America and leave her in ashes!
President Trump (pulling doomsday football from his briefcase): Oh yeah? One more word out of you and I push this big red button!
Kim Jun-ung: But Big Red Button Man — you’re with me here in North Korea! Let’s just kiss and make up again.
Oblivion averted. Again.
We have learned dried nasal mucus/boogeritis afflicts millions of Americans. It cuts deep across all social classes, regardless of race, color, or creed. It doesn’t matter if you’re a Fortune 500 CEO, driver sitting at a red light, or essayist who has just gotten away with writing a juvenile newsletter but you can’t say anything – because, remember, he has a disease.
Consider all this when you see a nose running excessively. And tell it to nix the running tights.