What to expect when you're expectorating

Warning! This blog entry features talk of bodily functions. Ye be warned.

Sully Versus the Reiki Practitioner

In everyday life, I try my best to gently push back against the general superstition and woo that are scattershot throughout my human interactions.

Since magical thinking is ingrained in everyday phrases and metaphors, I like to think that my off-the-script responses will prompt some kind of scientific epiphany in those who I meet over the course of the day. I don't believe this, I just like to think it.

For example, people at work often remark that I must've been "the one praying for rain", and I've taken to replying "If I believed it would make a difference, I certainly would." This general policy of assholery brings about many conflicts of interest. Like the tale I'm about to tell you about.

I have an aunt who is awesome - easily the nicest woman I've ever met. She's an incredible host, a wonderful cook, and is generous with her time to an unfathomable amount. Knowing the story I’m about to tell makes me fret that I'm about to misrepresent this fantastic woman, but tragically, certain elements of her personal philosophy clash with mine.

Let me start with a tale to introduce this woman and what she's about: A few days after my cousin's grandmother died, he answered a phonecall from his neighbour, and later reported that he initially believed the voice on the other end of the line to be that of the recently deceased. When my aunt heard this, she told my cousin that it was his granny’s way of checking in on him. She told this story to a roomful of relatives (as the older generation nodded sagaciously, the young 'uns exchanged confused looks).

My aunt is a humble person, and when she talks about how 'science can't explain everything', it sounds as though it is motivated by sheer humility. I think it's clear that anybody who immediately grasps for the supernatural explanation rather than accepting human error is not interested in sensible exploration into life's biggest questions. She wants it to be true, and will share her take on the mysteries of life with anyone who’ll listen.

I can’t remember the comment I made that set her off, but I felt the regret as soon as I began to utter it. Whatever the case, she began with her tirade about how science can’t explain many things, like the energy channels in the human body that only her reiki crystal can detect. I attempted to talk to her about the ideomotor effect, but by this stage she had whipped out her crystal, unwrapped it from its protective cloth, and was insisting that I lay back on the couch.

I didn’t want to insult this nice, albeit deluded soul, so I heeded her wishes and threw myself on the sofa, looking up at the ceiling. She started talking to me about the seven chakras, their locations and effects on the functions of the body as she began with the ritual. Starting over my feet, she dangled the popsicle-sized crystal from a foot-long chain, and told me that the speedy revolutions it was making were caused by my energy chakras, and not by her hand. As she moved through my lower body and abdomen, she told me that I had good energy, a fiery spirit, and various other attributes that somehow related to the bodyparts the crystal hovered over.

When she got to my chest, she tutted. The crystal had stopped spinning.

Prognosis Negative

My brother just got diagnosed with a viral infection - seeking to learn more about how not to catch this affliction from him, I decided to do some research.

Top result - seems like a safe bet, right?

After a quick skim, everything seems in order, let's continue on to the 'therapies linked to this health conidition...:

Herbal Medicine? Aromatherapy? For a viral infection? Oh sweet Jesus, what the hell is going on? Where am I?


Strewth! In my haste to get to the info, I didn't realise that I was on a 'Complementary and Holistic Healthcare' website.

This right here? Dangerous. Credulous people want real advice on how to deal with their health concerns, and instead they're getting directed towards sugar pills and magic needles.

'Viruses do not respond to antibiotics' - the page informs me. Seems like Western Medicine has been defeated! Score one for the healing crystals!

Of course, it should read that 'viruses do not respond to most antibiotics' - my brother was prescribed Amoxicillin, which "is used to treat many different types of infections caused by bacteria" according to drugs.com, which apparently includes the one he was diagnosed with this morning.

Perhaps I'm being a little dramatic - they do have a rather helpful "I-wash-my-hands-of-this-business" style disclaimer:

The Healing Web Ltd accepts no responsibility or liability whatsoever with regard to the information on this site. In no way are any of the materials presented within this site meant to be a substitute for professional care or attention by a qualified medical practitioner, nor should they be construed as such. You are encouraged to consult with your own Doctor to discuss any course of treatment presented or suggested.

Out of interest, I thought I'd check out the same part of Drugs.com:

Drugs.com provides free, accurate and independent advice on more than 24,000 prescription drugs, over-the-counter medicines & natural products.

Data sources include Micromedex™ [Updated 22 July 2009], Cerner Multum™ [Updated 16 August 2009], Wolters Kluwer™ [Updated 31 August 2009] and others. To view our editorial policy, content sources and attributions please click here.

'Accurate'? 'Data sources'? 'Editorial policy'? 'Content sources and attributions'? A little bit more reassuring than soothing green graphics and pretty buzzwords.

Curse you, evil search-engine-optimised shillers of wishy-washy nonsense!

Written by a bin-man!

Tucked under an article I was reading was the following advertisement.

Quite the absurd boast, 'discovered by a mom' - isn't it? The only thing it impresses upon me is that this 'trick' is just a scam to part fools with their money by selling them nonsense.

This advertisement bothered me as much as it did because it reminded me a nonsense product I encountered in the States called 'Airborne'. Some acquaintance of mine was complaining about getting a cold, and announced her intention to buy this medicine that would cure her malady. It wasn't hard to be sceptical about this product, as it hadn't made its way to Irish shores, and I'm sure a cure to the common cold would have no trouble finding a market / Nobel prize recognition.

Proudly printed on the front of the box, before you've had a chance to read the nonsensically vague jargon about 'wellness' and whatnot on the back, is the following:

I won't detail how the FDA laid the smack down on the specific claims that the Airborne people were making (but if you're interested, click here), instead I'll just whinge about the pervasive anti-science sentiment that is so popular these days.

I can understand the appeal of the underdog prevailing, the lay-person happening across something incredible and winning all kinds of fame and admiration beyond which they ever imagined. Unremarkable credentials are the basis of many compelling film protagonists and (seemingly) the driving force behind those tawdry reality TV shows, but do we really want to take medical advice from these hacks?

So do me a favour, those of you with the mental flexibility I so obviously lack, and explain to me why so many people are more content following the rituals of ancient Chinese people than consulting with a doctor? Who in their right mind would pay good money for pills with no active ingredients that were devised back when we believed that the key to health was keeping your blood, phlegm, yellow and black bile ratios in check? Why would you give anybody hard-earned legal tender for therapeutic touch (which involves no touching) when a physiotherapist can deliver actual results?

Should I just chalk it up to the anti-corporatism that is de-rigeur in cool social circles, or take it as a lack of faith in the regulatory bodies who are in place to keep these evil pill-pushers in line?

By my recent admission, I don't exactly have a clean record on grey-area medicinal practices, but I'm happy to sidestep my own inquisition with a shrug and a "my family made me go". Why aren't the adults who should be in the know focusing their health efforts on the proven stuff?

"Über-Sceptical"

Okay, so my idea of getting back to this in a ‘day or two’ was somewhat optimistic, but at least the comments beat me to the punch!

Before I attempt to rationalise all this away, I should point out that while my back certainly still gives me trouble, that day saw a rather sudden improvement – up until that day, I had spent a rather unfun two or three months having to carefully deliberate whether to sit down or not, such was the discomfort involved. As you can imagine, it was a pretty miserable time – the initial two months of physiotherapy had limited success, and I had been told it was the only treatment available. Which brings me to the first important point to be aware of – not only did I want it to work, I felt at the time that I needed it to work,

I’ve never found anecdotal evidence particularly compelling, whether it was people on TV effusing about alien encounters, or friends recounting their religious experiences, but the very sudden improvement of my grandfather was something I couldn’t ignore. Looking back, I should have paid more attention to the fact that I visited him in the hospital before the operation; at the start of his recovery, and just because I wasn’t around to witness it, it didn’t mean that his improvement wasn’t gradual. I still believe the story of his sudden recovery was accurate, as the visit to the healer may have lifted his spirit, but I’m inclined to believe that the heavy lifting was done by the conventional treatment he received.

In the waiting area, the amazing testimonies from once desperate people told in earnest, hushed tones served to bolster my preconditioning (“if it works for these desperate cases, surely it’ll work for me too”), and the sheer volume of patients – both physically present and cited as referees – was also encouraging. I can only imagine that amusement caused by the bizarre surroundings of a farm-shed hastily converted into an operating theatre contributed to the overall “flood of endorphins or some mildly hypnotic analgesic” that Jason alluded to in the comments.

After a week or two of imagining what he looked like, and a half-hour of listening to his pithy mutterings behind the partition, my sense of wonder was bombarded when I finally came face to face with the healer-man. Not only was his appearance novel, but the way he conducted himself threw me off – particularly when he disappeared behind me for a few moments, only to begin with the vigorous prodding and manipulation.

I’m inclined to believe that what he was doing was chiropractic – the spinal manipulations seemed (at the time, and even in retrospect) far too specific and expertly administered to be for show, but I’m inclined to believe that there was a placebo effect surrounding the encounter, which encouraged me to push myself beyond my established and rather limited comfort zone of spine-extension, which surely contributed.

It saddens me to contemplate that the modern day, über-sceptical Sully would never go to such an establishment, and I can envision myself scoffing at the deluded fools who went along and enjoyed their placebo effects while I suffered on with a somewhat masochistic-pride. It’s possible that if the guy positioned himself as a certified chiropractor, I’d give it a whirl, but if you told me what I heard two years ago, I’m pretty sure I know what the response would be:

“You want me to go a barn to be prodded by some old dude with a magic coathanger? What are you, fucking nuts?”

21st century Christ charges a €20 fee

So then, where were we? Ah yes, tales of teenage douchebaggery debauchery!

Well, now that I’ve baited you with the embarrassing stuff from a decade ago, I’m going to shift gears to my more recent past.

I’ve blogged before about the few months I spent doing slave-labour in Belgium as part of my academic obligations, but didn’t address a remarkable encounter I had shortly after coming home.

In March 2006, during a weekend-trip home, I visited my 88-year-old grandfather in the hospital. He had been having problems with his back and was spending most of his days in a wheelchair – at the time I was struck by how suddenly he had crossed the line and become frail and old, disproving the notion I held of him as a man of infinite vitality.

By the time I left Belgium for good some three months later, my grandfather was back on his feet and sprightly as ever – I was delighted to see this transformation, and enquired about what I had missed whilst I was away.

My uncle told me that my grandfather had gone to a healer – a man who lives on a farm some twenty miles away who takes a coat hanger, waves it over the afflicted body part, then manipulates it back into health. I scoffed at the story, but my uncle told me about how my grandfather sat morosely at home for months before agreeing to see this quack. On the morning he left to see this chap, my grandfather was barely able to walk from his bedroom to the sitting room, and had to be helped into the car. An hour after the encounter, he was able to get out of the car unaided. The following day, he was able to walk the 100 feet to his front gate and back. The day after that, he went outside kicking a football around with his little grandchildren.

It was a miracle!

But of course, I don’t believe in miracles.

I listened to this tale quite incredulously, but it was some rather compelling anecdotal evidence, and my grandfather confirmed that the tale was exactly how I had heard it. Both he and my uncle pushed me to go see if this mysterious chap could do anything for the recently diagnosed spinal disc herniation that had brought a great deal of misery into my life. My uncle even agreed to pay the €20 ‘miracle fee’, so I had nothing to lose!

What follows is the e-mail I sent to my then-girlfriend the following morning - and I assure you that the prescience I exhibit towards the end is word-for-word how the message was sent:

From: Seán O'Sullivan <[deleted]@yahoo.co.uk>
To: [deleted]
Subject: My audience with the modern Jesus
Thu, 22 Jun 2006 19:38:09 GMT

Evenin’ miss!

I was going to put off writing this e-mail until my main 'news' thread was complete, but I feel as though I should send you something to show I care in the meantime!

So here is my epic tale of visiting the healer guy! My uncle made the ‘appointment’ for me, and we drove in convoy up to the hilly forested area, and navigated a narrow dirt track to a barn – a big red one, in fact – at which point he left me to fend for myself.

I entered the small barn door and found myself in the 'waiting area', which was a partitioned off from the 'examining area' by a line of flimsy, whitewashed timber boards. In this waiting area were two chairs, a radio (with fuzzy reception) and a diesel tank! As more and more people crammed into this waiting area, I heard some truly astonishing tales about their experiences with this healer chap. These were people who had invested huge amounts of time and money in conventional medical care, but one trip to Mr. Red Barn sorted their woes almost like magic. I have to admit, I was excited by these testimonies, but I tried not to get my hopes up. The two people in the queue before me took easily 10 minutes each with the healer chap, and then it was finally my turn.

He was silver haired, had scraggy tufts of facial hair, and looked around 60 or so. He wore a suit that looked about two hundred years old. After looking blankly at him for a second he asked "are you stiff in your back"? Wondering if I should have brought along the x-rays, I told him that the discs of my lower spine were pinched together. He nodded at the stool – the only item of furniture in his open-plan surgery – and I parked myself on it.

He stepped behind me, and I stared blankly into the barren concrete floor as I tried to determine if the magic coat-hanger I had heard so much about was coming into play. No sooner had the thought occurred to me, I was being poked.

He prodded my lower left spine, then lower right spine, then tweaked my arm and twisted my leg over to one side, and told me to sit for a second. After a few seconds he told me to get up and walk around for a moment. He stood still and peered at me as I self-consciously paced in front of him.

Upon returning to my stool, he took another poke at my back, and proclaimed "You're fine”.

I got up, astonished by this bold claim. I asked him what he meant.

"You're fixed".

I stretched my back to validate this claim and didn't feel the stab of pain at my usual point of extension.

I gave him a confused "Huh" and watched him smirk at my reaction...

The whole thing took about two minutes! I was thoroughly bewildered. I wanted to make sure I was getting Uncle Phil's money's worth:

"Are we done?"

He nodded solemnly, then thoughtfully added "Don't sit on any couches for a month. No soft things."

So I left. Confused. Wondering for how long this restriction applied, and whether getting back into my car would break this covenant.



So I definitely felt better, but I'm not quite perfect yet – still feeling the familiar pains when I reach that little further, blahdeblahdeblah, but there's a marked improvement.

When I informed my uncle of this - he told me that if I give it 3 days, I'll be fine... So I woke up this morning, and – sure enough – felt a little better!

For now, I remain cautiously optimistic that whatever weird voodoo this guy is after using on me will keep working! The last glance that guy shot me was one of knowing something I didn't!

Sorry that this e-mail has rambled on so long about essentially nothing of interest for you, but at least I'll have a typed record of what happened that day after my shitty-memory kicks in and I forget about the entire thing!

I'm going to wrap it up here, but first I'll let you know that I'm being interviewed by the American Embassy on 17th July to determine whether they want to let me into the country or not. Oh and I've been accepted into RMU, so I'm happy!

I'll give you a call either tonight or tomorrow (if I ring now I'll just end up telling you what I just wrote, since I've been sitting around at home since yesterday)!

Okay – that’s all for today, kiddies. Come back in a day or two for the present-day, sceptical reflection!

Of course, feel free to steal my thunder in the comments - what do you think of all this business?

It seems that I'm an asshole

So randomly today, I found myself the unwilling participant in conversation with a person who told me that he hurled himself off the top of a five-storey building in an attempt to end his life.

There was a moment of silence, in which he expected me to react, but to chase away the silence that met him, he topped off his story:

"That was the first time I tried to kill myself"

Not wanting to get into a touchy-feely conversation with the how or why behind this person's mental illness,I decided to try and end the conversation as politely as possible:

"It's true what they say - you never forget your first time."

Sick Note

That picture was taken last Friday at the Cahercalla Clinic in Ennis, just before I got my wisdom tooth pulled.

In advance of the surgery, I was advised to take a week off to recover. I was looking forward to the this process, thinking it’d afford me a few days to write and blog and job-hunt with the kind of zeal my present obligations have a tendency to interfere with.

For the past few days I’ve felt a desire to defend the procedure, lest anyone think any less of me for the fashion in which it was carried out. This compulsion is enforced by the phenomenon that most people I’ve talked to have had more teeth pulled with much less ado.

Y'see, my lower right mandibular third molar (to use its proper title) was removed whilst I was under general anaesthetic, on an operating table, wearing only a hospital gown. My father couldn’t help but compare this with his experience, in which he had four wisdom teeth removed in a dentist’s chair (whilst conscious, wearing his own clothes) on a Friday, and was back at work on Monday. Any efforts by myself to situate such incidents as belonging to a more barbaric time are immediately rendered fallacious by my girlfriend who underwent essentially the same procedure not too long ago.

For these reasons, I feel the need to regurgitate half-understood buzzwords from my dentist’s diagnosis to elevate my seemingly childish ailment into a testament to how severe the situation was. When someone innocently remarked “I’m surprised they knocked you out for just one tooth”, I couldn’t not stick up for myself: “The one tooth I did have was coming in horizontally!” I spluttered, as if such an orientation gave it explosive properties. I followed this up with a swift appeal-to-medical-authority to quell the quarrelsome lay-person: “Also, it was so close to the nerves for my tongue and lips that they didn’t want to take any chances”.

When dealing with more-credulous profferers of sympathy who unwittingly stumbled into the realm of undermining my condition, I’d occasionally indulge in some purely speculative exaggeration. “My wisdom tooth came in horizontally, and was pushing against my teeth – in time they could have looked like a line of collapsed dominoes!”

Anyhow – whether or not I managed to impress upon those around me that my recent “surgery” deserves the quotation marks or not, I can at least assure you that I believe it was an ordeal. The amount of pain and swelling I’m experiencing is still on a sharp upward trajectory; whereas the lump in my cheek was the size of a ping pong ball yesterday, it’s more comparable to a tennis ball today. As my face balloons, I can hear my speech growing increasingly indistinct, and I’m starting to sound a poor man’s impersonation of Marlon Brando in The Godfather.

Needless to say, the first day of my well-intentioned week hasn’t been very productive. Not only has my work ethic been kicked squarely in the nuts, but my level of concentration has taken a hit also. Whilst driving my car earlier on, I noticed the lack of the symbiosis between man and machine – I was on edge, trying hard to focus on what I was doing, but having little success and feeling quite unsafe in the process. There was an editorial-piece that I was going to get around to writing today, but if I can’t trust myself with the mechanical operation of a motor-vehicle, I’ll hold off on any attempts to provoke-thought for the time being. Instead, I’ll post something that I wrote last week, decided ‘nah’, and figured I’d touch up before posting at a later date.

Since I’ve spent the past 600 words hedging the following entry with a ‘don’t blame me, I’m on medication which affects my judgement!’, I think I can safely post it without the edits I planned on making whilst of sounder mind. Enjoy!

Regurgitation Recollection

Given that it’s been a slow month for a blog that primarily serves to chronicle the odd happenings in my life, and my montly target of five posts was looming, it seemed like a safe enough bet that my brother’s stag party in Poland would be a safe bet for blogging fodder.

The flight to Krakow was scheduled at the rather painful time of 7.30am, and we showed up at Dublin Airport at around 5.45am – other than a curiously relaxed security screening that failed to find the 150ml canister of deodorant (a banned substance for the past year or so) that one of our group had in his carry-on luggage, there was nothing unusual about the beginning of the journey.

I was looking forward to taking a nap on the plane, as I had only slept for 2 hours the night before, but despite being absolutely knackered, I couldn’t slip into a gentle slumber. All of a sudden, my eyes opened, my mind snapped into to full alertness, but my energy levels utterly vanished. I mumbled something to my brother, who was seated to my right, about not feeling good and then frantically began searching for a sick bag. Upon finding one, I immediately retched into it, much to the delight of the gentleman seated to my left, and very much within the splash zone, should things get messy. It took immense effort to keep the bag held up to my mouth, as all my strength had immediately dissipated.

Despite making a fuss, nothing actually materialized in the sick bag. My brother put his hand up to my remarkably sweaty forehead and pronounced that I was “stone cold”. Within a few moments, my energy came back and I wandered up to the bathroom, in case another wave struck, clutching my sick-bag should the queue prove too taxing. After a minute or two of sitting in the tiny toilet, with nothing happening, and the cold-sweat gone, I began to feel a little silly – not to mention ignorant towards my fellow passengers. I sat back down and fell asleep.

I awoke shortly after in a cold sweat, again lacking in energy drained. The sick-bag was still clutched in my hand, which was fortunate, as I had it quarter-filled in a few seconds. During – and before – the episode, I wanted to get up and make my way to the toilet, but my legs were a dead weight. Within a minute or so of the purge I managed to drunkenly stumble towards the front of the plane and sheepishly ask the stewardess where I should dispose of my breakfast. She responded with a surprising amount of sympathy, and told me to use the bin in the toilet – where I took up residence for a few more moments. Once again I dawdled for a few moments, but left after nothing happened.

After stepping out of the tiny room, I was greeted by another stewardess, who lathered me up with sympathy before asking if I was “sick from last night, or food poisoning”. She offered me some Motillium and told me to sit in the much-coveted exit row while she dug out the stomach-settling pill. She sat opposite me and ran through the symptoms – “clamminess, nausea, vomiting” (yup, yup, yup), then gave me the pill and a glass of water that she repeatedly told me to “sip slowly” with exaggerated gestures in a kindly manner.

I held out another two hours or so until we got to the hotel, then sunk into my comfortable routine of sleeping, waking up in a cold sweat, then regurgitating as I swore at the porcelain. In between bouts I imagined a contraption for people in similar quandaries, who have to use both “ends” at once, and don’t want to have to “hotswap” whilst on the toilet. Prototyping begins this Autumn. You heard it here first.

Moral of this story? Aer Lingus stewardesses: keep up the good work! Soho Coffee in Dublin Airport: go fuck yourself.

€9.45 for food poisoning? Bargain!

101 Things removed from the Human Body – Sully Edition

Dear reader, for eons now, you have regarded me as a paragon of intellectuality, a fountain of inspiration in a world overrun with stupidity, an oasis of smart in the desert of dumb known as life. Allow me to subvert this somewhat.

My most recent misadventure followed a long and surprisingly pleasant shower in my somewhat austere college accommodation. My post-shower tradition dictated that I clean my ears with the generic-brand cotton buds that I bought in Aldi. I’ve never been one to pay too much heed to the ‘keep out of ear canal’ warning that these goods carry, figuring that if I’m careful enough, my cotton bud will remain intact. I’ve done it for years, and never had any problems whatsoever. Until that fateful day, of course.



The surge of panic that went through my head when I saw a bare blue stick in my hand is hard to explain. Imagine getting your hand stuck in a jar, or a fat woman jumping on top of you while you’re eleven years old and swimming in a crappy pool at a cheap resort in Gran Canaria and you’ll know what I mean. Of course, my first reaction was to blindly plunge my fingers into my ear to try and fish it out, which I realised was utterly futile once I realised how small a hole I was poking at. I tried taking pictures of my ear using my webcam, but I couldn’t see anything, so that was also a waste of precious time.

Knowing that time was of the essence I charged off towards the medical centre on campus, foregoing any attempts to tidy up the messy hair that sat on my head and face, hesitating only to decide that I should leave the iPod behind for this walk. I pounded my way through the building, hurling open doors with remarkable aplomb and bounding up the stairs three at a time to the medical office. As I approached the hatch to inform them of my malady, I tried to steady my heavy breathing. I loomed in front of the hatch, watching two old biddies chatting quietly and waited. This might be an emergency I thought to myself, so I made with the polite cough. One of the biddies approached.

“Yes?”

“Um... Hi. I –uhh, got the cotton off a cotton bud stuck in my ear, and I can’t get it out”

“Sorry?”

“The cotton... Off a cotton bud. I was cleaning my ears just now and the cotton didn’t come out when I removed the stick. I was hoping to have it looked at.”

“You know not to put anything smaller than your elbow in there, right?”

“Yeah – I know... Could I maybe get someone here to try and remove it?”

She told me to come back at 3:15. 3:15! That was over three hours away! Was this not some kind of emergency? By now I was late for my lecture, and since I had yet to collapse, decided to wander in.

Concentrating on the lecture was difficult. Could I feel it rattling around inside my head? I felt a pressure on my jawbone – had the fluff somehow wandered down and got stuck in my skull? As the lecturer began to warble on about globalisation and linguistic phenomena, I began to daydream. I had daydreams in which I blew my nose, and a little bit of fluff landed in my tissue. Or daydreamed about a painful urination culminating in the explosive ejection of a wet piece of cotton from my penis like a bullet from a rifle. Or sneezing and watching a piece of lint playfully float out of my ear. By the time I got to the tickly sensation during a bowel movement daydream, the lecture had ended.

I met my friends outside the room and told them what happened.

“You know not to put anything smaller than your elbow in there, right?”

“Of course I know!”

One of the (rightly) unsympathetic bastards asked me why I didn’t just yank it out with a tweezers, at which stage I invited him to have a look for the offending piece of fluff. After gazing into the dark hole in my head for a second, he agreed that some specialised hardware would be necessary.

I went back to the medical centre at 3:15 and had barely settled in the waiting room before my name was called. The middle aged woman asked what the problem was:

“The problem is – I’m an idiot. I managed to get a piece of a cotton bud stuck in my ear”

“You know not to put anything smaller than your elbow in there, right?”

“Yes, I know – and I’ve heard that phrase about twenty times already!”

The fluff in my brain must have been causing me to slur my words or something, because she asked a question I never thought I’d ever have to field:

“You’re not from Cork, are you?”

“Why? Is this the kind of behaviour you’d expect from a Corkman? Do they generally come in here after sticking things into their heads that don’t belong?”

The banter continued as she used the othoscope (the ear-proby thing with a light) to investigate the vast recesses of my brain.

“I can see it now. You have a foreign body in your ear.”



The stout nurse lavished sympathy upon me as I sat there making stupid self-deprecating remarks. She told me that there was a tool specifically used for such purposes, but lamented the UL medical centre’s lack of of such equipment. On that note, she asked me to “hang on a tick” and wandered off, returning with an implement in her hand.

“Oh great! You found it then?”

“No - I brought this in to show you the basic structure of the tool. Y’see – it’s like this, but it has an extra grip thing here that you can use to hook the foreign body and pull it out safely.”

What the hell? Did she think that the power of our combined imagination would make the tool appear? I decided it would be best for all concerned to keep things moving forward:

“Fascinating. Um. Maybe we could try something to get this thing out of my head?”

She told me she’d try and get the fluff with a forceps, then left the room for a moment to beckon another nurse to her side, so that one could hold the light while the other used the tool. Like a father and son tinkering with a car engine. She returned a moment later, out of breath from the exertion of wandering into the next room.

“She’ll be here in a minute – she’s busy in the other room.”

To alleviate any awkwardness that would come from making conversation with me, she continued looking into my ear, all the while muttering things like “that’s well in there” and “we’ll be doing well to get that out.” She told me that if I left it in, my ear would dry out and my head would explode (okay – I admit, I don’t recall the specifics of the conversation), and I needed to get this sucker out within 24 hours or something bad would happen.

As we waited for the other nurse, I decided to use the opportunity to brainstorm some alternate ‘exit strategies’. I suggested flushing it out by using a syringe full of water;

“Oh no – we can’t do that! I might shatter your eardrum”

“Okay. How about we get another cotton bud, put some glue on it, shove that into my ear canal, and see if it picks up the other one?”
“You’re just being a smart-arse now”, she helpfully pointed out.

The other nurse waddled in through the door at this very utterance, asking

“Does this smart-arse know not to put anything larger than-”

“Yes, yes – the elbow I know! I’ve heard it enough today that I’ll never forget, don’t worry!”

Now that the nursing dream-team had assembled, we could begin with the forcepsing. I felt the cold tool dredging along the inside of my ear, and the failed attempts at grabbing the fluff felt like hairs being plucked from deep within my skull. Eventually, they gave up. The nurse looked up at me, and gravely uttered:

“You’ll have to go to the hospital, I’m afraid.”

The blood curdling scream I emitted echoed out into the halls as the narrator chimed in:

"WILL SULLY EVER BE RID OF THE FLUFF INSIDE HIS HEAD? WILL HE AT LEAST LEAVE WITH ONE OF THE NURSES' PHONE NUMBERS? TUNE IN NEXT TIME AND FIND OUT!"