You Don't Know Neti

"You need a NetiPot" Thomas said, smugly, through his upended beer. "It'll fix you right up. Yup, I swear by the NettiPot." He saw my quizzical expression and smiled. "What. You don't know NetiPot? Tell him, Seth." He gestured in Seth's general direction with an elbow and tipped his beer up once again.

Seth began with "Well. Its like this. No, actually - let me see. Its kind of like this thing that you put water in. Hold on, let me back up - before you put water in it, you kind of pour this stuff in there and mix it around....." then he trailed gently off, scratched for a bit, and said: "Well, basically, it's like a little teapot."

"YOU POUR SALTWATER IN IT AND RINSE OUT YOUR NOSE" Thomas interjected.

"Right, thats what I said - its like a little teapot" said Seth.

"So, its like a nasal douche then" I said.

"Hahahahhahahaa!!! You said 'douche' " they both chortled.

I let it go.

Still confused, I swung by Walgreens for a mysterious NetiPot to find that it is, indeed, a little blue tea kettle with little white packets of saltstuff to mix in it. Once mixed with warm water, you pour the whole thing straight in one nostril, and it comes straight out the other.

How it knows to do that, I don't know (I would have anticipated it would come back out the SAME nostril) but I do know that I spent 15 minutes furiously dogpaddling air to avoid drowning upright in my bathroom last night. I finally decided I might rather just have the sinus infection than slowly kill myself with tiny packets of saltwater. Too late though; because now I'm afraid I managed to flush whatever was in my sinuses straight out into my ear holes.

Whenever I tilt my head I hear the ocean.