This time last year, I was on a TV programme with three singers. There was a rapper of Ghanaian heritage, a big pop star, and a famous mezzo-soprano. It was deep midwinter. The night before, I’d been at an old friend’s 60th birthday, crammed into the function room of a pub somewhere in Surrey. It had been a good night, but now, just for something to say, I wondered how it was possible to avoid catching a cold when half the people at the party were players in a symphony of coughs, sneezes, snuffles and nose-blows. By the way, how come some people have nose-blows like trumpets, and others don’t? A question for another day.
At mention of my night out, this trio of troubadours in the TV green room did two things. First, they shrunk away from me slightly. Second, they engaged in a feverishly enthusiastic discussion on how to avoid catching colds which, naturally enough given their line of work, was something of an obsession for them. I get that, but I have skin in this game too – I must avoid colds at all costs because the colds I get are worse than anyone else’s. I don’t have a medical certificate to confirm this, but I know it to be true. My colds last longer. My nose is more blocked, my throat is scratchier, my coughing fits are louder, barkier and apparently endless. My family, wise to the couple of quick throat-clearances which herald the coming storm, either kick me out of the room, or clear the room themselves. Back when I presented football on ITV, my poor colleagues in the studio gallery grew attuned to the warning signs. “Cans off!” the studio director would holler to his team, before I deafened them all, blowing the wiring in their headphones.
As for my blocked noses, don’t start me. Sprays, drops, even the electric shock of fumes of boiling plum brandy my mum prescribes … they all work for a while before admitting defeat. And there’s nothing as pitiable as the sound of a Birmingham accent spoken without the benefit of air passing through the nostrils. I mean, it sounds a bit nasally restricted at the best of times. At least this elicits sympathy, which isn’t always a good thing. In my first year away at university, away from my mum and her medicinal brandy, the cleaner in our halls of residence took pity on me. “I’ve got just the thing for that, you poor thing. I’ll be back in a minute.” She was very lovely, very Irish, and very insistent that I ate the peeled, raw onion she brought to my sickbed. She stood and watched me do so. Bless her. Didn’t achieve anything, I’m afraid, apart from sending my guts into raptures and making my breath smell terrible.
So no, I hate colds and am quite sure that prevention is better than the cures which, onion-based or otherwise, don’t work. I paid close attention then, along with the rapper and the pop star, when the mezzo-soprano walked us through her cold avoidance regime. With forthcoming bookings to sing for her supper over Christmas, she clearly took it all very seriously. She commanded us to apply hand sanitiser on the hour, every hour (all winter long, as far as I could deduce) and, in addition to this, there were special precautions required when it came to parties and what not. Ahead of any such engagement, she recommended a couple of blasts of Vicks First Defence (other brands are available) up each nostril – whether you felt a cold coming or not. Extreme. I like it. And, get this, she insisted on following it up after the party with another couple of squirts of the same stuff.
I was in. And I have to say, I snuffled not once all last winter. There were downsides: the countless bottles of First Defence I bought, mislaid, bought again, found, etc. And that dispiriting moment you realise you’ve sat on the little vessel of hand gel you left in your back pocket and it’s now splurging everywhere. Still, all a price worth paying. And now winter’s upon us again, I’m re-armed to the teeth with the mezzo-soprano’s recommended ordnance. I’m ready for battle.
• Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist
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