It is not flu or cold season. The sun is warm and bright, the air is hot and sticky. But you have that scratchy lump in your throat that heralds the onset of a summer cold.

That's right, you'll have to take a hanky to the beach.

Summer colds are the worst. They can cramp your style, clog your snorkel, slow your swimming and unbalance your skiing with retro-sneezes. Sniffling in the sun, you may even feel feverish. But what can you do? While others are having wet fun you are having wet misery. While others are tanned and smiling, you will be drippy and sad.

It is so unfair, this summer cold thing – so horribly unfair.

Catch a cold in December and, well, it figures. You bundle up, you buy boxes of Kleenex and extra cough drops. The whole ordeal becomes bearable. You accept it with good grace. You can even seek temporary relief by sipping hot tea. But try drinking hot tea in the dog days of August. (What more can you do to break out in hives?)

You want to eat hot dogs and soda at a summer ball game, but mentholyptus makes hot dogs taste funny. You want to drink that can of cool soda, but carbonated drinks become positively dangerous, threatening to backfire into your draining sinuses with unpredictable consequences.

People may argue the point, but no cold is worse than a summer cold. You want to join that swimming party? "Go ahead," says the summer virus, "make my day." You jump into a swimming pool and the virus gleefully spreads to your ears. At first, all sound is muted. You may be 25 years old, but you now require a hearing aid. Then comes the splitting pain of an earache. And you know what that means. It is 105 degrees outside and your only relief is to rest your head on a heating pad. The sweat beads up on your face and skull. It streams down to form a puddle until the accumulation threatens to short-circuit the heating pad, with the added possibility of death by electrocution.

A summer cold will drain you in more ways than one. Will there be anything left besides a warm, salty puddle? At times like these you remember that the human body is mostly water. And there you are, running like a faucet. Yet you are told to "drink plenty of fluids." This makes you even runnier. You drink five glasses, and all five glasses pour back out of you. How do you compensate? You try the cherry flavored cough drops because you want to take a more cheerful approach to being sick, only the cherry drops don't work as well as the nasty tasting ones.

You might decide to try those pills, the ones that make the symptoms go away. But this only guarantees that the cold will stay longer, return sooner and hit harder on its return. So if you're smart, you tough it out. You spend that miserable week of affliction wondering who might have sneezed or coughed in your direction. You think of that waiter with the sniffles last week. You think of all the doorknobs you touched. Perhaps you forgot to wash your hands at a critical moment.

Mother always said to wash your hands.

There are a few benefits to a cold. You don't have to cook or clean for anyone while you're sick. After all, you don't want to spread your germs to the rest of your family and friends. On the other hand, those who are maliciously inclined can purposely transmit their summer affliction to others. And don't think it doesn't happen. In these modern times everyone knows a cold is contagious.

We also know that misery loves company.

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