I heard something tonight that rocked my world.
Airborne cold remedy doesn’t work.
What’s more, this news centered around a recent class-action lawsuit in which Airborne didn’t admit fault but settled for $23.3 million.
What’s next, that Head and Shoulders causes dandruff, that RoundUp actually encourages crabgrass, that Pepto Bismal is just mint-flavored nothing and Midol intensifies PMS?
As my friend so correctly wondered, what about Emergen-C, will we learn Emergen-C is bogus, too?
I was such a consumer sucker. I believed a second-grade teacher’s home-made Fizzies in a plastic cylinder could really prevent colds.
Did I ever bother to stop and inquire how, although inventing The Cure for the common cold had thus far eluded scientists around the world since forever, a grade-school teacher could whip up the effervescent answer in her kitchen?
No, I did not ask that question. Nor did I stop to wonder when exactly we weren’t supposed to take Airborne formula, since words on its container recommended its use in: “Airplanes, restaurants, offices, hospitals, schools, health clubs, carpools, theaters and sports arenas.”
What’s left? Homes, prisons and stores? Clever how it didn’t mention stores, since that’s where we must go to buy Airborne.
Did I question anecdotal reports about the virtues of Airborne from people who flew here or there and popped Airborne left and right and then bragged how, thanks to Airborne, they dodged a cold on that trip?
Hook. Line. Sinker. Swallowed it.
Course, nobody mentioned the majority of times we fly on airplanes probably filled with TB passengars or the times we pushed goobery grocery carts or the times we shook hands with a coughing, sickly person and never got sick, sans Airborne.
I was a gullible consumer lamb led to the retail slaughter.
Geez, I got myself all worked up over this, and now I’m sneezing my head off, and I feel all stuffy and achey.
Baaaa-choo!
I have brand-new box of Airborne in my medicine cabinet. Grapefruit flavored, even. That only reminds me how much money I’ve spent on Airborne over the years, at about $10 a pop. I probably averaged about two or three of those a year.
Cha ching.
Now, they tell me it’s useless. Thanks for nuttin’.
That’s why, when Bruce took the above photo of Airborne for this column, I told him to go ahead and plunk two or three or four Airbornes in the glass for full effect. Go away, waste them all, for all I care.
They mean nothing to me now.
I’m going to find that second-grade teacher and get my money back.
And spend it all on Nyquil.
