Head Full of Garbage

No, I don't mean that my head is filled with metaphysical garbage such as propaganda, calumnies, hatreds, or the like... my head is literally, and I literally mean literally, filled with garbage. For some reason, last night might sinuses filled up to the extent that I could not breathe through my nose. I spent much of the day bundled up under the covers, mouth breathing like a... uhhhh... like a mouth breather. I did spend about twenty minutes shut up in the bathroom, putting the stopper in the tub and running the shower at scalding temperatures to simulate a poor man's steam room. After opening up the old nasal passages, I blasted my sinuses with my trusty neti pot.

In the meantime, I decided to cook a stew based on the Iberian classic olla podrida, having soaked some chickpeas overnight. Because of my sinus congestion, I went heavy on the spices- an overly generous shake of black pepper, several cumin and ajwain seeds, a whole head of garlic, five dried hot red peppers, four jalapeños, and a dried chipotle (I didn't have any smoked paprika, and wanted some smoky notes in the stew). Breathing in the steam from the pot was quite therapeutic, but I know why capsicum is used as a non-lethal chemical weapon.

Right now, I'm not nearly as congested as I was... my all-out war on my sinuses has paid off. I figure I will run the shower again, fix myself a hot toddy, using the bottle of Tullamore Dew I always keep on hand for medicinal purposes, and then bundle up again in a welter of covers. I need to clear the old head, and again, I mean that in the most literal sense.