The Sneeze

As the weather turns cold we start to hunch our shoulders, look down as we walk and sniffle & sneeze. There is no avoiding the winter chills.

On the tram trip home the other day a man walked past me to get to the door. As he waited for the stop he let out an explosive sneeze. He promptly said "oh excuse me, I seem to have some dust up my nose!" As the remaining passengers sniggered, he got off the tram. Very polite of him to excuse himself considering he had scared the wits out of everyone sitting nearby and had left his saliva all over the legs of a young guy sitting with his school mates. You can imagine their horror and comments.

Sneezing comes in many forms: there are explosive ones as mentioned; suppressed; coughing; snotty etc. Some people are extraordinarily loud allowing the release to affect their entire body. I am a bit loud but only when I am in the company of friends and am being a bit silly. My sister says my sneezes are like a cough which, come to think of it, is quite accurate.
The sneeze that bothers me the most is the suppressed sneeze. It sounds like it is more of an effort to hold it in than to let go. It is also very bad for you. Without consulting Google right now I remember reading somewhere that a sneeze can be expelled at approximately 60km/hour!!!!! Can you imagine suppressing that and having the force reversed into your body? Why would you do that to yourself? An ex boyfriend had this type of sneeze and it was very worrying (no, actually it was frustrating).

In my last job a young lady who sat next to me would sneeze and it would immediately be followed by a sound I can only describe as the "cuckoo" chime that you hear from the unique cuckoo clock. Funny, kooky and just a little bit odd!

How do you sneeze?