Eight years seven months ago, I woke up on a Tuesday morning with globs of vaseline smeared over my right eye.  Well, not literally, but that’s what it looked like as I peered through my glasses and started to cry.

I remember that day well.  The prior week I had had the nastiest of colds.  The kind where you blow your nose constantly, and if for a moment you manage to breathe in through your nose, you end up choking on the phlegm drawn into your throat.  Yuck.

The previous Friday I had gone...