For my first two years living in the Bay Area, I was thrilled to find that my annual fall allergies no longer held me captive for the months of August and September. Back in Ohio, as soon as the local news began to report pollen counts I'd be sneezing my ass off and generally miserable (or medicated) for 6-9 weeks.

It seems that Mother Nature has decided to correct this oversight. Now we have high pollen levels in the Bay Area. And I'm really feeling the effects. I'm back to popping Benadryl every few hours. It's great. Clears me right up. Expect that it also makes me drowsy. So I picked up some Claritin at the store last night. Time will tell if it does the job without knocking me out, 'cause it's really hard to write this way.

Posted by jzawodn at May 28, 2003 09:12 AM

Reader Comments
# Roberta said:

Thank goodness everything has a time and a season - let's just hope the pollen season is very short. My sympathies. *drip, sneeze, drip*

on May 28, 2003 09:57 AM
# kasia said:

Claritin is a lot better than Benadryl.

on May 28, 2003 11:36 AM
# milbertus said:

I use Claritin myself, and it usually does the trick. It doesn't make me drowsy at all, either.

on May 28, 2003 02:28 PM
# Charles said:

That's one reason I moved to California, I'm allergic to everything that grows in the Midwest, but almost nothing in California. But allergies still bothered me once in a rare while, even in LA, when the Santa Ana winds kicked up.
Unfortunately I react badly to allergy drugs. Actifed and sudafed make me too sleepy, Benadryl makes me speed around like a crystal meth addict. Allegra is the only thing that works for me, and it's a freaking miracle (especially since I'm back in the Midwest). Now I can actually go outside in the summer instead of hiding indoors in my air conditioned room.
My allergies were one of the reasons I got interested in computers in the first place. Back when I was about 13 years old, I discovered our local university computer center was the only public place in town with a filtered, air conditioned environment. They had a nice lobby with tons of cool geeky stuff to read, so I hung out there on summer evenings. I decided I'd like to work in nice air conditioned offices with computers for the rest of my life.

on May 29, 2003 09:16 AM
# jr said:

Ah, so other than the gender issue, you can pretty much identify with this.

on May 29, 2003 11:47 AM
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