I felt the first tell-tale signs of a cold on Tuesday afternoon. My throat was feeling dry and scratchy, my head beginning to poud -- I knew what was coming.

I'm rarely sick. Not counting my maternity leaves, I've had only 2 sick days in the 10 years I've worked at the paper. I've always attributed it to my healthy lifestyle and a body that's primed to fight infection quickly and efficiently. But, every once in a while, I succumb to the common cold.

On Tuesday, I felt this cold was going to be one that would take me down. So, I stopped at Giant Eagle on my way home to see if I could pick up some Airborn -- the new product that claims to reduce the length of a cold if you take it at the first sign of illness.

I've never taken it before, but figured it couldn't hurt.

I ended up buying the store brand Airborn product (10 tablets for $5) because I'm way too cheap to fork over an additional $2 for name brand no matter how sick I am.

The bottom line: I think it worked.

I shook up a bottle (it's an Effervescent, so you need to disolve the tablet in water) and drank it before the preschool board meeting that night.

The next day, the cold hit -- just as I knew it would. I soldiered through with some cold pills. Last night, I went to bed and expected to wake up with a big stuffy nose and sore throat and...

nothing.

In fact, it feels now like I'm at the tail end of the cold. And, it's only been two days.

Not bad.

Was it the Airborne or was this just a more mild cold than I thought? Was it all in my head? I don't know, but I think it was worth chugging a bottle of this yucky stuff (like flat, powdery OJ) anyway. And, I plan to use it in the future.

More info can be found here:
http://www.airbornehealth.com/

Let me know if it has (or hasn't) worked for you.