Monday, March 26, 2007

My drugs are better than your drugs



Ahhhh the smell of Autumn is in the air....I think. Or at least it would be if I could smell right now. Damn Autumn! Here in Brisvegas Autumn is heralded by cooler nights and damp air, so I have the beginnings of a cold and ear infection. All at once I knew I would have need of the glorious Sigma Pharmaceutical Company and their greatest invention: Chemists' Own Cold & Flu DAY/NIGHT Tablets. Talk about truly awesome stuff. It has, of course, Day-time non-drowsy formula tabs with Pseudophedrine 30mg, Paracetemol 500mg, and Codeine Phosphate 9mg. Night-Time Tablets For Rest with Chlorpheniramine Maleate 2mg, Pseudophedrine 30mg, and Paracetemol 500mg.

For those without a slew of knowledge in the chemistry field, Paracetemol is the evil twin of acetaminophen (aka Tylenol). They just had to mess with our poor heads and call it something different, didn't they? Everyone else seems to know that pseudophedrine is the stuff they make crystal meth out of. I just found out when I tried to buy out the entire supply from the chemist lol. How would I know? I don't make drugs in a lab under my house! I just wanna take the stuff that makes my nose stop dripping fluid so I can breathe again. Apparently they regulate this stuff pretty heavily....but we can buy codeine over the counter? Huh? Ok I may be confused about the whys and wherefors, but could honestly care less as long as the ears, eyes and nose are clear, k?

Now, those of us in the Land Down Under know how cool it is to be able to buy codeine over the counter. Most American travellers discover this when they leave the continental US and need the chemist, generally for montezuma's revenge, but that's beside the point. By the way everyone in the English speaking world, except Americans, call a pharmacist's shop a chemist. Though they have pharmacies here, too, which is a little weird. But anywho, I shall be stuffing my pie-hole with tons of these little tablets til the cows come home or my nose stops dripping, whichever comes first. It certainly doesn't hurt to have a little extra kick from the codeine fairy to get rid of the monstrous headache either.

Just thought I'd share *grin*

1 comment:

Mooselet said...

My s-i-l keeps wanting me to buy her Neurofen with Codeine (aka ibuprofen with codeine) and send it to her back in the States. I'm pretty sure I'd get in trouble for that, so um... no. I don't love her that much. :-)

I also love that you can get Phenergan OTC as well. We used to give that to our chemo patients to stop vomiting back in States, but I used it to knock the Toddler out cold on our flight back to the US and when she was not sleeping on our caravanning holiday last year. Brilliant stuff.