... and it works.

I've been rather ill the past few days, with massive amounts of chest congestion and "productive coughing." I've had little voice and yet this morning, I went to lead the service at the church I serve. We had a spoken service since there was no way on God's green earth the I could chant anything. Everyone was very tolerant of this, especially since we only had a baker's dozen or so at the service. (For the record, the weather in Southwestern Ontario was wretched.)
At the end of the service, one of the congregation gave me a cough drop or lozenge to sooth my throat. It was a Buckley's lozenge. Now Buckley's Syrup appears to be a Canadian legend. When my family and I moved to Canada, we were given a bottle of Buckley's Syrup in a Christmas basket from some good friends. We were told it tasted bad but it cleared up cold symptoms.
"Bad" is an understatement.
The stuff tastes vile... revolting... horrendous. It looks like mucus. And yet it does the job.

You have no idea.

Soon after taking it, your head is often clear and you resolve NEVER to take the vile stuff again. But you will... because it works. To be fair, Buckley's is available in tablets for day use (in Sunshine Yellow) and for night use (in a lovely Nappy-Time Blue.) These work too, but they taste like... pills. 

The lozenge is a different story. After the service, I unwrapped the thing and popped it in my mouth. Immediately, I tasted the taste of Buckley's -- imagine the flavour of pine, eucalyptus, and diesel fuel and you'll be close. Then a little hole opened to the centre of the lozenge. Lurking there is Buckley's Syrup in a concentrated gel form, just waiting to spring into action and ambush the unsuspecting user whose senses are already dulled by illness.

... like napalm.

My eyes rolled up in my head and my head rolled up into my neck. The folks counting the collection and washing the altar vessels laughed, because they all knew what I was experiencing. My head and sinuses began to clear. In fact, the dwarves that make up Buckley's active ingredients began to mine NEW sinuses in my head.

An unretouched picture of Buckley's Dwarves beginning work... turning your head into Khazad-Dûm.

Lord only knows what they found in there.

I drove home with my head clear and my chest and throat more open. It's still more open now, two hours later. I think the stuff works like sympathetic magic; it fights mucus since it looks like mucus.

Maybe I'll never take it again.                    Who am I kidding? The vile, revolting stuff works.