To cure the common cold -

  1. Take two slices of bread, a wedge of salted butter, one small onion, one jar of English Mustard, one jar of Marmite, three eating knives and chopping knife.
  2. Butter the bread.
  3. Thickly spread the mustard on one slice, the Marmite on the other other using a separate knife for each. Otherwise you get buttery mustardy marmite and every combination thereof which is a bit gross, especially as it looks like an infected gut-wound.
  4. Dice your onion. Evenly place the diced onion on the Marmited sliced of bread.
  5. Place the mustarded slice of bread to form the top of sandwich.
  6. Press down firmly on the top - you should do this without forcing the filling out of the sides. Just enough to get it all firmly stuck together.
  7. Bite. Chew. Swallow. Breathe clearly. You're cured!

In all fairness, any bug that can survive this treatment deserves its chance to kill you.

The UK centre for common cold research is based at Cardiff University.

For the past eight years they have been conducting experiments into the progression of the disease with the help of the local student populace, who are a notoriously sickly bunch, due to the general lack of sleep, poor diet, and consumption of huge quantities of alcohol on a regular basis, which leads to them having a depressed immune system, and catching lots of colds.

When they first show signs of the illness, volunteers turn up at the centre. If you are deemed to have shown up early enough in the development of cold symptoms, you are rewarded with a crisp tenner, and asked to fill in questionnaires on a daily basis as to the current state of play with the cold, and any cures you attempt, until it clears up

In the 1999-2000 academic year they ran trials of echinacea, a herbal remedy commonly touted as a 'common cold cure', both as prophylaxis, and when the symptoms first became apparent, to see if it had any impact on the diseases progress. The research is still being analysed.

My personal advice on clearing out cold, is to eat the hottest curry you can manage, which, after the streaming eyes and nose have cleared up, seems to make me feel a whole lot better

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