The crud

Don't really know how to describe what has been ailing me.  It's not unlike a cold which I suppose it is really.  It started a week ago with that little feeling in the throat that is different from anything else.  You know you are getting sick.  I grab the Zicam which promises to shorten the duration of a cold if taken at the onset.  Well, this is the onset. 
  Most colds I have start with a stuffy nose and move down into the chest and some start in the chest and end of in the nose but all come with sore throats, chest congestion, coughing, sneezing, stopped up noses and mucous.  Sometimes I think my body is a mucous factory. 
  This illness didn't seem like it was going to last long and I was ready to sing Zicams praises.  Two days of a slight tightness in the chest, coughing, a few sneezes, and then the nasal congestion, and the fifth day I seemed like I was almost well.  Then the night coughing and the mucous came,  I seem to be okay for hours then suddenly my nasal passages turn into faucets running with this thick gel like substance.  It's stuck in your chest, clogs your throat, fills your sinus cavities to the brink of bursting and makes one think that putting a bullet into your brain isn't such a bad idea and then finally it seems to be almost gone but not entirely.  A couple of hours later it starts all over again.   There never seems to be an end although you know from experience it will one day go away. 
   One of the worst things about this crud   is that everyone around you is suffering from it but they have all been to the doctor, some miss functions because they are "so sick" , and there is no one to give you any sympathy.  In fact, everyone else believes their case of crud is worse than your case of crud.