Mystery Solved

Hello. How are you today? Now I'm doing well to pretty well. Before I was doing horrible to very horrible. Why you ask?

My alarm went off at 7:45 this morning, as it usually does, and I slowly got up and took a shower and got dressed, as I usually do. I exited my building and began my 15 minute walk to work when I started sneezing like a madman. For the life of me I had no idea why I was sneezing so much. Was it allergies? Possibly, but usually I'm well over that by this time of year. Was someone repeatedly slapping my nose? No, I don't think so, although perhaps I missed that.

The day wore on and I kept sneezing. I was baffled by this disturbing turn of events. Finally, while walking to get a drink of water I scratched my left torso/flank/lower-spleen area and felt a hard, rectangular object under my shirt. It turned out to be one of those tags that they now attach to clothing! I was about to cut it off when I noticed the writing...

"Remove Before Wearing or Washing to Prevent Uncontrollable Sneezing"

I immediately cut off the tag and within minutes my sneezing problem went away. All I can say is that I am a lucky man: if it weren't for the itch in the lower spleen area, I might still be sneezing and suffering now.

THE END