I wondered if the word quorn might be related to quern, a grindstone. Turns out it is, but not the way I expected (i.e. nothing to do with grinding the fungus, just a coincidence of place names).

I LOVE M&S food. It's all on my Treat List.
But oatcakes, whoever they are made by, are essentially edible cardboard.
I have never warmed to them.

Whenever I read about Hard Tack I think of oatcakes.

I came here to tell you a sad story.
I had an intense cold last week - really extreme symptoms for 24 hours only. Yes I did go to work. But it did amuse me that it was the quintessential 24 hour bug.

Trouble is, it's hung around in the form of catarrh. I've never been a big cougher. Sneezer, yes. Cougher, no. But I keep having to clear my throat because it's catching as I breathe.

So Mum asked me this morning - after an extended bout that I think annoyed her - can we get you something from Tesco?
I generally think cough mixture is a waste of money, but I was so flattered that she asked, I said yes.
Anyway, they got home about 30 minutes ago and I had my first swig.
IT TASTES OF LICORICE!

:(

I simply cannot use it.
Same as when I was four and we got food poisoning from Co-op pork sausages. The Doctor prescribed kaolin & morphine, but Mum had to let it run its course, because I heaved so much when she tried to give it to me that I was making myself sick.

Sundae - the only cough syrup worth using has narcotic in it. Can you get some of that?

TBH I only agreed to this because I felt flattered.
I've not intention of spending my own money on it, narcotic or not.

Rotgut cider is £1 a can. That will do :)

fify

When we were kids there was one cough medicine which I couldn't stand which was called Senegrenamonia :greenface and then there was another one which was raspberry flavoured which we were hardly ever given:thepain:.

Warm 'em up to about the temperature of toast right out of the toaster.

Commercial, packaged oatcakes ain't generally worth the powder to blow 'em up if the few I ate were any sample. Edible drinks coasters. Seems they have to be homemade, using home-kitchen dripping, to taste like much of anything at all. Had 'em that way, not bad in a fats-and-starch way.

Thanks. I'll give it a go and report back.

We used to have Pripsen when one of us had worms. One of us had them, we all got dosed.
It was supposed to be taste of raspberries, and you added milk to it.
It was the most disgusting taste in the whole world and I gag now just writing about it.

To this day I still get suspicious of anything raspberry "flavoured" in case it carries a hint of the taste.

Kids today can have tablets.
Lucky fuckers.

Wait. What? Worms?

Yup.
What?
You don't get worms in America?

Turns out you call it pinworm, we call it threadworm.
It's grim anyway, with the female coming out of your anus at night to lay her eggs. How disgusting is that for an adult, let alone a child to comprehend?

They are often spread hand to mouth, when hands are not washed after going to the toilet, but can become airbourne after contact with clothes - not much you can do about that - you simply breathe them in.

Classic symptoms - itchy bum.
Not verified medically - hunger.
Still said today by adults, "I can't believe I'm still hungry! I must have worms!"

I've not known of anyone to actually get worms, unless they were cats who liked to hunt wild mice.

Headlice seems like the big parasite here.

I don't know that I've encountered it, though I think I have heard of it. My kittehs can get worms, dogs can...why wouldn't humans?

Yeah, I think I would totally freak out.

However, if I could get my hands on a modest tapeworm I'd love worms and all things wormy. ;)

I don't think I'd even contemplated the idea of worms until I was in my late teens. Combantrin is widely advertised as the medication that deals with worms in Oz.

http://www.jnjaust.com.au/products/combantrin/

My sister had ringworm once, which turns out to just be a fungus on the skin. She and my mom were freaking out after the doctor announced she had ringworm, but before he explained what it was.