Monday
Jun152009
Comedy
Monday, June 15, 2009 at 6:10AM Saturday night, TOG and I went to a comedy festival with friends. This is dangerous for two reasons...
- Comedy makes me laugh really hard (duh!). Thus I rate comedy shows on the official Asthmagirl Inhaler Lung Scale (AILS) which is similar to how scientists predict earthquakes except far more exact.
- Most comedy festivals are in downtown Seattle which is triple jeopardy for the lungs; bus diesel, parking garages AND laughing as hard as you can...? Time for AILS!
So the two headliners were:
Mike Birbiglia and...
Kathleen Madigan!
While the two opening comedians were very good, these two had me reaching for the inhaler multiple times. (Yes, laughter is a trigger!).
Kathleen Madigan alone? We saw her last year. She was a 4.5 on the AILS.... Kathleen Madigan and Mike Birbiglia? They scored an all time high at 6!
Thus, on Sunday I was struggling with how bad my chest hurt from both coughing as hard as I could and laughing until I cried!
I would far rather have asthma issues from laughter than anything else though!
AG out!
Reader Comments (9)
We better bring extra inhalers for Blogfest...
I don't think I've seen Madigan, but I just love Mike Birbiglia. And yes, if I had to have asthma, I think I would prefer laughter as the source.
MPM beat me to it ... and frankly wheezing is not a good thing no matter what sets it off ...
I haven't been to a comedy club in a long time! Glad you are recovering from laughter, not something even more sinister!
When my little asthmatic gets laughing I know it's inhaler time. I'm surprised tose comedians didn't incorporate you and your inhaler into the act!
If I had asthma I would much rather use an inhaler for laughter too. Glad you had some good laughs!
I've just been cruising around and stumbled across your blog. I can totally relate to the laughing triggering asthma thing. It always bothered me because laughing was somewhat a p.i.t.a. I mean, everything is a'okay with the inhaler and all but it's still a pain. Sometimes I even left the room so that I would stop laughing so I could catch my breath... Do you ever do this??
I had never heard of laughter as a trigger, but I agree it is one of the better reasons to need to use your inhaler.
I suffer form asthma and very bad allergies the only medication I trust taking with my asthma is Flonase over the counter.. I read up on it at "kiwi drug" news after a friend told me that its the safest thing now to take with my inhaler. Feeling amazing this fall and able to breathe properly!