#989 Blowing your nose in the shower

Neil Pasricha
Squeeze that nostril

When you wake up with your ol’ nose holes filled to the brim with thick, slow-moving night-phlegm, there’s only one solution. That’s right. Get up, stumble to the shower, and let’s get down to business.

First, that hot steam needs to get the job started. Those tiny flying water molecules are like miniature chisels, floating right on up your nose and hammering away at the Wall of Salty Nose Gel blocking your air passages.

At the same time those flying chisels are working their magic, another old friend shows up just in time to lend a hand as well. Our old pal gravity. Just standing up lets the night-phlegm know you mean business, and that you’ll employ the use of any weapon necessary to get those air passages cleared up for the long day ahead.

So now you’re in the shower. You’re totally soaked at this point — front and back got a rinse at least, maybe a tummy wash in there — and everything sure is all hot and steamy, nice and thick like a blanket of fog.

At this point you should feel a bit of a tickle high inside your nose, as the wall slowly starts to give away. Now is not the time for complacency. “Oh, I’ll just let gravity and steam finish what they started,” is what you should not say. No, now is the time to attack!

There are three steps to pull it off:

  1. Place your thumb right on the outside of one of your nostrils — preferably the one which is getting the better airflow at the moment. By doing this you essentially drop a massive two-by-four across your airway’s emergency exit door. Now there is no way for that air to get out of your lungs, except for your other nostril. And your mouth, of course.
  2. Close your mouth.
  3. NOW BLOW AS HARD AS YOU POSSIBLY CAN!!! EYES CLOSED, CHIN DOWN, BLOW, BLOW, BLOW!!! PUSH, THERE YOU GO, KEEP PUSHING OUT!!! LONG, HARD PUSH!!! PUSH, PUSH, PUSH!!! ANNNNNNNND… you’re done.

…

…

… So, how was it? Did it do the job? If not, you probably still feel clogged up. You’re out of breath, tired, and frustrated. But I hope that didn’t happen to you. I hope you broke the translucent nosespit dam wall right on down. I hope you blew that clear, slick membrane of headglue away. If you did the job right, your hand should now look like you just squeezed the life out of a baby jellyfish. And if does, I want to give you my sincere congratulations. Because you, my friend, are incredibly

AWESOME!

A key ingredient

152 thoughts to “#989 Blowing your nose in the shower”

  2. It takes forever to get everything out, and then my nose tickles really bad. Sometimes it won’t come off of my hand.

  3. Guys, there is a proper term for this process, it’s called a ‘Snot Rocket’.

  4. i thought i was the one of the few people in the world that did this! it is awesome but i try to be really discreet about it because i think others will be grossed out

  6. Eeeew, But rather awesome! I thought this was one of those unspoken habits, that virtually everybody does!

  7. EPIC! :D
    I do this alla time, and I honestly didn’t think anyone else would think it was just as awesome. :D

  9. UGH! My husband does this, but he leaves the boogers all over the walls. Dried up boogers on a shower wall are nearly impossible to remove unless you use a scraper of some sort. If you must do this, please be considerate and make sure they go down the drain.

    1. I know, I am like your husband, just the fact that I wear glasses to see clear and I cannot wear those in the shower makes the problem of removing them during showering a tad harder. I just don’t see them!
      And… I am a guy, so I always forget to check for them after I dried myself.
      Sorry to my current girlfriend for the mucus she finds on he walls and shower curtain…
      Epic!

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  13. It’s fine to do this and you really feel clean inside and out, but one advice in respect to the person who cleans the shower: make sure the snot absolutely doesn’t reach the walls of the shower. Because when it dries out later, it is very difficult to remove from the shower wall!

  14. we live in a quaint, but very old house with very old plumbing so we use a fine mesh – wire basket filter thingy in the drain to catch hair …. and whatever. problem is my hubby does that all the time in the shower and NEVER cleans it out afterward, so guess who gets to clean it before i can take a shower!? and BTW – s’not funny!!!

  15. Awesome! I do the same thing with a twist or three:

    1. I fill my nostrils with water first, a la neti pot.
    2. I do it at the sink; I use my hand as a cup to gather water to snort up, and the faucet at the sink fills my hand up faster.
    3. I use my whole hand, as if I had a tissue — this gives me better control over where it goes!

  18. After I told my roommate I do this, she told me how gross it was and that people would get boogers on their shoes (we’re in college and wear sandals in the shower). Although her saying this hasn’t stopped me from blowing my nose in the shower, I don’t do it when anyone else is in the bathroom with me. Seeing that other people think that this is as awesome as I do makes me not care. Next time I’m in the shower and have a stuffy nose, I’m blowing it, even if there are people in there :]

  19. we have exposed aggragate on our shower floor and I happen to be the one to have to clean it. there’s nothing worse than hearing someone blowing their nose in there and having to locate it, let alone clean it up, YUKKKKK!

  21. Dont blow too hard or your ear drums might pop true story although this is still very awesome!

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  25. Ive actually never thought about just blowing blank in the shower….i dry my hands stick my head out and grab some tp, but going to try it this way tomorrow.

  28. Wow awesome way of saving tissue. But how about blowing your noses on a wash cloth. I do that when needs must.lol…

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  33. Doing it in the shower isn’t totally awful but seeing someone outside shoot a “snot rocket” when they think no one’s watching is just wrong and so very gross.

  34. Reblogged this on ilargia64 and commented:
    Ahhh! I find it disgusting! But C. does number one in our shower and I just found it after 3 years of marriage…And I still love him!

  35. Ahhhh! I find it disgusting! But C. does number one in the shower and I found it after 3 years of marriage…And I still love him!

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  41. I don’t get how some people don’t think this is awesome! It’s kinda funny that just today I woke up with a stuffy nose and I blew my nose in the shower on the same day that this shows up on the awesome thing of the day

  42. The only thing that is funnier than this post is the COMMENTS. Oh my gosh, I’m LITERALLY crying right now. Like… who the heck DOESN’T do that in the shower, right? Oh gosh. I haven’t laughed like THIS hard in forever. And I dearly love to laugh.

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