The tightness of the throat. Dry hacking cough that won't dislodge anything to provide you with an instant's relief before it flows back down from your sinuses. Dry nasal passages that feel like someone's using a steel wire brush to scratch inside.

The tremendously frustrating part is, I had this back in September. Hit me out of nowhere like a truck (actually now I'm cough-laughing remembering the final bus-strike in Mean Girls) and I was out of work for three days because I couldn't barely utter a peep, let alone say "Hi thanks for calling Tech Support".

The screwed up beyond all belief part comes in two sections: one guy in my department had it last week, but he was nice enough* to stay out for three days until he wasn't contagious. Also, one guy in the other half of my department was stupid enough to NOT stay out at all, and continued to come in ANYWAY without even SEEING a doctor for THREE DAYS!
*Unfortunately, the guy who was nice enough to stay out, got his wife, step-son, and newborn daughter sick!

So then
I think it was Wednesday
At least one, if not two of the moms in the office bring in their kids. One was, I think, picked up sick from school, with the middle-school version of what our office has.
Now picture this
A Dilbertville style office cube farm with germs bouncing around from person to person like TB in an airplane
and they introduce at least one (if not two) kids with superhyper germs
That's like throwing a bottle of Viagra to a dozen old men surrounded by 36 Playmates of the Month.
So all our sedentary germs which /might/ have died off with careful cleaning and consideration got a major freaking boost from middle school energeticosity (made that up) and now more and more people are getting sick.

WTF.

Of course now I need a brain scrubbie to get the mental image I posited above out of my head. Doh.

And I have to wait another 40 minutes before I can call the doctor and say "rescue me."