Saline drops

The Doktah and I were hanging out in my living room, probably watching Buffy or something, when she started complaining about something in her eye. Now, I consider myself something of an expert when it comes to getting something in your eye. My eyelashes fall into my eyes so frequently that I often wonder how it is that I have any eyelashes still attached to my eyelids. In fact, I used to keep a mirror by my bed so that, when I was reading before going to sleep, I wouldn’t have to get out of bed every time I got an eyelash in my eye. I used that mirror six times a night.

So when I saw The Doktah suffering, I ran upstairs to get the eye drops I keep on hand at all times so she could rinse out her eyes. She looked at the bottle somewhat skeptically, but I assured her they were just saline drops. “Trust me,” I told her.

Well, she dropped them in her eyes, and pulled face. “Um,” she said after a few seconds, “they kind of hurt.”

“What?” I said. “Don’t be ridiculous. They don’t hurt.” I took the bottle and examined it. “They’re just saline!”

“Well, she said, eyes reddening, “maybe some of the water evaporated and the salt is too high of a concentration.”

“I don’t see how that could happen. The bottle’s sealed,” I said, and I decided to try out the drops myself. I tipped my head back and dropped them in.

“Oh my lord!” I cried as the liquid fire drops hit my eyes. “What the hell happened to these?” I ran upstairs, tears streaming down my face, and found a fresh bottle of saline drops which solved the problem.

Moral: Saline eye drops have a shelf life.