And I can't move my arm, for the fear that you will wake. And I'm five years ago, every thousand miles away.

Without wanting to make such a blanket statement, I think most people would agree that having access to the WWW and The Internet makes life easier.
Just the other day, I was remarking how much easier it must be for school kids nowadays. Long gone are the days when researching a subject or person meant such things as going to a Library or talking and interacting with other people. Perish the thought! The most brain-power they have to apply nowadays is just how much 'copy & paste' they can get away with. Anyway....that wasn't my point.
Since the beginning of the year I've been feeling unwell. My energy levels have been piss poor, but more importantly I've had problems breathing. The best description I can give is that I'm struggling to draw anything other than shallow, rapid breaths. The evenings are the worst, finding me waking up several times; coughing, struggling to catch a breath and feeling like I'm fighting to breathe through a straw. I don't appear to be suffering any cold or flu like symptoms; no sore throat, no headaches, no snotty nose.
I'm aware that giving up smoking can often result in chest/breathing/coughing issues and had probably convinced myself that this was as good an excuse as any. But I just can't manage anymore. I'm waking up several times every night with this breathing problem, causing me to cough and splutter, yack and make the most awful noises while I'm fighting to calm my breathing down. Having to deal with it myself would be bad enough, but I've got other people in the house trying to sleep too and I'm surprised that The Girl hasn't at least tried to muffle me out with a pillow over my face.
I have a Doctor's appointment later this afternoon.
In anticipation of this, I've been surfing around websites, looking at symptoms and possible causes. This is where I'd like to state that having access to the WWW and the Internet isn't such a good thing after all.
Enter "shallow breathing" into Google. Click one site, then another. Follow the links. Click, click, click. Read through one site where all the symptoms sound familiar. Click through to another where it sounds like I've potentially got something else. Page after page, link after link, site after site. All of a sudden it gets to the point where I have to close all the pages down because I'm now wondering which of the potentially fatal diseases I've got. Wonderful.