C.O.P.D.

     One of those diseases that, no matter how many times I hear the name, I come up blank on what it stands for.  COPD.  Yes, I get the drift on what's being affected; it's somewhere North of asthma, but however accurate the descriptors for the ailment these initials signify, the words quite stubbornly get lost upon my memory.

       Yes,  the beginning might protrude through and unveil "Chronic Obstructive . . . " but then, the remainder of this high class Latinate/Greek body wracker will stay hidden.

       In fact, the whole COPD might as well be the Colorado Police Department as anything intelligible I can come up with.

       All right, finally, "Chronic Obstructive"--(if memory permits)--"Pulmonary Disorder."

       Or, as I gasped to the attendant medicos in emergency the night the flu felled me, "can't breathe."