Hay Fever

There is a distinct medical downside to this season of cool weather, falling leaves and gentle melancholy: hay fever. If you want to call it something more serious, you might try "seasonal allergic rhinitis," but the terms mean the same thing. It's the time of runny nose and eyes and a feeling of stuffiness that's caused vTC by allergies.Hay fever can be a terrible nuisance, but it's not dangerous and there are several measures that can counteract its effects.Hay fever occurs when antibodies initiate defensive reactions against plant seeds floating in the air.The body has a defensive reaction when foreign objects appear in the upper respiratory tract -- the sinuses, nose, throat, mouth and trachea -- which filters out potentially harmful material to keep it from the lungs.

Millions of miserable, sneezing, itching, nose-blowing hay fever sufferers could find a strand of hope in a DNA-based vaccine developed by Johns Hopkins scientists, who say it appears to squelch the body's allergic response to ragweed pollen. A small but promising study reported in today's New England Journal of Medicine says test subjects who had just six weekly injections of the vaccine - a fusion of bacterial DNA and ragweed protein - enjoyed a 60 percent reduction in allergy symptoms compared with people who got a placebo.

Hay Fever' latest Coward production Actors have an affinity for plays about other actors, and director John Going seems to have his own affinity for the plays of Noel Coward. Both these strains come together at Olney Theatre Center, where Coward's "Hay Fever" opens tomorrow under Going's direction. Inspired by the late great actress Laurette Taylor, "Hay Fever" takes place over a wild summer weekend at the country home of former stage diva Judith Bliss, played at Olney by Patricia Hodges.

Hay fever is the best argument yet against the theory of evolution. More and more people are getting it, and what possible reproductive advantage could it confer? Do red eyes, a boggy nose, a scratchy voice and a head on the throbbing brink of explosion catch better mates? Not likely. Does hay fever do the plants that cause it any good? Even less likely. On the other hand, it's also the best argument yet against intelligent design, because even a dope of a designer wouldn't have come up with something that causes so much dreary misery in so many people - tens of millions in America alone - for no discernible reason whatsoever.

Our 4-year-old daughter is sneezing like she has hay fever. Isn't she too young? And isn't this the wrong time of the year?Children can have hay fever, and despite the name, spring is not an uncommon time for its symptoms to appear. Hay fever got its name because its symptoms, caused by an allergic reaction to fall weeds, appear during hay season. In the spring, the same symptoms can be triggered by tree pollen. Some people are allergic to molds, dust mites, animal dander or cockroaches. They may have "hay fever" all year round.

THE BALTIMORE hay fever agony season tickles the respiratory system with an early harvest of misery. May those who suffer from this affliction be shown mercy.Anyone who is tormented by the August-September sneezing; watery, scarlet eyes; nasal complaints; reddened eyes; and generally foul moods has reason to worry. This has been an extremely wet summer. The weeds and grasses remain as lush as they were in May. I fear a bumper crop of whatever it is that sends me to my handkerchief drawer.

The Vagabond Players is wrapping up its 75th anniversar season with a production of Noel Coward's "Hay Fever" that's nothing to sneeze at. If anything, it could be contagious.The Vagabonds' third stab at "Hay Fever" since 1929, the current production combines Coward's wit with a delightful sense of physical comedy, under the direction of Carol Mason.Loosely based on the young Coward's visits to the household of the great stage star Laurette Taylor, the play is set at the country home of an eccentric retired actress named Judith Bliss.

We're a family of snifflers and sneezers. Hay fever season is not a pretty sight. But we're preparing by changing filters and stocking up on effective medications.Hay fever is badly named, because it has nothing to do with hay and you don't run a fever. Instead, you just sneeze your nose red in response to ragweed pollen. For some folks, itchy red eyes are an additional torment.We are not alone. Over the next month millions will be miserable as pollen drifts invisibly throughout the environment.

The Bliss family home is anything but blissful in Noel Coward's 1925 comedy Hay Fever. What begins as a quiet weekend in the country ends up total pandemonium when it turns out that each member of the family has invited a potential paramour. And, that pandemonium is a pure pleasure in Center Stage's production, directed by Will Frears. The Blisses are no ordinary family. Matriarch Judith is a grande dame of the British stage whose every word and gesture is theatrical; her weekend guest is a clueless but besotted prizefighter.

The area's long, lush spring has produced an abundance of tree pollen to bedevil allergy sufferers. But weeping, sniffling victims might take comfort in the fact that this year's pollen levels haven't come close to past records."

Anna Camp was a trouper all right - a gal who knew the show must go on, even when she all but took "break a leg" literally. And what did she get for it? A lot of applause and - believe it or not - some complaints. Camp, 23, was playing the part of a flapper in the Center Stage production of Hay Fever last month when she fell off the stage. They were between Acts II and III, and the lights were out. Camp was supposed to exit the stage, but she bumped into another actor, and then a piece of furniture, before tumbling off the stage.

Unlike the owners of the country home in his 1925 comedy, Hay Fever (currently at Center Stage), when Noel Coward built a vacation retreat, he did not want houseguests. In Jamaica recently, I visited Firefly, the home the British playwright built, high atop a mountain. The living room is furnished with two pianos; the dining room has one wall open to the air; the study is still equipped with his desk and portable typewriter; and there's only one bedroom. When Coward had visitors, they stayed at Blue Harbour, the guesthouse he owned at the bottom of the mountain.

The Bliss family home is anything but blissful in Noel Coward's 1925 comedy Hay Fever. What begins as a quiet weekend in the country ends up total pandemonium when it turns out that each member of the family has invited a potential paramour. And, that pandemonium is a pure pleasure in Center Stage's production, directed by Will Frears. The Blisses are no ordinary family. Matriarch Judith is a grande dame of the British stage whose every word and gesture is theatrical; her weekend guest is a clueless but besotted prizefighter.

MUSIC Baltimore's Rockfest 2005 If you love the '80s, then you'll love Baltimore's Rockfest, taking place Saturday. This concert will feature such memorable big-hair musical acts as Quiet Riot, Vixen and Never Never. Baltimore's Rockfest 2005 is at 5:30 p.m. Saturday at 1st Mariner Arena, 201 W. Baltimore St. Regular tickets are $35-$55, and VIP tickets are $55-$75, which includes admission to the after-party at Rams Head Live!. For more information, call 410-347-2020 or visit 1stmarinerarena.

To the relief of fans around the world, the Blogger of Baghdad has resurfaced. Many had feared for the safety of the popular Web diarist Salam Pax after his blog, or Web log, went dark March 24 - just as his colorful and verbose accounts of life on the edge of war were gaining him notice. As it happens, Pax is not only well but as breezy, acerbic and irreverent as ever, whether reporting on the "surreal" sight of "three tanks parked in front of an ice cream shop" or his hay fever - "The sexual life of palm trees makes me weep."

Times change. And although Noel Coward might have once been the voice of urbane wit, the dialogue in his 1925 play Hay Fever now seems a bit dated. And the play, with virtually no plot and little action, is inherently difficult to perform. These problems were evident in the first act of Colonial Players' production in Annapolis. Some performances were charming and convincing, but the dialogue often suffered from being written in a long-gone era, and the characters seemed overblown. Written to compel the audience to read characters' thoughts, Hay Fever promotes a labored interchange, which weighs down Coward's trademark lightness and transforms dialogues into monologues.

Olney Theatre Center's production of "Hay Fever" is drenched with so many glowing, vibrant colors that it takes a while to notice the one that isn't there. One woman wears lemon yellow and a green the shade of iceberg lettuce, another floats by in sea-green and watery blue, while a third is dressed in a pale pink that approximates ripening fruit. It's a rich palette, but a cool one. Nowhere is there a single drop of red. The omission is no accident. Human passions are strikingly absent from the world that Noel Coward creates in "Hay Fever."

Times change. And although Noel Coward might have once been the voice of urbane wit, the dialogue in his 1925 play Hay Fever now seems a bit dated. And the play, with virtually no plot and little action, is inherently difficult to perform. These problems were evident in the first act of Colonial Players' production in Annapolis. Some performances were charming and convincing, but the dialogue often suffered from being written in a long-gone era, and the characters seemed overblown. Written to compel the audience to read characters' thoughts, Hay Fever promotes a labored interchange, which weighs down Coward's trademark lightness and transforms dialogues into monologues.

The all-volunteer Colonial Players Theater Company begins its 53rd season this month with To Gillian on Her 37th Birthday, one of five plays on the schedule. Gillian, which opens Aug. 31, is a production of the 1985 Michael Brady play that tells of a young widower who cannot accept his wife's death more than a year after she was killed. When family and friends gather to celebrate the date of Gillian's birthday, David, the widower, and Rachel, his alienated teen-age daughter, confront their feelings.