Every now and again you'll hear something that'll jar you right down to your shoelaces.

On a recent early morning television show for instance, the NBC medical expert noted that women suffer and complain more than do men.

Then, out of the blue, as every listening male in Greenville was sticking out his chest in a self-congratulatory gesture, that gorgeous blond, Jane Pauley, bespoke her ego-shattering phrase.

It went like, "Maybe the high instance of female suffering is caused by the 'pains in the necks' they (the women) have to live with."

Now, if that isn't a deflator - a savage jab to the solar plexus of maledom, a complete obliteration of the male vanity - then there ain't nothing, nowhere, nohow, no time, that can be said to lower a man in his own esteem.

The wife who purchases the groceries, and almost everything else at our personal castle, sort of chortled when she heard Jane's rejoinder to the doctor's remark.

"Hah," said she, "Jane has hit the nail right on the head - there's a libber who really knows how to express herself."

"Yes, sez who?" sez I.

"Well," responded the mistress of Mortgage Manor, "her remark may not have a universal application - but it certainly applies in her personal case - all you have to do is take a glim at some of those far-out comic strips of that Trudeau character to realize that."

Trudeau, Jane's husband, authors the controversial Doonesbury comic strip, which is more of an adverse commentary on weighty matters - largely political, ethnic and ethical - than anything else.

In spite of this digression into a discussion of the personal lives of those two celebrities, the fact remains that women do, percentagewise, suffer more from backaches and headaches than do their male counterparts.

Could be that the macho males are more stoical, more long-suffering-in-silence than the softer sex, thus accounting in part for the favorable "tilt" they get in the illness department.

Our incidences of headaches are daily, as well as legion, at The Greenville Advocate.

However, they are dealt with on a first-come, first-served basis, and generally by workday's end, all is in readiness - all problems having been summarily dispatched - and a bright, new tomorrow is looked forward to with anticipation.