In ancient days, springtime heralded the beginning of marauding season. Various armies or other up-to-no-gooders would pick an enemy to maraud, and would announce this intention by saying to the enemy, "What does maraud mean?"
The reason spring was such a popular time for mutual invasion and destruction is generally assumed to be because spring thaws allowed armies to move about more freely, but this is only part of the reason. Another important main reason people took advantage of spring to attack their enemies was that with spring would come their greatest offensive weapon: allergy season.
If someone wished to do harm to a particular enemy, they would simply send them copious gifts of flowers, trees, bushes, or anything loosely considered "nature" with instructions to -- in case this was not clear -- "inhale deeply." Within minutes, roughly 40% of the enemy population would be completely helpless -- some being taken by fits of sneezing, some held hostage by runny noses, and some having fallen fast asleep where they stood due to first-generation allergy medicine. The people not affected by allergies would be kept busy running to get Kleenexes for those who were, and the invaders would just walk in and it would be all over. They would take their booty, being careful to also take back their treacherous gifts of nature, which would then be sent to the next enemy on their list of potential spring conquests.
In modern times, of course, flowers and trees are no longer used as weapons of war (having been outlawed by the Geneva Convention), but spring nevertheless remains basically a war season for allergy sufferers. There are two sides in this war:
Allergens: the bad guys
Immune system: the good but possibly overeager guys (GPOG)
If you are an allergy sufferer, your immune system (GPOG) declares itself to be its own army, independent of anything and everything you wish it to do or not do, and this army holds firmly to the belief that every whiff of pollen or other allergen that comes in must be destroyed at once with an entire arsenal of weapons. Under GPOG rule, no one is safe from suspicion. Even innocents are subjected to intense and unpleasant scrutiny ("Sure, sure, you SAY you're just a molecule of french fry smell...LET'S SEE SOME I.D.!").
Even the GPOG's mothers, if they HAD mothers, wouldn't get by easily ("Sure, sure, everybody says they're my mother").
One of the effects of your body's constant alertness to enemy attacks is that you, the actual but ineffective head of this determined army, stand around in a perpetual fog of dullness. At work, for instance, you might stare at your to-do list for a while, and when a coherent thought finally forms (this could take until lunchtime), it is this: What are all these marks on this paper? After considerable more time spent staring at these marks on the paper, you might think, Do they mean something? And finally, when it is just about time to wrap things up for the day and head home, this thought makes its way into your foggy brain: Should I be concerned that I don't KNOW what these marks mean?
But luckily this state of affairs will not go on forever. Eventually the bad guys will grow tired fo baiting the GPOG and will go away, and the GPOG will no longer have any reason for existence and will thenceforth run for national political office. So take heart, allergy sufferers! It may be spring, but hay fever season's coming.
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