季節の変わり目、鼻にくる… 　 　 　 　∧＿＿∧ 　 ･　 ﾍｯｸｼｭﾝ!! 　 　 　（ ＞　ロ　＜ ）ﾟ･ ･ ﾟ ･ 　 　　　（　 　　　）　 　 ･ ﾟ ･ 　 　 　 /　　/ 　　　∪　 ∪

Nine tiny specks fly off to the right of the face, and they start right at its edge: the first ﾟ is pressed against the face’s closing ）. Some are ･, a half-width katakana middle dot, and some are ﾟ, the half-width version of the little ring that turns ハ (ha) into パ (pa). They fan out as they go, one on row 2, five on row 3 at mouth level, and three on row 4. The face itself takes up a single row, row 3: （ ＞　ロ　＜ ）. The eyes ＞ and ＜ both point inward, the classic kaomoji way of squeezing your eyes shut, and the mouth between them is ロ, the katakana letter ro. It’s a small square that looks almost exactly like the kanji 口, “mouth,” so here it’s a mouth thrown wide open. Up on row 2, two ∧ (the logical “and” sign from math) stand up as pointed ears, one almost directly over each eye, joined by two full-width ＿. That line sits at the bottom of its character cell, so it links the bases of the ears into the top of the head. At the right end of the same row, ﾍｯｸｼｭﾝ!! in half-width katakana reads hekkushun: Japanese for “achoo.” Row 4, （　　　）, is an empty body, narrower than the face, with no arms at all. On row 5 the legs are two plain slashes, / /, both tilted the same way, top to the right, and on row 6 the feet are ∪ ∪, the set-union sign, each one sitting to the left of the ear above it. Put together, the head has lurched out ahead of the feet, toward the spray, the way your whole upper body jerks forward with a big sneeze. The caption on row 1, 季節の変わり目、鼻にくる…, means something like “The seasons are changing… and my nose knows it.” In Japan, kisetsu no kawarime, the turn of the seasons, is the go-to explanation for sudden sniffles, especially in November, when mornings turn cold and afternoons stay mild. Writing the sound effect in half-width katakana outside the figure is a habit from 2channel, the huge Japanese anonymous message board where this kind of text art took off in the 2000s. This tiny original AA, six rows in all, was drawn for this site.