People's systems vary a great deal, I think. I 'upgraded' to Advil/ibuprophen a few years ago- and I wasn't satisfied with it. I never could tell when it started working. So I went back to aspirin.

I was reminded of that the other day when my knee was hurting. I had taken two aspirin not more than 10 minutes before when I felt the wave of peace waft across my knee. (Sorry to sound lyrical!) I was surprised- I thought it more commonly takes about 20 minutes. Guess I'll stick with aspirin.

For escaping from stress, for me there's no better way than live music.