shoes and pie

While at the supermarket the other day, I thought to myself, “Oh, while I’m here, I should pick up a new toothbrush.”

Holy hell, I am not trained for this kind of shopping.

What is up with all the toothbrushes? It used to be bristles on a stick. Well, okay, technically it used to be a stick. But as far as manufactured goods go, I was pretty well satisfied with the craaaaazy inventiveness of the original Reach® angled-head toothbrush. I mean, whoa. That was some thinking, there.

Since that time, toothbrushes have become quite the industrial-design darlings. I don’t care about the brand, but that was the least of all the decisions I was faced with. Manual? Battery-operated? Disposable? Replaceable head? Angled head? Angled bristles? Cross-action bristles? Indicator bristles? Antibacterial bristles? Gum stimulator? Tongue cleaner? CHEEK cleaner? Dual-action? Triple-action? And would you like that in soft or medium? What color? With extra country-style pulp, plus added calcium? Want fries with that?

Ho. Lee. CRAP. I was buying replacement heads for my Ultrasonex for quite some time, but I switched back to manual a good two or so years ago. And I assure you, I have gone through a number of toothbrushes in that time. Where did all of these choices come from? How have I not noticed? Have I been buying my toothbrushes from the local We Only Carry Three? Or has it only recently reached this level of overload?

I finally picked a brush with three different levels of two different angles of four different colors of bristles, with a row of gum-stimulating “fingers” along either side. The super-grip handle (have there been a lot of slipped-toothbrush accidents that spurred on this influx of ergo-grip toothbrushes?) is, I think, deep pink. I didn’t look that closely, and my eyes were glazing over.

I know this much: the damn thing doesn’t fit in my toothbrush holder.

Okay, now that my local peeps have had their chance to see Eddie perform live, I can post a clip from the current tour without spoiling anything for them. If you haven’t seen the current tour yet… well, click ‘play’ at your own risk. This isn’t his best bit, but of the limited Stripped tour clips currently on YouTube, this one was by far the least annoying in terms of sound/picture quality. I bring you The Ten Commandments, especially that one about coveting oxen:

I’m going to see Eddie Izzard tonight. Woo! So, um, yeah. Here’s a clip from a previous tour:

Thank you for flying Church of England. Cake or death?