Death to germs.

We have dogs -- did I mention that? Really? When I started this blog on the old, defunct host site our dog count was exactly: 0. Now it's -- let me take a quick headcount -- yes: 2. How did this happen?

Our dogs don't have cooties, but they do lick everything on Planet Earth, and roll in dirt, so we find ourselves washing our hands a lot. So we go through a lot of hand soap. Here's a new one I had to try:

Purell, the brand name synonymous with germ killing (Catholic Guy and notorious germophobe Lino Rulli uses Purell as a verb on every episode of his show) has now gone into the soap end of the germ-removal business. How's that working out? We'll get to that shortly.

Purell is such an omnipresent brand now that it's hard to remember life before hand sanitizer. When the swine flu and SARS and scares swept the nation in 2009 and 2003, each time the office I worked in installed more hand sanitizer dispensers, which in time were allowed to go empty as the panic died down.

Not that Purell is a bad thing, nor is any other decent hand sanitizer for that matter. When these became a must-have accessory for germophobes I scoffed at first. I said, It may kill bacteria but most sickness come from viruses. I was wrong; they work well against cold viruses (less good against norovirus, though). I think its #1 germ killing ingredient is good ol' booze, actually, but it smells better than dipping your hands in cheap vodka. (I should note that the CDC only recommends alcohol-based hand sanitizers, so what does that tell you?)

You'd think that Purell was pushed on us by one of the big medical consumer product outfits like Johnson & Johnson (sales: $71,890M) or even Medline Industries (sales: $5,100M), but actually it came to us by the plucky guys at Gojo (sales: $305M). Gojo proudly tells us that they are the INVENTORS OF PURELL, which they released exactly twenty years ago in 1997, which product by the way is now also available as a surface disinfectant spray. And of course as the soap.

Okay, so how is the soap? We like it! It scores well on three of the Key Components:

1) Does it clean your hands? You bet your bippy! In fact, I think it would do a good job cleaning your bippy.

2) Does it smell nice? All Purell products smell nice. I've used the hand sanitizer as aftershave.

3) Is it gentle on hands? Well... not really. Most soaps aren't, and my wife reports that the Purell soap is drying. It would be more of a problem in winter, but in late spring, not so bad, but still. I wash my hands so much you could strike matches on my knuckles, and this is not some shea butter concoction that can put some of the moisture back.

4) Does it kill germs? Not more than other soaps, I think, but that's okay. Soap's main job is to separate your skin from the germs so they can be washed away, and this does that just fine.

So I would recommend the Purell soap. We got the Clean and Fresh flavor, but it also comes in Soothing Cucumber and Fresh Botanicals. Maybe they'd be easier on my hands. Might smell too girlie to use on my face, though.