The tripods have landed.

Lately I've been talking about my wife's crazy product purchases in this space, and I'll give her credit for two things -- the stuff she's been getting is not expensive, and if it works as advertised it would be helpful. 

Well, my latest present from her is this set of tripods. 

If you use liquid hand soap, or a shampoo or the like that comes in a pump bottle, you may find the Flip-It! bottle emptying caps useful. I like to get everything I can out of the soap bottle, which in the past has meant trying to balance it on its cap or just water down the contents and try to get an adequate handwashing out of what's inside. 

Well, no more! The amazing tripod cap allows you to stand that bottle right up on its top, and gravity does the rest. 

I didn't think much of the Flip-It! at first, but I was surprised how little residue is left in the bottle after Isaac Newton has had a chance at it. When the soap is gone, one quick rinse and into the recycling bin, to likely go in the landfill with the rest of the garbage. Well, at least I tried. 

The kit comes with two tripods and six adapters, so any standard bottle should be accommodated. I've used a medium adapter (the dark gray ring above) and a small one for two different soap bottles. I imagine shampoo/conditioner bottles need the larger adapter. 

Though I've taken a flyer on all sorts of gadgets and gizmos, I probably wouldn't have bought these. Still, it's always fun to see if an idea works as described, and the Flip-It! does. Two caveats: Because it is designed to adapt to shampoo bottles, you will likely get more liquid hand soap dispensed than you want if you're not careful. Also, both times I used it, the adapter was difficult to get off the empty bottle -- probably dried soap gluing up the works. 

Still, as cheap but clever ideas with no working parts go, I give this two clean thumbs up. My review: Flip-It? Good!

Santa's cleaning up!

This here Santa soap has been hanging around in the downstairs can for a couple of weeks. He certainly is cute. His label requires a choking hazard warning because of the cotton ball glued to his side. His soap is supposed to smell like candy canes, and it's close enough, I guess. It's not unpleasant.

But he's still overstayed his welcome. 

Santa here is a product of Scent Theory, a New York-based outfit that makes some aromatic stuff. It's right there in the name. But before you think they're all boutiquey, let me mention that I've only ever seen their products in Walmart. Santa here was an impulse buy at the checkout line -- as I love to Christmas up the joint, in the cart he went. Scent Theory makes a number of holiday-themed products, including a Gingerbread soap, but I didn't see that one at Walmart. 

Many of their scents seem to try to evoke a theme rather than an actual smell. For example, Cozy Comfort, which is intended to be a woody, musky scent, possibly to get you thinking of the first fireplace log of the year (or the second, if you forgot to open the flue on the first one). Santa here specifically says Candy Cane, and over time the Mrs. got a little tired of it. 

So off he went to the can upstairs. 

Since I work downstairs and engage in most cooking and dog-related activities downstairs, though, hand soap tends to last a lot longer upstairs. I may be looking at Santa until Valentine's Day.  

Maybe I can recolor some of his garment, remove the cotton ball, and make him look more like St. Valentine. It's not that much of a stretch. 

Still festive!

A merry Christmas to all, and don't forget to wash your hands! Ho ho hygiene is important! 

American jobs!

You know, when companies are run by idiots, even when they do things right, they do them wrong.

Take for example Procter & Gamble, the company so woke that it insulted the vast majority of its razor users and watched the division fall by $8 billion. 

One of its longstanding products is Safeguard soap, which was only available as a bar soap (as far as I know) in the pre-pandemic era. During the height of COVID mania, the company released large bottles of liquid hand soap under the Safeguard brand. I got some on a few occasions because hand soap, like hand sanitizer and toilet paper, went flying off the shelves at that time and you had to get what you could get.

Well, my wife really liked it, so despite my desire to continue to punish the company for its rudeness, I have been compelled to get some for use at the kitchen sink. But I note that on the bottle they say "Made with American Jobs." What, they suddenly love America? 

In fact, they love America so much they repeat the slogan on the back. (They seem to think that the US has one star on its flag, like Texas or Puerto Rico, but never mind.)

The thing is, I will never trust the company to do what it says again. So I wrote them the following e-mail: 

"I see that the Safeguard soap bottle says 'Made with American Jobs.' What does that mean? It doesn't mean it's made in America; it could just mean someone in America called the factory in Mexico or Canada to order more. I'd like some clarification on this, please."

A few days later I got a reply:

"Thanks for getting in touch with Safeguard. I'd be happy to help assist you today. All Safeguard products are made at facilities in the United States of America. Our liquid hand soap and body wash are made in Iowa City, hand sanitizer is made in California and Virginia, and bar soap is made in Ohio."

So there you go -- the products are actually made in America, but for some reason they couldn't just say that. Instead they had to use some unusual phrasing that made it sound like they were cheating. 

"Oh, yes, we mean an America, not that America. South America is sort of still America." 

"By American jobs we meant Hector in the mailroom, who sends the note to the plant in Xinjiang to order more." 

"We referred to Peter Jobs (no relation to Steve) who is working at the factory in Mexico City." 

Which just shows you that when you break trust with the people, they expect the worst. And it takes a long time to reestablish the respect you've lost. All our institutional leaders ought to bear that in mind. But it's probably too late.

Next to godliness.

Back in the eighties, Safeguard soap was advertised as being "the smallest soap in the house." Everyone will prefer Safeguard to whatever else you have! Buy more Safeguard! Everyone uses it! Safeguard is the smallest soap in the house!

Not anymore.

This 25-ounce bottle is the largest dispensing bottle of hand soap I've ever seen for the home consumer. The local supermarket had a bunch of them. Of course I got one. We haven't run out of hand soap during the current Chinese Death Virus crisis, but the store's liquid-soap shelves have often been bare, and we were prepared to use body wash or -- gasp! -- bars of soap if need be.

Unfortunately I did not realize that Safeguard is owned by Procter & Gamble, also known as Political & Correctness, the company that insults average American men and made me stop buying Gillette. They make a billion products; it's hard to avoid them all. And I will give them points for sending out soap to the soap-hungry millions. But at six bucks for this bottle, it was hardly out of the goodness of their blackened little hearts.

But: Is this a sign that things might be getting back to normal on the supply side? Not sure. Weird things going on. Have not had a good potato in months. Paper products are back, though. And I got a bottle of Lysol Laundry Sanitizer in the warehouse store. (Lysol Laundry Sanitizer does not claim to destroy or deactivate viruses, which are pretty much done in by the laundry process anyway; it does, however, kill bacteria, and when you have two large dogs that constantly need toweling off in wet weather, and a large occasionally sweaty male in the house [me], you know that some loads need germ-killing.)

Here is the big news, though: While I was in the warehouse store, an announcement came over the PA that Clorox Disinfecting Wipes were limited to one to a customer (one being a pack of five). It took a moment for that to sink in. Disinfecting wipes have been missing for months! Karen Townsend of Hot Air explained why:

It turns out that the supply chain is stressed because the cleaning wipes are made with polyester spunlace, a material currently in short supply. It is also used to make personal protective equipment like masks, medical gowns, and medical wipes. “That entire supply chain is stressed. … We feel like it’s probably going to take until 2021 before we’re able to meet all the demand that we have,” [Clorox CEO Benno Dorer] said. Though in May Dorer predicted that store shelves would be restocked by the summer, that has not materialized.

I did not get my one-to-a-customer wipes, though; I was already checking out. I had been down the aisle where they usually are kept, but they must have had them in some special spot. We still  have some at home anyway.

Soap, antibacterial detergent, antiseptic wipes -- in some ways, it seems like a little normalcy may be creeping back in our lives.

Or maybe not. The flagrant stupidity in our culture is still be enacted with violence and looting in our streets, with governors who won't govern, prosecutors who won't prosecute, and mayors who may or may not be brain dead. God knows how all that is going to end.

Where there's smoke, there's laundry.

Walking the dog around the side of the house one chilly, humid morning, I saw great billows of white smoke coming from the back. For a split second the primal alarm went off in my head -- FIRE! -- but by the time the second ended I realized that most fires don't smell like Snuggle.

Yes, and I had been the one who put the laundry in the dryer just before going outside.

Depending on the weather, the scent of dryer exhaust can really permeate the air, visibly or not. I do not complain about this. Everyone wants the clothes to smell nice. No one is washing the clothes in coal tar. So I'll be walking the dog and he's sniffing the grass and I'm like "Oh, the Johnsons are up early and doing today" or "The Smiths use Snuggle too."

Bears in the neighborhood.

Does it introduce a man-made perfume into nature's glory? Yes. Is that a problem? No. The dryer vent effusion is fleeting. And nature mostly smells like nothin', although sometimes it's very nice, and sometimes very bad.

Sherlock Holmes wrote a monograph on tobacco ash called Upon the Distinction Between the Ashes of the Various Tobaccos. Since true tobacco connoisseurs are thin on the ground these days, I think a modern-day Holmes might instead write Upon the Distinction Between the Scents of the Various Laundry Products, focusing on their color, scents, effectiveness, and whatnot. He, or perhaps a chemical scientist for a soap company, might be passing down my block and announce, "Aha! Clearly the scent of Lirio detergent, tempered with a dash of Ensueño. We may conclude that the residents are not merely Latino, but likely Mexican!" Or, "Hinklemeyer claims to have been shopping for laundry soap at the Mega World at the day of the crime, but his clothes smell distinctly of Kroger's house brand." Or, "You detect that, Watson? A mix of Downy Unstopables with Snuggle Scent Booster. Fresh scent and Blue Iris Bliss, unless I miss my guess. The occupants clearly are using extraordinary means to cover odors in their laundry. Come to the dryer vent, Watson; the game's afoot!"

Mostly I find it amusing when a family's laundry announces itself as far as the sidewalk. And a little relieved. In this quarantine era some people are getting a punchy, and might be wearing the same sweats for a couple of weeks. Let's keep our focus, people!

Alternate world products.

When I was in the hospital, and checked into my room (so to speak), I was given a little courtesy bowl full of things to help keep up appearances. Soap, toothpaste, toothbrush, antiperspirant, etc., all branded with names you never heard of, like they dropped in from an alternate world. Yet I was very pleased by this. I had heard from an unlucky traveler who was injured abroad that in Romania the hospitals don't even feed you; if you want to eat, your family has to bring you food. (Since she was traveling alone, this put her in a sticky situation, as you might guess.)

I wasn't allowed to shower, with my back in such awful shape, but I definitely used that toothpaste and brush. And I have to tell you, it was the second nastiest toothpaste I ever tried.

Freshmint was the "brand," and I use "scare quotes" because I doubt it ever finds its way onto American shelves. I think it is sold particularly for hospitals and other institutions, and the little tubes can be purchased online in bulk. The label said it was made in India. Perhaps our Indian friends have different preferences in toothpaste flavor. This tasted like mint-flavored cardboard. But it was much better than nothing, and better by far than the awful Burt's Bees crap I paid money for.

The little soap I took home; there were soap dispensers at the bathroom sink, so I never used it.

"Freshscent"

Ditto the antiperspirant; I figured it would be thrown away if I didn't take it, so why not? A memento of my little sojourn.

How do they smell? Like the hospital. That is, I think all the ambulatory patients, and probably half the staff, use this stuff for the same reason I took it -- otherwise it would go to waste. So it makes sense that the whole place would smell like this and not, say, Dial or Axe. It's a pleasant enough scent and not overpowering, like baby powder. Oddly enough, the Freshscent products seem to be made in the USA, although the branding is quite similar to the toothpaste. There are questions about the supply chain that can only be answered by distributor New World Imports, and I haven't time to pester them right now.

Finally, there was the shampoo, or shall I say baby shampoo and body wash, which tells us what we ought to know about shampoo -- that it too is soap:

MedSpa does not come to us from NWI, but rather is a product of Medline, the company that makes Curad bandages and plenty of other medical supplies. This made-in-the-USA shampoo/soap smells pretty good too, a sort of generic soapiness, like a slightly stronger bubble-wand soap. It's just OK, but it got me clean, and after four days and change without a shower that's the key to quality, you ask me.

So that's my experience with hospital loot. I never opted for a pair of the grippy socks, nor did I try to take the charming split-back gown home. I never get invited to those red-carpet events anyway.

Lack-of-summertime blues?

Feeling low as we slump to the end of February? Tired of winter in this northern hemisphere? Wishing for a hint of summer?

Let's go shopping!

Things have certainly changed since the days when Doritos and Fritos were the closest thing one could get at the supermarket to a tortilla chip. There are a lot of good brands out there now, but of course Late July was chosen for its name, a name specifically created for thoughts of summer. The company puts it this way: "Late July is the sweet spot of summer. It’s a moment in time when life is simple, pure & good. It’s also our name and philosophy on snack making."

I suppose that's okay, although as a child I would have said that late July was a disaster because summer was half over, and if we were going somewhere fun we had probably been. August was a hot stretch of boredom tainted with growing fear. But their point is taken and the snacks are good, even if they are organic. Are they really "restaurant style" as advertised? Sure, but that always depends on the restaurant.

We're not just here to talk about food, though. Let's go to the can!

Target keeps changing its house brands. A couple of years ago they introduced a new line of inexpensive personal-care products called Smartly. Intelligence, despite being in low supply, seems to be in higher regard these days, and I guess it's smart to be a skinflint. The company said, "A product that gets the job done but doesn’t cost an arm-and-a-leg? That’s smart. A whole line of products that are effective, stylish and unbelievably affordable? Now that’s Smartly, Target’s new essentials and personal care owned brand perfect for a budget-conscious and space-constrained shopper."

I don't see how my can of shaving cream does anything to save space, but for a buck, it certainly saved money. What caught my eye was not the price, but rather the scent -- not "Ocean Breeze" or "Sea Escape" but "Smells Like the Ocean." Pretty straightforward. As the site says about its attributes:

rich, soothing lather

moisturizes and protects

light ocean fragrance

all skin types

Okay, well, I can't say it's good for all skin, because I only have one. Its lather is not really very rich and is not particularly soothing; I don't find it to be very moisturizing or protective, either. But smell like the ocean? Yes, yes it does.

I know that can mean many things, from the brisk scent out in international waters to a fish stink at a barnacled broken-down dock, but it's probably just what you'd imagine: A sea-salt fresh-air breeze. Puts you right on the beach. And that'd the summertime beach, because in the cold weather you don't get much of an ocean scent, and you're probably staying away from the beach anyway. I sure am. So I call it a summertime callback product.

Of course, there are other places to be at the seaside in summertime, like:

This is Scent Theory's Summer Boardwalk hand soap.

"The Theory of Scent shapes our lives," says the company site. "It affects our mood, evokes memories , and makes us feel ENERGIZED, CALM, REFRESHED, HAPPY. A moment of pure indulgence in every pump." Pretty strong words for a product I got in Walmart!

Like "ocean," the word "boardwalk" may evoke different scent-memories to different people. Sea breezes. Sausage and peppers. Zeppole. Sweat. Corn dogs. Unwashed carnies. Small-child vomit. But that's not the direction Scent Theory chose to go, thank heaven. "Revisit the carefree SUMMERS abundant in cotton candy and sunny BOARDWALK adventures. Indulge yourself in something special." They love that CAPS button at Scent Theory!

This soap is definitely different. It's pretty much all cotton candy. Nothing wrong with that. It is a fun scent, and it's not cloying, and it not so strong as to make people think you've been strangling clowns. I haven't had cotton candy in a long time, but this brings back some nice memories. And no, not about strangling clowns.

If none of these things help you through the February blahs, take heart -- February's almost over, spring is less than a month away, and in my slice of New York there's daylight at six a.m. and at six p.m. Keep the faith!

Smell like the King.

A few years back I told you how you can smell like the Boss. And I've even told you how you can smell like the President. But now we're going far beyond that -- how to smell like the King.

Today is the last Sunday of Ordinary Time in the Catholic church, the end of the Liturgical Year, and on this day we celebrate the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe. And today I have his soap. Sort of. Not really.

Indigo Wild sells a variety of goat milk soaps in the Zum Bar line, in weird scents that include Juniper-Fir, Clove-Orange, and the inevitable Patchouli-Ylang Ylang. But they also sell this, the Frankincense-Myrrh.

Myrrh is mentioned several times in the Bible, sixteen times in the New American Bible (rev. ed.), reflecting its importance as a valuable resin, used for medicinal purposes and also as incense and a means of anointing the dead. Frankincense is similarly used for incense. Matthew 2:11, relating Jesus's birth, states

and on entering the house they saw the child with Mary his mother. They prostrated themselves and did him homage. Then they opened their treasures and offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Thus, the gifts of the Magi are forever joined with the narrative of the Nativity.

Now, I've been curious about these gifts since I was a boy and learned all five verses to "We Three Kings." I knew what gold was, but what were these other substances? The verses explain their threefold purpose in the threefold purpose of Jesus, as king (gold), deity (frankincense), and sacrifice (myrrh). But what did these two weird nouns refer to? And how did they smell? You can't get that out of an encyclopedia.

Well, I still can't tell you how they smell individually, although I wanted to at least get a clue. I winced and paid the price to buy the Zum Bar, which cost more than a bundle of Zest bars. And before I got home, I can tell you this: As substances refined for burial of the dead, who famously do not smell like a bed of roses, they work pretty darn good.

Not that I had any dead with me, but that little bar of soap, way in the hatch of the car, could be detected from the driver's seat. It's not unpleasant, but it is powerful. Pungent is one word. "Deep, sweet, and woodsy aromas" is how Indigo Wild describes it. I'd say it is a woodsy, peppery scent, spicy, sugary the way maple is, but rich and fruity. It put me in mind of the resin in logs when Dad and I would cut up the ol' firewood, but a billion times stronger. As I write it is wrapped in the plastic bag from the store, and you can still smell it when you walk by. Try that with a bar of Yardley.

Frankly, I'm afraid to use it. I don't think people would smell me go by and think, There's one biblical dude! I think they might think I was dead. Or that I'm a serious dead head, trying to cover up the Mary Jane stink. When I was a teenager, that's the only thing I ever saw incense used for. The Zum Bar Web site doesn't really assure me that potheads with money are not their primary customers.

So maybe I'll actually try a shower with it one day that I'm not leaving the house. Even then I'm afraid the dogs will not recognize my smell under all that and go for my throat. Then I might be dead! And I'd be pre-anointed, so I'd have that going for me.

One last note: Jesus did not use myrrh as soap, or perhaps at all. It's suggested by some that the gifts Mary and Joseph received from the Magi were used for money, for the years in which they hid from Herod in Egypt, but we don't know. Also, there's not a lot of descriptions of bathing in the New Testament (not counting baptism), but the one time we see Jesus anointed with expensive oil during his ministry, it contains nard (according to Mark 14); nard, or spikenard, is said to come from the plant Nardostachys jatamansi, not Commiphora abyssinica like myrrh or Boswellia like frankincense. When Jesus had died, the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) say nothing about his body being anointed, and in fact that's why the women who found the empty tomb on Sunday were going there. But John 19 says "Nicodemus, the one who had first come to him at night, also came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes weighing about one hundred pounds," and Jesus was bound "with burial cloths along with the spices, according to the Jewish burial custom." Just FYI.

Washing the dog.

Little dog Nipper, who is only just over a hundred pounds, is pretty well behaved at the groomer and can get a bath and haircut, no problem. Big dog Tralfaz, who is larger, has gotten panicky there, and the last time we tried to bring him in he displayed such powerful anxiety that they could not do anything with him.

Most groomers really don't want to work on dogs as big as Fazzy. Hell, I don't either. He'd never bite, but he will try to run, which can still hurt you, and could hurt himself.

But regardless, I have been in charge of bathing him until such time as we can find a groomer willing to work with him. My wife is in charge of giving him trims. She keeps his fuzzy feet from looking like old-man slippers, gets the knots and tangles off him.

Here are the steps I follow for giving Tralfaz a bath. Maybe you'll find it useful if you have to bathe a 130-pound dog.

1) Change into old clothes. Yes, an 1906 cutaway suit and spats would be nice. Failing that, old T-shirt and sweats and socks that look suspiciously like a hole is fixing to bust out. And boots.

2) Set up porch. Towels, bottle of water, showerhead attached to the hose (make sure the water in the hose is not hot after being in the sun). Move flower pot -- we don't want him to come back dirtier. Shampoo. Scissors for any surprise tangles. Grooming leash (a.k.a. choke collar). By now the dog knows something is up, but fortunately he is too big to hide.

3) Bring out Scrubby mitts too, and the new dryer, and treats, and mesh sponge, and brushes, and comb. (This dog needs more product in the shower than my wife does.) Then try to brush out as much loose hair as possible. My dog manufactures hair like General Mills manufactures Cheerios. This part could take a while.

4) Take dog down to yard to pee and maybe -- yes, score! Get that poop out now so that he will be able to keep that behind clean as long as possible.

5) Remove collar, flea collar; put on grooming collar. Wet down the dog. Dog does not appreciate getting wet. I thought dogs liked getting wet?! Not this dog. Starts trying to pull away from grooming leash, which is tied to porch and may bring down the whole porch roof. Tries to shake off water. This is why I wear old clothes.

6) Shampoo dog thoroughly, from neck to tail, as directed. This is like bathing a 130-pound toddler who hates baths. Keep at it. Remember: He stinks. We're doing this for the health of his skin and coat and the fact that he has to be around others tomorrow and we don't want them to faint when they smell him. Once he's somehow all soaped up, get at the tender bits with the Scrubby mitts.

Now we pause for this commercial and distasteful message. Friends, I receive no sponsorship from the makers of Scrubby, but I endorse them strongly. These disposable mitts contain their own gentle soap, so when you get them wet you can clean your canine chum with them safely. You don't even have to rinse them off, just wash and dry. They could replace bathing entirely for small dogs, but I think my guys still need a bath. However, they are excellent for getting up around Tralfaz's face, down around his Mr. Winkie, and especially around his butt, where the hair sometimes collects (distasteful part) dried poop. The Scrubby allows me to dampen that hair and (usually) remove it with no pain to him, then dispose of the cleaning mitt in the trash. Sadly, this time I pulled at the hair too hard and he freaked out. That's on me, not Scrubby.

Where were we? Oh yes:

7) Calm down freaked-out dog with a treat.

8) Rinse, which is more water and he still doesn't like it, ensuring him in happy voice that it's almost over (which comes across as the "blah blah blah Ginger" of Far Side fame, no doubt). When it looks like the soap is gone, turn off the water and let him shake to his heart's content.

9) Dry off with approximately 87 towels.

10) Brush the damp hair; remove more loose hair. Try new dog hair dryer with attached brush. Find it getting stuck in his hair. Call wife urgently.

11) Try to make self useful as wife demonstrates that the hair has to be combed first. Bring in damp towels; start load in laundry with bleach or Lysol Laundry Santizer. (They're too wet to burn.) Throw away old Scrubby. Bring in showerhead, shampoo, etc.

12) Marvel at how dry the Mrs. got the dog, who is looking happy and clean and very, very tired now.

13) Walk baby dog Nipper, who is extremely jealous at this point.

14) Go hide somewhere until the pain wears off enough to take your own damn shower.

Big words.

Okay, watchers of packaging and cultural trends: What's the difference between these two products?

The answer, of course, is nothing. These liquid hand soap bottles are from Colgate-Palmolive's Softsoap, part of their slightly elevated "luxury" line -- you can tell by the silver tops -- and they contain the same jasmine-mint scented soap. The only difference is, the one on the right is the new bottle redesign.

I'm always interested in changes to packaging. Every now and then a company will decide to refresh its look, catch the consumer's eye that is used to being glazed as it scans the shelves. "Is that something new? No, it's just that Softsoap. I like that new bottle." And into the cart we go.

It's always interesting to see how the same idea is expressed in different ways. This is, as I say, the lux line, and until recently, rich but subdued colors and handwriting font were the way to express that. Now a burst of foliage and big capital letters are the way to go. The old one looks more elegant, but the new one is assertive without being tacky. They each have their charms, but as a representation of what's in the bottle? I guess either is fine.

I've noticed that this kind of big block lettering has gained in currency lately. I think it's a sort of mid-century retro, although I couldn't tell you the fonts or when they were originally popularized. They represent a kind of confidence and clarity that seems lacking in our modern age, which may be why it's appealing to designers. Life is messy, and you feel like it's a race between you and the country to see which one goes all to hell first? Look here. This soap knows what it's about. This soap is solid... even though it's liquid. This is real. To say all that would be pretentious twaddle, but to express it in art makes it feel true.

Another example of what I mean is our old refreshing friend, Fresca: 

Fresca's had a lot of looks over the years, trying to be fresh, or fun, or healthy, or energetic -- whatever the most valued aspect of a grapefruit soda might be at the moment. Here's the original, found online:

That's a great mid-sixties look, fun and young and new. The 2018 one looks more centered, more meaningful, because of the letters (and the "est. 1966," like it's a family business rather than a Coke product).

I think the new look probably started with artisan companies, outfits who started up in old warehouses or manufacturing plants (or wanted to act like they did), designing logos to look industrial but independent. Look at Jones Soda and TOMS and Mrs. Meyer's, for example. Snarky but earnest. Now the look has spread up the line -- it will be thought of as the Look of the 2010s one day.

So the time has come. It's up to us to be confident, meaningful, solid. Now we have to live up to our soap, to our soda.

We can do this! Who's with me?

Cleaning up this town.

Need something superhero themed to amuse the kids? This looks like a job for SUPERMARKET!

Tucked in with the Mr. Bubble and the Johnson's Baby Wash is Crazy Foam, an aerosol body wash/shampoo/conditioner that I vaguely recall from my childhood. Apparently it went away in the 1990s, but is back now and as much fun as ever. Maybe more!

Well, everyone's in love with Wonder Woman again, following the success of the feature film earlier this year. Let's try that one.

Uhhhh....I know comics are what they are now, but that's a lot of cleavage for a product meant for the preschooler crowd. At least I think it is meant for the tots among us. That big hole where the mouth should be---I mean, I know I have a tendency to see potential Rule 34 situations, but the thing looks like it was the design for a prurient inflatable doll, IYKWIM (AITYD).

Well, let's try the soap. 

Okay, well, the soap isn't helping.

For the record, as an adult the soap is not so great. It is missing some key ingredient (sodium laureth sulfate, perhaps? It has sodium lauryl sulfate, though) that makes you feel like you're getting clean, although once done you actually do feel clean. I have no idea what I just said either. It's like with glycerin soap; gets you clean but without the lather you feel like you have to work twice as hard. For the kids, though, it's perfectly adequate to get the little stinkers clean. As Fran Lebowitz famously noted, "Even when freshly washed and relieved of all obvious confections, children tend to be sticky." Well, giving them some Crazy Foam might make them more eager to wash themselves, so that's something. Plus, it smells like bubble gum, which---

Uh-oh! Wonder Woman! What's wrong! She looks sick! Quick, the toilet's right there!

Phew. Another close call for Wonder Woman!

Now, in fairness, this Wonder Woman is a tie-in to the upcoming Justice League movie; you can get a less-cleavagey Wonder Woman from Crazy Foam's "DC Comics Originals" line, which features the characters as they tended to look in the 70's.

The Joker seems like he's really enjoying this gig, though, doesn't he?

Next time we'll see how supermarket life embarrasses other superheroes. Spider-Man string cheese, perhaps?

I guess that's not so bad, unless Peter Parker is lactose intolerant. But it does make me think of him shooting cheese from his webshooters, which... No, never mind.

Hope soap?

We all want to do nice things, right? Except for those people, and you know who they are. The rest of us want to be sweetness and light all the time, except when people are on our last nerve and we're having a day. Or it's Monday.

But let's assume most of the time we want to make a positive impact in the world. And it's Holy Week, so we want to holy up. There are so many good things we can do. We can even help others by making charitable shopping decisions.

Really? Is that just soft soap, or can we shop our way to a better world?

Soapbox Soaps says we can.

Soapbox's array of hand soap, body wash, shampoo, and other cleansing products uses your purchasing dollars to fund a variety of charitable projects in various parts of the world, including the distribution of soap to the soapless. Anyone familiar with the scourge of cholera knows that handwashing is more than just a means to avoid the common cold; it saves lives.

Here's a list of charities they support. One of the neato features is that you go to the Soapbox site and plug in a code on the package to see exactly where your support went.

This made a contribution to Sundara Soap Recycling in Mumbai,
which turns used hotel soap into sanitized soap for the masses.
Anyone who's ever been around us masses knows we need soap.

So when you spend $4 for a bar of soap that would normally cost a couple of bucks, you know that in addition to getting a good quality soap, you're helping someone somewhere.

OR ARE YOU?

Serious economists have wondered about the shop aid model; the buy-one-give-one used by TOMS shoes has been a matter of some study. Concerns have ranged from the provision of inappropriate footwear for local conditions (a concern TOMS addressed) to the need for things even more basic than shoes (food, medicine, shelter) to the destruction of the local economy by massive giveaways.

These were issues addressed also in economist Dambisa Moyo's eyeopening 2009 book, Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa. Everyone was familiar with horrible warlords hijacking aid to the poorest, dictators who skim charitable donations or just take it all, and whatnot, but Moyo also gives a sound illustration of what happens to the local economy even when things go right. She gives a hypothetical example of an African manufacturer of mosquito nets who is driven out of business when a Hollywood star arranges to send 100,000 nets to Africa. The manufacturer is driven out of business and his employees turned into charitable dependents. And "in a maximum of five years the majority of the nets will be torn, damaged and of no further use" and there will be no one around making new ones.

There's no question that the TOMS people and similar outfits want to help the world's poorest; there is a great deal of question over how it can really be done. As Dennis Moore discovered on Monty Python's Flying Circus, "this redistribution of wealth is trickier than I thought."

And I don't have the time to even address the charities who mostly seem to be in business to help their officers. 

I don't want to single out Soapbox, who really do make a nice product and may have learned to avoid some of charity's traps. But from a layman's perspective, based on what I've read, it is extremely difficult to lift the people of another country out of poverty. The farther the country has sunk into chaos, the less likely it can be helped. Efforts to help can backfire in any number of ways, including by accidentally empowering those who cause or exacerbate the chaos in the first place. I am probably as helpless to aid the starving in Somalia as I am to punish the bastards who blew up Egyptian Christians on Palm Sunday.

The most useful charitable donations tend to be cash donations for emergency aid (don't send food or blankets or other things unless asked). And check out organizations at the Better Business Bureau's Give.org before you donate. Some good pointers can be found here as well.

Personally, I think some of my best charitable giving is when I don't indulge in anger or irritation at the people in my proximity, but rather try to change my attitude to one of helpfulness and kindness. No one wants to be a Mrs. Jellyby. It's a lot easier to throw money at people far away than to be nice to those who are bugging me. And it's Monday, too.

Bathroom sads.

This kind of thing always makes me a little sad. 

When you have to have a little bottle of hand soap instead of having soap in the dispenser. What could this mean?

I see three, not independent possibilities. Either someone has failed to get refills for the dispenser; they are unable to get refills for the dispenser; or the dispenser has stopped working. Any of these is bad tidings.

When a restaurant, shop, or other establishment falls down on the soap job, it's bad tidings. Covering up by getting a bottle of hand soap at least shows responsibility, but there's a reason that only very highfalutin joints avoid the wall-mounted dispenser: people engage in petty larceny. Plus, those bottles don't hold that much. If this bathroom is busy, that soap is going to vanish, one way or another.

It's worrisome too if the dispenser is unfillable or busted. It takes commitment to manage things at times like these; lacking such commitment, you wind up with a permanent ornament of dysfunction wedded to the wall, or a bracket where it used to be, which is just one of those signs that no one gives a damn anymore.

Maybe I'm overly sensitive to this, but I've done my tours in public schools. I know what not giving a damn looks like.

This bathroom has not reached the critical stage yet, not by a long shot. The towel dispenser still works---and still has towels! The lock on the door functions. The toilet flushes and is not repellent. There are lightbulbs. This soap bottle situation may have just been a temporary expedient while supplies are delayed or something.

Still, you have to beware the little things. First you have a nonworking dispenser; next, you're drying your hands on your pants; then the toilet itself performs a knockback feat when you walk in because of its state of grunginess. It's easy for this stuff to get out of hand, and it generally starts with the hand soap.

Smell like Bruce.

I came upon an interesting bit of disputed trivia, about Bruce Springsteen, the Jersey Shore, 1960s teenage boys, soap, and maybe Star Trek.

As Springsteen fans know, his first real band when he was a short, skinny teenage dork in Freehold, New Jersey, was called the Castiles. Brucebase reports that the band played at least 115 shows, and also made some recordings.

The site also reports that the band was named "after a brand of soap." Peter Ames Carlin, in his book Bruce, said the name of the band was a "tribute to Castile shampoo, the brand local teams seemed to favor".

They're both right and wrong, I think.

Castile is not a brand of soap but a kind of soap; as Webster's tells us, castile soap is not made from animal fat, as many soaps are, but is "a fine hard bland soap made from olive oil and sodium hydroxide" or other vegetable oils, originally associated with Spain's Castile region. Back in the 1960s there was not quite the preponderance of soaps that there is today, and certainly nothing like the vast variety of shampoos. I found precious few trademarks on the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office site using the name "castile" that dated to that era. So who was making castile soap when the Castiles began playing in 1965?

Kirk's Castile Soap, made with coconut rather than olive oil, has been around since 1839, and is still around today. I suspect this was the soap that the boys in the Freehold area liked, and it would have been perfectly acceptable to use it as a shampoo too. (Pace Carlin, although Kirk's makes a shampoo now, but I would guess that they didn't fifty years ago.)

Bottom line: If I'm right, you can find out what Bruce and his buddies smelled like in 1965 by buying some Kirk's. I got this bar at Walmart.

Is it worth the effort? Well, if you're into non-animal-fat soap, I suppose this is a good option. It's not expensive; it's a nice, soft soap, feels pleasant on the skin, and doesn't seem to be any more drying or less effective at cleaning than your average bar soap. The scent is mild, not perfumey, and not at all coconutty, at least to me, so you don't smell like a big piña colada as you mosey down the boardwalk.

As for the Star Trek thing: I was just imagining if the Castiles had actually used the brand name rather than the type of their favorite soap, and called themselves the Kirks. In 1965 they might have sounded like a religious folk group from Scotland. But in September of 1966, they would have sounded like Star Trek fanatics. And they kept playing until 1968, so the name might have grown uncomfortable.

I guess they could have changed it to the E Street Band or something.

Another story from the bargain bin.

This is an interesting soap product.

Yes, it is a hand soap meant for children, and is by Kandoo. It popped up a basket of sales at the grocery store. My mission: Make an uneducated guess as to why.

I can say a couple of things in its favor right off. First, there's no dadblasted Disney character present. Although the turtle on the label looks like a bit like a cartoony Teenage Mutant Ninja type to me.* The bottle, a friendly shade of green, is shaped like a happy frog, so they have all your amphibian needs covered. The spout and the soap itself are purple, the soap being a lighter colored foam. Essentially they came up with an eye-catching kids' product that used just purple, green, and white instead of the usual panoply of colors that looks like clown barf.

The base of the bottle is wide and thick, which is very helpful for the tykes. Those who have to reach up high to get to the top of the sink, and approach the bottle at a bad angle, are as likely to send the bottle flying off the vanity as they are to get some soap out of it. This makes it as easy as could be hoped for a kiddie pump bottle.

I'm sure they product-tested the squirt soap on the little squirts, but I find the scent rather odd and hard to place. Sort of like Miscellaneous Berry. It supposedly contains fruit extracts, so that's exactly what it might be. When I wanted extra cleanliness and mixed a handful with some Purell, the combined scent was powerfully reminiscent of beer wort from fruity homebrews. Haven't smelled that in maybe fifteen years, but it took me right back.

It is an odd soap in other ways. I find that the color stays on the towel if you don't rinse off properly, but that's not a bug, it's a feature---the idea is to teach the kids how to wash their hands. I guess I need some rinse reminders myself. The color comes right off in the wash, so don't worry about staining the good guest towels.

I think it may have wound up in the bargain bin just as a sale, to drum up interest in the product, and I hope so. Hoover's says the parent company, Nehemiah Manufacturing of Cincinnati, is a smallish outfit of $27.3 million in annual sales---a plucky David compared to the self-care Goliaths that fill our supermarket shelves. So if you have little kids, or even if you don't, try the Kandoo soap and see if you like it too. And if you are a homebrewer, try the Purell thing and let me know if I'm right.

---

*As it turns out, it's Captain Clean, a super-strong frog.

Dial up the terror!

Oooooh! Scaaaaaaaaaary!

Okay, maybe not too scary. This is Dial's Halloween hand soap, in non-Halloween scent. It has a very nice scent, I should say, but it's just a foaming hand soap, not, say, a pumpkin-scented or burning-leaf-scented or candy-corn-scented soap. This doesn't quite make the cut for the Great Lileks's "Pumpkinification of Everything" that he's been running through October, as there's no pumpkin flavor; also, he's focusing mostly on candy and snacks.

The Dial bottle is disappointing enough. It's certainly got nice art, and the standard Dial foaming soap bottle shape gives it a more pumpkiny look than many other seasonal pumpkin-themed products. The problem is, it is supposed to be glow-in-the-dark. Twenty minutes of light supposedly fires up the glow-in-the-dark outline of the spooky face. Look out! Could scare the kids!

Well, here's my artist's impression of what it looked like in the dark:

And it thereby fulfilled a longstanding tradition of non-glowing glow-in-the-dark products for Halloween.

It's important to keep these holiday traditions going from one generation to the next. In November we'll focus on your aunt's dry turkey and watching your school lose on Homecoming Day.

No soap Daddy-o..

"Yeah, I was big and strong once, too. Don't be cocky."